LONDON – Facebook has blocked the page of anti-Muslim group Britain First and the pages of the group leaders, one week after they were jailed for hate crimes against Muslims.
“[The pages had] repeatedly posted content designed to incite animosity and hatred against minority groups, which disqualifies the Pages from our service,” Facebook said in a blog post Wednesday, March 14, Mercury News reported.
According to the BBC, Britain First’s Facebook page reportedly had more than 2 million likes. The pages of its leaders Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen also had a large following.
Fransen, who last year tweeted out videos showing purported violence by Muslims and was retweeted by President Donald Trump, was found guilty last week of religiously aggravated harassment.
According to the court ruling, she and Golding reportedly targeted homes of people they believed to be responsible for a gang rape.
Formed in 2011, Britain First is a far-right, fascist organization established by former members of the British National Party.
Their objective is to campaign against multiculturalism, based on their belief that traditional British culture is being eroded. And this is quite an irony as reports of the first modern Britons who lived 10,000 years ago show that they had “dark to black” skin.
London’s first Muslim Mayor Sadiq Khan applauded Facebook’s move.
“Facebook’s decision to remove Britain First content from its platform is welcome,” Khan tweeted Wednesday.
“This is a vile and hate-fuelled group whose sole purpose is to sow division.”
Khan delivered a keynote speech at SXSW in Austin, Texas, on Monday, during which he read abusive tweets and death threats directed at him. In that speech, he called on governments to regulate tech companies and for Facebook, Google, and Twitter to do more to prevent the spread of hate speech on their platforms.
“Rather than blaming companies for innovating ahead of regulation, politicians must fix things when the regulation is out of date,” he said.
British Prime Minister Theresa May, leader of the Conservative party, also welcomed the move.