Native Americans Get Facebook Pages Removed On Columbus Day For “Fake Names”

creeping bearFacebook is still one of the largest websites and businesses in the world, but the social networking platform has become increasingly irritating for its users, thanks to a number of new policies that have been put into place.

Facebook’s most recent controversy is surrounding its new “real name” policy, which is forcing users to input their government identification information before gaining access to the website.

Many users have complained about this change of policy, and some have even refused to sign back up.  Less than a month ago, Facebook was forced to issue an apology to a large number of drag queens who were blocked from the social networking website, due to the real name policy.

Now, the policy is facing new opposition, this time from various Native Americans who have been accused of using “fake names” on the website.

To make maters worse, these changes actually went into effect on Columbus day, a day which in itself is an insult to native people.

It is not clear whether it was a human or an algorithm that made the decision to suspend the accounts of people like Shane Creepingbear, on the assumption that they were using fake names.  Creeping Bear is the Assistant Director of Admission and Multicultural Recruitment and Enrollment Coordinator at Antioch College, in Ohio.

Just this week, on Columbus day, Creeping Bear had his profile removed on grounds that his name was not real.  Luckily, his followers managed to somehow sway Facebook to reinstate his account.

On Tuesday night, Creeping Bear made his first post after being reinstated, thanking his friends for coming to his defense.

In the post, he said:

Ha! Thank you ‪#‎Facebook‬ for reinstating me! You gotta admit it’s kind of ironic for a n8ive to get booted from the network on Columbus Day. Special thanks to everyone who took the time to raise hell about it!! But the real question is… Who reported us!?!?!!?!!????,? Fess up, I’ve only put ‪#‎americanair‬ and some randos on blast recently. ‪#‎prayingformyhaters‬

Shane’s wife, Jacqui Creepingbear also had her account temporarily suspended during this time, but was reinstated along with Shane’s profile.

Popular on True Activist