Facebook.
We all use it to share with friends, to promote our books or just chat about writing, but what happens when it goes bad?
I discovered what happens today when Facebook, in all its omnipotent wisdom decided to shut down the official Facebook page for the graphic novel I illustrated, Witch Hunts: A Graphic History of the Burning Times.
According to a very vague message from Facebook, the site breached its community standards, specifically in the area of “bullying”.
The thing is Facebook won’t tell us what constituted the bullying. They just shut us down – even after we made an appeal.
There is nothing on our Witch Hunts page that constitutes bullying, or any other breach. In fact the graphic novel has received nothing but positive reviews from critics, is a textbook in a history program at a US college and is up for a Bram Stoker Award.
Worse still, mine, Rocky Wood’s and Lisa Morton’s Facebook accounts have been temporarily blocked for 12 hours.
Whether the complaint is genuine is now less important compared to the actions of Facebook. To shut down a page without a warning, or better still the opportunity to reply to the complaint – in other words to find us guilty before innocence has been proved – is ironically tantamount to wait for it … BULLYING!
If someone out there has a genuine complaint then let’s hear it. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Everyone is also entitled to have a fair right of reply.
I ask anyone who reads this to share this on your social pages. The only way we are going to get Facebook to change it’s barbaric ways is to let the world know about it.
In the meantime, you can still find out all there is to know about our book at www.witchhuntsbook.com
Here’s Rocky Wood’s thoughts on the debacle http://witchhunts.lisamorton.com/wp/?p=339
Darkscrybe 
FB has been coming under a heck of a lot of fire recently from the #FBrape campaign run by @EverydaySexism (you can follow all the action of Twitter if you're interested about it. In fact, a lot of major newspapers and bloggers have posted online about it too)
I think FB may be in a bit of a vulnerable place right now regarding censorship and moderation of its content.
Of course, none of this excuses the way in which they have closed your page down without sufficient explanation or your right to reply. The two things may not even be related, but I wouldn't be surprised if we see FB partaking in a bit of a blanket ban over the next month or so.
Thanks for your feedback Angeline. Much appreciated. I hope to get a resolution to this soon.
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