Lush’s social media boycott won’t cut it for big tech
Lush, the trendy cosmetics and soap company, has announced that until social media giants provide a “safer environment for users”, they will close all of the company’s “brand, retail and people accounts” on certain platforms. Given recent revelations from Facebook whistleblowers, this move, which could dent Lush’s bottom line, is laudable.
But this knight in shining bath-bomb, like many top brands, could be doing a lot more to fight against misinformation and promote reliable information.
A NewsGuard report has showed how, through programmatic advertising, top brands inadvertently fund misinformation websites to the tune of $2.6bn a year. Lush might not be one of them, but while brands point out the harms caused by social media, they should also ensure their ad money is spent on promoting sources of reliable and transparent information, not funding the harms they decry