Spaniel Aid, an animal welfare charity working to discovering houses for spaniels, found itself muzzled when Meta started taking down posts looking for to rehome dogs claiming that they ‘violate community standards’ on ‘regulated goods’ – principally assuming that the posts had been concerning the sale of dogs fairly than adoption.
Now, the scenario has escalated to the purpose the charity is prone to dropping their web page in the event that they make any extra posts about dogs looking for new houses.
“Spaniel Aid uses the social media platform, part of Meta, to tell its 180,000 followers about dogs ready for adoption,” the charity has acknowledged. “Thousands of individuals have had their first sight of a brand new member of the family on Facebook, and have gone on to use to undertake the canine.
“But now Facebook says any further posts about spaniels looking for new homes could result in the page being taken down permanently because posts violate community standards rules on regulated goods.”
“The issue seems to be that Facebook can’t distinguish between the sale of animals and a rescue trying to find homes for rescue dogs”
While Spaniel Aid says efficiently appealed when posts had been taken down previously, however that “it’s increasingly hard to have appeals seen by a real person”.
Spaniel Aid founder and trustee Nicola Kebbell says, “The issue seems to be that Facebook can’t distinguish between the sale of animals and a rescue trying to find homes for rescue dogs. We have tried posting in numerous ways to get past this, but they are removing lots of posts and our page is now on a warning – as are many of our admins.”
She provides, “The most annoying thing is that a fake Spaniel Aid page is still up despite being complained about numerous times, as are some dodgy rehoming groups that we know for a fact have scammed money from people. It is very infuriating and is not helping us to find homes in these tough times.”
As many of the visitors to Spaniel Aid’s adoption web page comes from Facebook, the charity fears that this may depart lots of and dogs unable to discover a new home.
“This is a tough time for animal charities like Spaniel Aid. If we lose our Facebook page and our ability to communicate with our followers and tell them about dogs looking for homes, it could leave hundreds of dogs and their fosterers in limbo,” a Spaniel Aid spokesperson says. “Please Facebook, find a way to recognise that we aren’t selling dogs, and don’t close our page!”
