Does Facebook Censor Bongs and Glass Art?
Out of all the social media platforms, Facebook is one of the Ogs of the internet. Not only is Facebook a great place to share and post content, but it is also considered one of the most popular sites for a peer-to-peer marketplace in the form of Facebook marketplace. With over 3 billion monthly users, Facebook marketplace would seem to be the best place to market your own artisan made bongs and glass art! The only problem is that Facebook heavily moderates the depiction, promotion, and facilitation of smoking paraphernalia.
Facebook’s Official Rules on Drug-Related Content
While Facebook doesn’t outright ban glass art, glass art typically falls under content that is prohibited for promotion on the marketplace platform, with Facebook policy stating: “Commerce content may not promote the buying, selling, or trading of tobacco products or tobacco paraphernalia” (source) This unfortunately includes bongs and other forms of functional glass art.
How Facebook moderation systems flag content
Facebook employs a variety of automated systems in place to detect and flag prohibited content such as: computer vision models, text scanning identifies keywords like bong or cannabis, user reporting, and commerce policy filters. If any of these systems detect and flag your postings of bongs or glass art, they work to hide or even remove your posts.
Why Glass Artists and Head Shops Get Flagged on Facebook
Glass artists and head shops get flagged on Facebook promptly for posting functional pieces that are detected as banned paraphernalia, or captions related to the functional use of glass pieces, and especially when their posts are linked to retail activity, which Facebook absolutely brings the hammer down on.
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How Artists Share Bong and Glass Content on Facebook Without Getting Penalized
There is a few sly ways to share bong and glass content on Facebook without getting penalized. These strategies involve working around Facebook's strict policies and automated content moderation by posting glass pieces under an “artistic” context.
Caption strategies that reduce post removals
Any keywords or phrases that relate to cannabis or even just the act of smoking will be quickly flagged and get your post swiftly sent to the shadow realm. You’re going to want to avoid any terms that refer to cannabis or glass functionality. Instead use captions indicative of artistic motivations and style of presentation. Using verbiage that also refrains from any mention of transaction taking place through Facebook will also play safely for the Facebook moderator algorithms.
Page vs personal profile considerations
A page for a business is bound to incur a more critical content review eye. These can be scanned frequently for any type of commerce violations and can easily lose posting privileges if multiple content flags go up at once. A personal profile on the other hand faces a little less pressure of overt moderation. A personal profile’s posting can still be flagged and taken down, but the rate of escalation of penalties (warning, removal, ban) is slower than a public business page.
Image and video content that tends to pass review
Wide shots that capture bong shapes from angles that obfuscate the parts of glass that indicate smoking functionality like the bowl or down stem for a bong. A good alternative to showcasing the art itself and risking a flagging could be to photograph or record the glassblowing process for a piece. If you’re set on getting images of your pieces on display on Facebook, then using backgrounds or environments that evoke an artistic context like a gallery or studio set-up will help your custom glass from being flagged as prohibited.
What Happens If Your Facebook Content Is Removed
Content removal of custom glass and bongs on Facebook can be often due to the platforms stringent content moderation. If a removal happens, you can attempt to appeal your removal by clarifying the artistic context of your custom glass piece. Be wary though, multiple content removals will stack penalties such as a shadow banning or outright account suspension.
Page restrictions vs account penalties
A page restriction will come with the cost of losing your posting ability, an inability to advertising. Meanwhile, an account penalty will involve temporary posting bans, limits on joining groups, or a full account disabling in the case of repeated offense.
Appealing Facebook content decisions
Appealing Facebook content decision is a tough but possible chance to get your content back up. Your only hope is to establish convincingly that your removed glass piece is indeed, “an artistic display of glass crafts, with no intention of sale.” If Facebook even thinks your post was to elicit a transaction, you’ll be totally out of luck.
How Glass Retailers Can Use Facebook While Staying Compliant
Glass retailers can use Facebook AND stay compliant by shifting Facebook’s role from a being used as a sales platform and instead as a site to raise brand awareness. This can be done by avoiding any and all mention of transactional activity on-stie. Use Facebook to promote your glass in ways that don’t highlight it’s functional purposes.
Final Thoughts: Using Facebook as a Glass Brand Without Losing Reach
Facebook is a sprawling platform great for advertising, but downright impossible to actually advertise your glass pieces for sale. For that reason, you should consider useful alternative platforms to get your brand situated comfortably in a position to be sold. Facebook may offer a trickling effect capturing and directing an audience toward your brand, using a industry friendly platform like Giggle Glass proves to be much more convenient, and effective!
