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Mark Zuckerberg Says Facebook's "Real Name" Policy Should Work For Trans People

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has reaffirmed that the company has no plans of changing their "real name" policy, which requires users to supply their legal name to eliminate "anonymity," as Facebook spokespeople have stated in the past.

Related: Facebook Banned Another Innocent Gay Kiss For “Violating Community Standards”

Zuckerberg maintains that this aspect of Facebook should work for trans people who wish to use the name they, themselves, have chosen.

During a Q&A with the public on his Facebook page earlier this week, the multi-billionaire CEO articulated this matter, stating that the policy is meant to keep users safe.

We know that people are much less likely to try to act abusively towards other members of our community when they’re using their real names. There are plenty of cases–for example, a woman leaving an abusive relationship and trying to avoid her violent ex-husband–where preventing the ex-husband from creating profiles with fake names and harassing her is important. As long as he’s using his real name, she can easily block him.

Second, real names help make the service easier to use. People use Facebook to look up friends and people they meet all the time. This is easy because you can just type their name into search and find them. This becomes much harder if people don’t use their real names.

That said, there is some confusion about what our policy actually is. Real name does not mean your legal name. Your real name is whatever you go by and what your friends call you. If your friends all call you by a nickname and you want to use that name on Facebook, you should be able to do that. In this way, we should be able to support everyone using their own real names, including everyone in the transgender community.

However, trans advocates aren't buying it. Last week during San Francisco Pride, a petition for Facebook to remove this policy circulated around the festivities.

Many were urging Facebook users to color their profile pictures with the trans flag in solidarity with the community, using this program to match the "rainbow-ing" many Facebook profiles underwent following the SCOTUS marriage equality decision.

One former Facebook employee, who goes by the name of "Zip" also spoke out against their former employer, saying the company "handed an enormous hammer to those who would like to silence [the trans community], and time after time I see that hammer coming down on trans women who have just stepped out of line by suggesting that perhaps we’re being mistreated.”

 h/t: Towleroad

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