As the inauguration approaches in the US, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been positioning his company for Trump’s second term.

Four years ago, after the riots of Jan. 6, Meta shot Donald Trump on his platform. Now, I present $1 million US for Trump’s inaugurationand Zuckerberg says the tech sector desperately needs “masculine energy” along with a revival of a corporate culture that “celebrates brutality.”

Commented on The Joe Rogan scene podcast in the midst of major social and cultural changes on Facebook and Instagram’s parent company, including the removal of third-party surveys and changing the guidelines to allow for the stigmatization of certain vulnerable groups.

His actions serve to highlight, media experts point out, how the winds of political change can bring more conflict to media — and reduce diversity in an already vibrant tech sector.

Celebrating aggression

One of Zuckerberg’s main talking points was the idea that the corporate workplace has moved away from a certain type of masculinity.

“Masculine power is great, and obviously, people have a lot of it, but I think the corporate culture was trying to get away from it,” Zuckerberg said. about three hours of conversation with Rogan.

“I think having a culture that celebrates a little bit of violence has its advantages which are good,” he added.

This language is important, according to Robert Lawson, an associate professor of sociolinguistics at Birmingham City University in the United Kingdom who studies the intersection between language and gender in the Internet and the Internet.

He said it’s no surprise that Zuckerberg invited so many men, because technology is a largely male-dominated field.

As of June 2022, only 37.1 percent of Meta Platforms’ global workforce were women. Women only make up 25.8 percent of technical positions and 36.7 percent of management positions, according to to data from Statista.

Lawson called this kind of speech a “frustrated right” from men who, for a long time, have been the center of society, and because of the increase in diversity and inclusion, they can no longer feel that way.

“And they’re angry,” he added.

Lawson said the sentiment is growing in the US because of the “type of men” Trump represents.

But what does this kind of statement mean for the future of Meta – its workplace and its popular products on Facebook and Instagram?

Change can lead to ‘slow erosion’ of minority groups

Since the US election, Zuckerberg has been trying to better align with the Trump administration that will come through various social and cultural changes.

Change comes as the Meta prepares He will go on trial in April on the US Federal Trade Commission’s statement that the social network bought Instagram and WhatsApp to break the coming competition.

Joe Rogan’s interview was released just days after Meta announced major changes to its display policies that have been praised by Trump, who said the company has “come too far.”

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The new guidelineswhich will continue to ban insults about a person’s intelligence or mental illness, now make an exception and allow users to make posts accusing 2SLGBTQ+ people of being mentally ill because they are gay.

The company defends them as prioritizing free speech, but even free speech advocates are skeptical of making exceptions that target vulnerable groups.

Meta did not respond to CBC News’ request for comment on the change.

Eliminate various functions, reduce costs

The company also said it would halt many of its diversification and integration projects, sparking controversy among some. Inside, nearly 400 employees responded with a crying emoji to the announcement; some are calling it “disappointing,” according to a report from Business Insider.

The New York Times She also reported that employees were instructed to remove tampons from the men’s restrooms, which were provided to the company’s non-binary and transgender employees.

Lawson thinks these changes will lead to a “slow erosion” of women and minority groups working on, and participating in, Meta’s platforms.

He said that all of this is due to “concern among young people about the distribution of land” and attempts to re-consolidate land.

“I think it’s going to drive the communities that are going to be in line from the right, from dangerous and difficult people.”

The company is also ending third-party reviews in the US, a move that many fact-checking organizations they have criticized.

“If you allow the worst users to thrive on your platform, the most vulnerable people will leave,” said Elizabeth Lopatto, senior writer at The Verge who covers economics and technology.

Believing that the changes at Meta are “motivational” and an attempt to “reduce costs,” Meta says it plans to reduce its global workforce this year.

“You might want to get rid of a certain portion of your staff and you might be able to persuade them to stop being like, Hey, it’s going to be miserable for you now,” Lopatto said.

So what’s going on?

The company is also changing people.

In addition to major contributions to the establishment of the president-elect, Zuckerberg has placed Dana White, CEO of the UFC and a Trump ally, on the board of Meta and removed the head of the company’s policy, Nick Clegg, and Joel Kaplan, a former lobbyist for Republicans. join the party.

“It’s pretty obvious because of all the trips that Mark Zuckerberg has made to Mar-a-Lago, that he has a wish list … so I think there’s a lot of horse trading going on here,” Lopatto said.

Lopatto said this idea of ​​traditional masculinity in the tech space is not new.

Zuckerberg started his career by creating FaceMash (which would lead to Facebook), a site used to test the attractiveness of women at Harvard University.

In a 2014 articleFormer Facebook employee and Mark Zuckerberg ghostwriter Katherine Losse wrote about how the gender dynamics of FaceMash continued with the creation of Facebook, meaning Harvard education that found women made most of the history on the site, and men made most of the historians and producers of the land.

“It (Facebook) was not a very welcoming place for women. And looking at the statistics of different types, it is definitely not like that,” said Lopatto.

As for the future, Lopatto points to what happened on the website of the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase in 2020, as the next step. That year, many employees left after their CEO he promised that the company would not participate in social activities.