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Stop Bitching About Facebook Messenger

Everybody is freaking out about the privacy settings on Facebook Messenger, but the privacy infringement from your cell phone company is actually way worse.

Photo via Flickr user Marco Paköeningrat

Outrage plays out differently on each of the social networks. Twitter attacks like a swarm of wasps. The onslaught grows until the target submits. Tumblr turns into a sixth-grade slumber party gone awry. Overwrought accusations are hurled back and forth until everyone gets bored and falls asleep. And LinkedIn? I couldn’t tell you. I’m trying to stay away from that shit for as long as I can.

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Facebook outrage is the worst, because it spreads misinformation. Any idiot can post junk about Fukushima radiation poisoning US oceans or lemons curing cancer, and the site displays it with the same neat and credible-looking format it uses for the London Review of Books.

Photo via Wikipedia Creative Commons

Facebook users are ultra-passionate about Facebook, so the greatest outrage is reserved for the site itself. Over the last couple of weeks, Facebook’s users shat a brick over changes to the site's mobile app suite. As of last week, they’re required to use the separate Facebook Messenger app for direct messages. Messenger sets up an exhaustive list of permissions to access your phone, like most apps. This caused a fracas. If you use the site, you’ve probably noticed it.

An AP story that ran almost everywhere debunked the controversy, but that hasn’t slowed the rate of martyrdom-flecked announcements about heavy-hearted decisions to opt out of Facebook messaging.

The furor bugs me, because it’s worse than inaccurate. It’s a massive misapplication of rage against the smartphone. Facebook’s loathsome content policies are nothing compared with the top US wireless carriers, who are driven by an unswerving impulse to keep our networks slow and outdated while bilking consumers as much as possible.

Here are just a few reasons why your phone company is a more worthy recipient of your outrage:

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It Steals Your Money

Where do I begin? Locked phones. Two-year contacts. Termination fees. Those $15 per GB overage rates. If your contract isn't up, and your new smartphone gets smashed or stolen, they team up with the manufacturer to charge you as much as $850 for a replacement. This forces you to turn to Craigslist for a replacement, which ensures more demand for stolen phones. The carriers dominate government: In a sort of corruption Möbius strip, the FCC’s chairman is the industry’s former chief lobbyist, and its current chief lobbyist is a former FCC commissioner. The result? None dare call it racketeering. Facebook might be tacky, addictive, and annoying, but at least it’s free.

It’s Trying to Kill the Internet

Along with its trade association (CTIA), the big four wireless carriers spent more than 47,000,000 of your phone bill dollars on federal lobbyists in 2013. That’s not just so they can ensure the two parties’ obedience to their agenda. It’s also intended to devolve the internet down to a glorified cable TV service by killing net neutrality. They’re preemptively dancing on net neutrality’s grave by throttling users' broadband speeds. Facebook, even if driven by self-interest, deserves a little credit for fighting on the right side.

It’s Why We Have to Settle for Mass Market Apps

At the dawn of the smartphone era, carriers and manufacturers implemented operating systems that saddled our phones with the limited functionality of game consoles. Remember personal computers? They had a fraction of the power of today’s phones, but could use them to save files to a directory or run programs without prior approval. And you could do it all without the censorship imposed by proprietary App Stores. Man, those were the days.

It’s not wrong to criticize Facebook’s disregard for its users’ fears about privacy. The company is tone deaf and creepy. The problem is that Facebook is already a cultural punching bag. The cellular phone industry gets a free pass, thanks to the gobs of advertising money they use to bombard a distracted public.

The Messenger rabble is big and loud enough to get the media’s attention. Its heart is in the right place. Before it’s too late, it should weigh in against the looming internet coup d’état.

Follow Tom Berman on Twitter.