Facebook will reassess what it defines as hate speech (Picture: Reuters)

Facebook has bowed to public outcry about images promoting violence against women after an internet campaign saw thousands call on companies to pull their adverts from the social network.

In a victory for campaigners, Facebook said in a blog post it would work on training its moderators to respond more quickly to remove offensive images and make the creators of battered and bloodied images of women more accountable.

The social network had previously insisted that it would not remove all disturbing content citing the need to uphold freedom of speech, saying that while ‘vulgar and offensive’ it did not ‘violate policies’ and was not considered ‘hate speech’.



But last night it admitted ‘we need to do better – and we will’ after a campaign by Women, Action & the Media (WAM), the Everyday Sexism Project and activist Soraya Chemaly attracted over 60,000 tweets using the hashtag #FBrape and 5,000 emails in just a week.


Examples of the content include a woman who has been thrown down the stairs with the heading ‘next time don’t get pregnant’ while another showed Rihanna’s battered face with the caption ‘Chris Brown’s Greatest Hits.’

WAM said at least 15 companies had pulled their ads from Facebook, including Nissan and Nationwide UK.

Jaclyn Friedman, the group’s executive director, said it was ‘an international tipping point in attitudes towards rape and violence against women’.

The climbdown marks a major victory for campaigners (Picture: Reuters)

The move comes after pressure piled on Dove to remove its ‘self esteem’ advertising which appeared next to brutal pictures of violence against women.

‘Facebook’s mission has always been to make the world more open and connected. We seek to provide a platform where people can share and surface content, messages and ideas freely, while still respecting the rights of others,’ Facebook said.

‘In recent days, it has become clear that our systems to identify and remove hate speech have failed to work as effectively as we would like, particularly around issues of gender-based hate.

‘In some cases, content is not being removed as quickly as we want. In other cases, content that should be removed has not been, or has been evaluated using outdated criteria.’

The victory for campaingers means Facebook will now change its policy on what it considers ‘hate speech’.

‘If an individual decides to publicly share cruel and insensitive content, users can hold the author accountable and directly object to the content,’ it said.

Laura Bates, founder of the Everyday Sexism Project said the groups would work with Facebook, adding: ‘We have been inspired and moved beyond expression by the outpouring of energy, creativity and support for this campaign from communities, companies and individuals around the world. It is a testament to the strength of public feeling behind these issues.’