Hi katie, I'm really sorry to hear this has happened. It seems that there are a number of websites that dont apreciate the difficulties that transgender people face regarding their identity.

It has come to my attention that as the internet has become a part of the fabric of society that it should be law that websites should respect the liberty of human individuals profiles and regard them as valuable as a human life. The fact that facebook has disabled your account, doesnt it feel like they have killed off a part of you?

I am sure there is someone in the ministry of justice and human rights or the european high court who would know how to approach this.

Much Love

Penny

x

Dear Priminister,

Please spend a minute to read as i feel this is important.

The internet has become a part of everyone's daily life. It has become a part of the fabric of society. Some people spend most of their lives on the internet.
Every day I hear more and more people complain about websites deleting or disabling their profiles and identities. Many people feel that when this happens that a part of them has been killed off. If all of their online identities were deleted wouldnt it be like throwing them into a mass grave?
I think websites should be made accountable to look after individuals human rights and their online identities. There should be some sort of appeal system in law to help protect individuals from this sort of behaviour by websites.
Like high street shops if the website is open to the general public they should accept membership from everyone and respect their liberty.
Maybe someone in the ministry of justice or the European high court would know how to deal with this appropriately.
Many ThanksPenny

I emailed the above message to the priminister

Hi Katie,

I'm left wondering why FB is doing this to you. They have mega millions of members and no matter how rich they are, there is no way they could be looking into everyone of them, so something must have triggered their action.

Assuming you haven't done something outrageously scandalous (and I haven't heard of anything) to draw attention to yourself, I can think of only three possible reasons.

One might be that their algorythms got too many hits on you for things they object to. Maybe too many "friends", or that you are perceived as a spammer for promoting TGS and Frock on their site without buying adverts - suspect this is the most likely.

Or, maybe they had a number of members "report" you as posting inappropriate content. This could be folks biased against TG people, or maybe another Trans person or group who are simply trying to cause you trouble. TGS is pretty free of flaming other TG sites, but that is hardly the norm in the general trans web.

Trouble with companies like FB, Google, PayPal, et al. is they do not seem to feel the need to justify a decision once it has been made.

Best, Mellie

ps, Glad they didn't actually search out your Birth Certificate. That would have been straight out of Orwell.

pps. Wonder if they will work their way down the list of TGS FB Amins to me - I have pages as both my drab/birth name and as Melody.

FYI:

There is a Change.Org petition protesting facebook's treatment of Katie:

http://www.change.org/petitions/tell-facebook-you-are-not-a-transgender-faker

Cut and Paste the above link into your browser and

Sign it!

I can't believe the reason would be because you are TG. If they were to adopt a policy of deleting TG accounts there would be a public outcry and it would do them untold damage.

Where in their rules does it say you must use your legal name? Some of my friends use silly, bonkers names, and change them regulary. Thousands of people use an alias on Facebook. I can't believe this is their policy either. And anyway how do they KNOW this is not your real name?

It looks like someone has reported you, maybe an anti-TG individual or someone who wants to cause problems for some other reason.

Shame on Facebook for acting on this at all, and at the very least for not giving you a fair trial.

Katie is innocent!

xx

I took a look at the Terms of Service for FB and they include:

4.Registration and Account Security

Facebook users provide their real names and information, and we need your help to keep it that way. Here are some commitments you make to us relating to registering and maintaining the security of your account:

1. You will not provide any false personal information on Facebook, or create an account for anyone other than yourself without permission.


2. You will not create more than one personal profile.


3. If we disable your account, you will not create another one without our permission.


4. You will not use your personal profile for your own commercial gain (such as selling your status update to an advertiser).


5. You will not use Facebook if you are under 13.


6. You will not use Facebook if you are a convicted sex offender.


7. You will keep your contact information accurate and up-to-date.


8. You will not share your password, (or in the case of developers, your secret key), let anyone else access your account, or do anything else that might jeopardize the security of your account.


9. You will not transfer your account (including any page or application you administer) to anyone without first getting our written permission.


10. If you select a username for your account we reserve the right to remove or reclaim it if we believe appropriate (such as when a trademark owner complains about a username that does not closely relate to a user's actual name).

I've added the bold italics. 

