- cross-posted to:
- news@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- news@lemmy.world
This headline was literally my first out-loud laugh of the day. I love it.
Meta has denied directly lobbying on the TikTok ban, but the company spent a record sum lobbying in 2024, including on “Homeland Security” topics. In March 2022, the Washington Post reported that Meta paid a firm called Targeted Victory to push the narrative that TikTok is dangerous to children. And Zuckerberg himself has spent the last five years painting a picture to Congress that his monopolistic company faces great competition, actually, from Chinese companies and more importantly from China itself. This story has served Meta extraordinarily well, as he has been able to distract from Meta’s myriad privacy violations and monopolistic actions by saying it would be worse if China wins. Meta is not a monopoly, he says. It is a company fighting on behalf of America against China and Chinese companies for the soul of the internet.
“Ooh, China bad, don’t pay attention to all the evil we do.” Jackass.
Why is Meta lobbying at all? Why does any private entity have the ear of presidents and congress? This is a fundamental problem with the system as a whole.
The foxes have been in the henhouse for a while. But now they don’t need to hide anymore. The American oligarchy can finally shed its masks and go full-on Russia 2.0.
They want to influence public policy for their benefit.
A large part of politics is balancing the needs of different groups.
That’s fine if all the different groups have a forum where being heard isn’t decided by the size of the donation.