Victory! Facebook backed down today and approved the ad for our gay Passion of Christ book. Thanks to good friends, the gay media, and God!
Artist Doug Blanchard was able to get the ad running again today. The book “The Passion of Christ: A Gay Vision” features Doug’s paintings of Jesus as a contemporary gay man in a modern city.
I consider this a win for the power of the people and the press. As Doug said, “We have the best friends in the universe!” We are especially grateful to Tris Reid-Smith of Gay Star News.
"Gay Star News contacted the social networking site for comment, they have reversed their decision and ruled it didn’t breach their guidelines after all. … Facebook told Gay Star News the ad was blocked but they have now reviewed it and decided it doesn’t breach their terms and shouldn’t have been removed" Reid-Smith reported today in the article “Facebook u-turns to allow gay Jesus crucifixion ad.”
Facebook shut down ads promoting the book’s Facebook page on Monday because the image “may shock or evoke a negative response from viewers.” They banned image was “Jesus Goes to His Execution,” which shows the gay Jesus carrying his cross.
In a strange and holy twist, the controversy brought the book even more attention than it would have gotten from the ads. Doug and I are deeply grateful to the many friends old and new who “liked” the Passion book page and invited their friends.
The page currently has 403 “likes,” and about half of them came AFTER the ads were shut down.
It reminds me of Genesis 50:20: “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.”
Facebook didn’t know what it was up against!
You can still show support by "liking" the page that Facebook didn’t want us to advertise: www.facebook.com/GayPassion.
Censorship of social media, especially social media advertising, is a grey area / new frontier with very few laws and legal precedents to govern it. It's the like the Wild West, and we won this round. I found a valuable article about it this week during the battle with Facebook: "The Brave New World of Social Media Censorship" (Harvard Law Review)
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Related links:
Facebook censors gay Passion of Christ ad
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Jesus in Love Blog on LGBT spirituality and the arts
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