Rev. Franklin Graham, the chief of the Samaritan’s Purse Christian ministry as well as the Billy Graham Evangelical Association, is accepting a formal apology from Facebook after the social media company blocked the noted Christian leader, who has millions of people who watch his page, for 24 hours.
The leftist social media company had someone on its staff impose the punishment for a two-year-old post in which Graham supported a state law in North Carolina, his organization’s home, that simply mandated that men use men’s restrooms and locker rooms, and women use women’s facilities.
That law later was killed by progressives in the state who demand that a man who says he is a woman be allowed to use the women’s showers in public facilities.
A report on the situation:
In a statement when the punishment was imposed, Graham said, “Facebook is censoring free speech. They’re making & changing the rules. Truth is truth. God made the rules & His Word is truth. The free exchange of ideas is part of our country’s DNA.”
In an interview, he explained the penalty “just came out of nowhere.”
“All of a sudden we got a notification we’re blocked,” he said.
He noted someone inside the social media company had to go back years to find the post that company officials somehow found offensive.
“It was a personal attack for me,” he said. “I was defending the governor and the legislature on a very controversial bill. It was a good law.”
However, in Facebook’s world, he said, for that “you can be classified as hate speech and racist.”
That would be if you disagree with Facebook’s mandate to promote alternative sexual lifestyle choices.
The solution isn’t complicated, he explained.
“I would hope they would look to the Bible and get some instruction from God’s Word.”
Graham’s original statement: “Bruce Springsteen, a longtime gay rights activist, has canceled his North Carolina concert. He says the NC law #HN2 to prevent men from being able to use women’s restrooms and locker rooms is going ‘ backwards’ … Well, to be honest, we need to go back. Back to God!”
Facebook condemns anyone who doesn’t align with its corporate policy of advocating for “protected characteristics,” including “gender identity” and “sexual orientation.”
Graham pointed out that Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg told Congress some months ago that his company was a “platform for all ideas.”
“His staff hasn’t got that memo,” he said.
Among the thousands of comments was one from Emily Gilmore: “The FB ethics committee is anti American and anti Christian. So when they say you go against the FB standards, they are really saying the opposite, if you are Conservative, Christian, White, a Woman, Patriotic, then FB monitors your every action. Biased, biased, biased.
Graham warned of Facebook’s “secret rulebook for policing speech.”
Facebook’s statement said it made a mistake.
