Whacked By Th FB Ban Hammer

This post is to give you the full story of how I got banned from Facebook recently. So let me start by saying I have screenshot every bit of correspondence between myself and Facebook to be completely transparent with you. Below is a small image Gallery that contains all of those screenshots. You will also see there are screenshots of conversations that I have been involved in using nothing but Elder Futhark runes. I took these pictures to show Facebook its a language and that it can be used to communicate making it a conversation and a language.

The Scoop

So my name has been in Elder Futhark Runes for more than 4 months. And this whole issue spawned out of someone reporting me for my name. Now my full birth name is Richard L. Bishop Jr. In Elder Futhark Runes it looks like this ᚱᛁᚲᚺᚨᚱᛞ ᛚ. ᛒᛁᛋᚺᛟᛈ ᛃᚱ. As you can see my name is my name just in runes. Even my family including my mother and brother have seen my posts on Facebook and are like WTF is Facebook doing? Understand my mother is a devout Christian. And even she supports my right to express myself through my beliefs and religion. Crazy right?

So Facebook’s solution is to ban you as punishment for being fake… Now here is the problem they want to ban people that are real people using their real names but it’s okay to use names that are not real names, and how many bots or fake spam accounts have we seen over the years. I can’t even begin to count the number of accounts I have seen that there are fake accounts.

Actions Taken

Now I previously uploaded a copy of my state-issued ID to verify my account when I opened it. As we all know state-issued IDs are not ever produced in a foreign language. But they want me to upload my id again, to keep my name as it is on Facebook. Question…How will that do anything beneficial? The other option given to me was to just change my name back to English. Yeah, not doing that either as it is my right to represent myself as I see fit as long as it is true and accurate. In this case, my name written in Elder Futhark is true and accurate.

This is not the first time I have been smacked by the Facebook hammer, and as a result, I have read the Community Standards and rules of Facebook so that I could ensure I stayed within the boundaries set forth by Facebook. Now that said, even with my name on my profile being spelled in Elder Futhark I’m still within the “Facebook Community Standards”. Here is a link to the Community Standards for Facebook. As anyone can see I’m well within the standards set by Facebook.

It Will Take All Of Us

Now me being the Norse Pagan I am and has been a practitioner for the last 16 years I am dedicated to my gods, my religion, my beliefs, and because of that I will not back down. With that, I have been banned. Why not just change my name? Because it wrong to be forced to conform. That is the biggest issue in today’s society which I will not get into as that is an entirely different subject. I feel right now like I am David in the Story of David and Goliath.

Will I win, no probably not. But that doesn’t make the fight with Facebook any less important and real. I will continue to make as much noise as I can because I am proud of my religious heritage and my freedom of choice. For Facebook to truly see the problem here and even come close to thinking about changing this decision and the stance on Elder Futhark, it will take all of us, thousands to share this post, the videos I make and have made discussing this issue. Only if we band together will we see this type of hate crime stopped.

Fight the Facebook Ban

With that, I ask all of you that claim to be true Norse Pagans, show your pride, show your dedication to our religion, our culture, and our runes. How? Be proud, scream at the top of your lungs! Share ask others to share, comment, post everywhere, be loud, be proud, and be heard. If you liked this post and video please be sure to hit that like button and share it with others. You can also help by subscribing to our YouTube Channel.

I love you and thank all of you for the amazing support and dedication to not only myself but Old Norse Paganism. May the gods bless you all and keep you safe. You can see the announcement article regarding this issue HERE.

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