Sheryl Sandberg Has 'Done So Much Damage To Our Society,' Argues Writer

The Atlantic's Caitlyn Flanagan writes about how Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg has done 'so much to damage our society that we may never recover'.

About: MSNBC is the premier destination for in-depth analysis of daily headlines, insightful political commentary and informed perspectives. Reaching more than 95 million households worldwide, MSNBC offers a full schedule of live news coverage, political opinions and award-winning documentary programming -- 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Connect with MSNBC Online
Subscribe to MSNBC Newsletter: MSNBC.com/NewslettersYouTube

Sheryl Sandberg Has 'Done So Much Damage To Our Society,' Argues Writer

[yapdog]

It's frightening how so few can do so much damage to American society.

[susan]

I bought her book years ago. and then I heard about who she was. never read her book sand so glad. I also quit Facebook over 1 year ago.

[norikadolmy]

This is so true. Your company doesn't care about you, no matter how many contributions you make or how much you lose sleep over your work. If you dropped dead on the job today, they would have someone in there tomorrow to replace you, ever person is replaceable in a company

[sweetsue]

I finally closed out my FB account on January 6, 2021, when it became obvious that every one of us helped finance and foment the insurrection by participating in FB.

It would feel really good to see FB face consequences for this betrayal.

[sarabeth]

Just stop using FB, Twitter, Instagram, etc. Nobody needs those services.

[paulachampagne]

Recently I noticed that the number of ads has increased dramatically and it seems as if my account is not my own anymore. I have to weed through all of them before I can even read my own feed. Every time I try to contact Facebook they seem to double down on the amount of ads i have to delete. And then they keep sending them back. Apparently the focus has shifted radically from a media platform meant for social interaction to how many advertisers they can satisfy and whether we “like “ the ads. After seeing Facebook become dominated by ads some of which aren’t even legitimate, I’m ready to call it quits. It’s sad that they care so little about the people who use Facebook and that they have turned Facebook into nothing but a sales pitch for things we may not ever want to buy. Several “malicious ads” pretty much ruined my account and Facebook never responded to my requests to stop doing this. It’s just not a safe thing anymore.

[frankwilson]

Because, You'll ALWAYS End Up, Compromising, Yourself!!!!

[gatheringmoss]

She's right about Sheryl Sandberg and Facebook, but "there is no greater joy in life than having a baby"?!?! Her assertion that every older person will always give that same answer is nonsense. And, the reason to have child is to guarantee yourself a lifelong source of love?!?! That's psycho.

[filippofittipaldi]

My friends on the LAPD said "the job is a puta. It can't love you back." Kind of gross, but also true. I believe this is true of all jobs. Even for the owners.

[yurei]

I think they are right, when they talk about the joy that young children bring to their parents lives. But for me was more than just them being babies. It was about them learning about basic things in life, all the way through adolescence.

[jillionairess]

AND YET THEY COMPLAIN THAT NO ONE WANTS TO WORK.

[ruthdepew]

This morning I was playing a game on my phone and it told me I could have an "expanded" version of the game. I clicked the icon and was invited into FaceBook. I clicked my way back out of there. I'll just play that game, the way I always have. I'll not be "expanding" my way into FaceBook.

[themaskedman]

This was the type of piece that sounds right on an aesthetic level despite being almost entirely devoid of perspective. There's no paradox, no conflict, between benefitting the social good and earning a profit. Businesspeople do this all the time, although we tend to hear only about the bad ones.

More to the point, I'm getting a little sick of people scapegoating their political enemies as an excuse for the rampant illiteracy in the American population. Maybe one day someone will pen an article and with the same fury and zeal attack the failed US education system, and then maybe that will be the day I enthusiastically plug an article in _The Atlantic._ Until then, there will only be one culprit whenever someone gets fooled by a baseless meme on social media: no one taught them how to learn. It's our schools who've been entrusted with that responsibility, not social media executives.

[idt]

Only the fools that ever used the platform are the suckers. The rest of us that have avoided all 90% of social media nonsense are collateral damage.

[kathleenodorizzi]

I have been suspicious of Sheryl Sandberg and her motives and positions for a long time, , as well. So, I am relieved someone finally has also noted that her influences may be self-serving and dangerous. She seems to unerringly take advantage of the privilege of her position. I look forward to reading the entire article.

[FinGeeknow]

I'm sure that FB didn't plan for their platform to go the way it has, but due to their engagement-first philosophy when designing the shown-content algorithms, it ended up devolving into what it has. We see this pretty much everywhere though when you perform a one-off search into Google, Amazon, or YouTube and then start getting spammed with content similar to that one-off search you did. The algorithm pretty much sucks since it doesn't take into account the "percentage of similar search terms and results" into account but rather they seem to weigh the algorithm into a "what did you search for last" result. This does nothing but lead people down rabbit holes which they would never have gone down.

Another issue is that these content platforms don't have a "trusted source first" policy, but instead they show ad-related content first (which in of itself is an issue since ads are cheap), then they show promoted content (which basically means that the site/owner paid the company for first page results), before showing content that has the most users going to it (does not take into account site traffic bots or unique page views). Only after those will the site start showing you content related to the actual search terms. For example, at the height of the pandemic when all the misinfo was being released, if someone looked up, "CDC vaccine" the search would take you to the idiots' pages first since they had the most "visitors" before taking you to the CDC site.

[shecalledmelisalou]

Sure blame the only woman at the table……

[jperry]

Can we have morning Mika, so tired of listening to Joe. It's like his sole purpose in life is to let everyone know how much he knows. gag

[CadetBoneSpurs]

Wow Joe I’ll give you credit….you some how manged to weave a great story without ever actually addressing the elephant in the room…capitalism and it’s negative influence….

[MR-xlni]

Earned millions while damaging the society and now want to escape all the karma. Her boss is still making millions but damaging society as we speak. They are making money from the Facebook users.