Bloomberg opinion columnist Parmy Olson discovered a similar phenomenon after the mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde last month. She messaged 10 Facebook users in Texas and Georgia advertising gun cases for sale and “whose listings hinted their title was a pretense: The price was an implausible $1, or they would put the word ‘case’ in quotation marks, or implored buyers to ‘PM me for details’ to find out ‘what’s inside.’” Half of the sellers responded with photos of fully operational semiautomatic rifles and pistols that were apparently the actual product intended for sale.
Instead of cleaning up its listings and enforcing its policy, Meta has aggressively insisted that public reports of gun sales on its platform are overblown — while reportedly allowing gun sellers and buyers to violate the rule up to 10 times before they are kicked off.
Meta spokesperson Andy Stone recently defended the company’s policies against gun content in a statement to The Washington Post: