GAY INFONESIA - Facebook FPI trigger violence or spread the message of humanity? The Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) denied it was spreading hate speech and radicalism, so their accounts on social media such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter should not be blocked.
The group's active accounts held the rally with religious themes that can no longer be found on Facebook on Tuesday (19/12).
What is clear is that FPI -via Da'wah Council Leadership Center, Novel Ba'mumin- said his organization actually spread the message of humanity.
"This is an injustice and irregularity of information received by the media, the media means by social media both FB and others about the existence of FPI, whereas FPI is an organization that has been involved in humanitarian action," Novel told Nuraki Aziz.
Messages from Facebook indicate FPI accounts are closed for violating site service rules, inter alia with closing content statements that support violence and discrimination.
FPI is seen as supporting discrimination against anti-Sharia and Khilafah groups, besides LGBT. The group also invites residents to besiege the Facebook office in Jakarta.
Social media is seen as a number of parties can indeed spread democratic messages, in addition to the antidemocratic. Twitter and Facebook often become powerful platforms for bringing together like-minded people, such as violence or discrimination supporters.
One of them is because the algorithm that is on Facebook for example the observer medsos, Nukman Luthfie.
"The core algorithm is the fun of the user, so if we use our Facebook it's actually, in our time line it's contents that's it.Although we have 5000 friends for example, our time line content is that person-that's it. -content and friends we often respond to, whether we like and we reply or content we share. "
The tendency to use Facebook to convey the message of pressing other groups is not just happening in Indonesia, but also in Myanmar that seeks to discriminate against Rohingyas, for example.
Messages of this kind can actually be counteracted through government reporting and filtering mechanisms.
"Actively, the Indonesian government is trying to force Facebook to do filtering by itself, or if the filtering fails, if the government feels the need to close an account or restrict the content, it can deal directly with Facebook," Nukman explained further.
Islamic social media
One of the steps FPI did after its blocked account was to invite supporters to use medsos that supported Islam.
"We will continue to work for us to be strong, position ourselves to have a strong medium, a media that can fight, counter to government, God willing, there is another way, because we have also used some media we already believe, online media that we already believe, "explains Novel Ba'mumin of FPI.
Facebook is one of the most influential social media in the world, with 111 million active users in Indonesia by 2017, or the fourth largest in the world - according to We Are Social and Hootsuite.
So whether a new platform that supports FPI messages will be able to replace Facebook? Nukman Luthfie doubted it.
"I've never heard of a pro-Islamic platform, all platforms are open, anyone can be in. If anyone is pro-Islam, everyone has always been heard."
"Why are they up to protest to Facebook, yes because Facebook is the most comfortable place to do propaganda, not elsewhere," said Nukman.