Report: Meta Bars Employees From Discussing Abortion Rights
Meta has reportedly barred employees from discussing the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade (and the resulting assault on abortion rights) on internal messaging channels.
The New York Times reports(Opens in a new window) that Meta issued a memo on May 12—after the draft opinion was leaked(Opens in a new window) to Politico—saying that "discussing abortion openly at work has a heightened risk of creating a hostile work environment" so it "would not allow open discussion" among employees.
The company has cited that memo when reminding employees not to discuss the Supreme Court's decision, which was issued(Opens in a new window) on June 24, according to the Times. A company policy is also said to have put "strong guardrails around social, political, and sensitive conversations."
A software engineer at the company, Ambroos Vaes, publicly criticized Meta's restrictions in a LinkedIn post(Opens in a new window) originally spotted by the Times.
"On our internal Workplace platform, moderators swiftly remove posts or comments mentioning abortion," Vaes said in the LinkedIn post. "The 'respectful' communications policy that was put in place explicitly disallows it. Limited discussion can only happen in groups of up to 20 employees who follow a set playbook, but not out in the open."
Meta didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
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