FB has the right to remove you if you use a "fake" name, but I still think it was a convient way to legally get rid of you, not the real reason.

There used to be a "too much chrome" law in a town where I lived. If you had a 1959 Cadillac Elderado Berlitz, which was nearly 3 tons of rolling chrome, you'd never get a ticket. But if you drove a 30 year old Chevrolet with chromed tail light bezels, the police had an excuse to harass you. Given the number of "fake" names on FB, I think something like this is what happened to you. They determined to boot you for other reasons and this rule allowed them to do it without having to explain or justify their real reason, whatever it actually was.

To Be honest, its a p*ss poor reason by Facebook to do that to you katie. I suspect there is something more to this than FB are letting on.

Anna-Marie xx

Jessica, copy and paste the following into your browser:

http://www.change.org/petitions/tell-facebook-you-are-not-a-transgender-faker

Don't click on it, that doesn't work.

Katie, No one here has any doubt that you did nothing wrong.

At work we have just been notified that we have a stack of revised policies and procedures.

Stick with me, this is going somewhere.

A list of all the new policies was put in the communication book and the revised mobile phone policy was the only one highlighted. Basically we are not allowed to use mobile phones at work, and if we have them, they’re not allowed to be camera phones. Now my manager has always told me that as I am supporting adults with challenging behaviour, I need to have my phone on me, and switched on, when I am supporting our individuals out to the community, so I was a little confused. I was especially confused as our employer has just sent the manager a blackberry phone with, you guessed it, a built in camera! And an internet connection!! When I pointed out the inconsistency and lunacy of the policy I was told this;

No one is actually going to come round and inspect your phone, the policy is only there to use against you if you take a picture and do something inappropriate with it, like posting it on the internet.

On that basis I would suspect that Facebook have used the “Not having used your real name” condition as a simple and convenient way of deleting your account because someone has reported you for something, which might actually be completely unrelated to using your real name.  (If I was a conspiracy theorist then I might even ponder a possible connection to the Google ads fiasco!)

Lets hope they dont delete the petition because we haven't used our real names

You also seem to have a fan page Katie, which is still active, and FB do have a policy relating to multiple accounts too.

Any one of the many other Katie Glovers listed on FB may have taken offense to you?

This is no excuse, I'm not here to defend FB, but what I am trying to say is that they have policies, terms and conditions to make things easy for them. In this case its looking like they're taking an easy option rather than having to use possibly scant resources to investigate something far more difficult, that most likely would have caused them headaches in deleting someones account for a more suspect reason, like being Trans.

Maybe we should all quit FB in protest and look for other networking sites?

Any one have a page elsewhere?

In the last day or so, I've invited two fb contacts to join here. One already has and the other has promised to join.

Not huge, but every little bit helps...

Katie , I have a polocy . NO FACELESS BOOK

                                  NO MY SELFLESS SPACE

                                  NO KRAK LIST

                                  NO EVIL BAY

By the way, I too own a chat forum / message forum - ALL FREE an open to anyone here . P- M for a link

Ellen

Look who the big honcho is at FB. Did you see "The Social Network?" The guy is a total douchebag. I'm sorry this has happened, Katie. BTW, I think saying that you used a "fake name" is an incorrect assumption. Now, if you had signed up to FB as Bonnie, or Agatha, or Simone, yes...you would be guilty of signing up with a "fake name."

But you didn't. Part of your core IDENTITY is female. Part of "you" is actually Katie. Therefore, in every way possible you ARE Katie, as well as whatever "boyname" you might have.

I think this is a fight we must eventually participate in and one we must win. We need to file a lawsuit about this. Maybe I'll send something out to Lambda Legal and see what they think.

Everyone's online life is becoming more and more full, it encompasses more than a single identity for us.

We should have the protection that we need to be happy, even if that means cross dressing.

We need to push back. I'm going to push back.

Joke em if they can't take a ****.

hi katie

if you have used your name other then the one on your birth certificate in official means mail, contracts, and other school and government paper work it becomes a legal name you can use. yes some things will require you to use your birth name but mostly for frod prevention. 

however i em not a law expert, but this is how i understand it.

If they are going to start enforcing the multiple profiles, only use the name on your birth certificate rules then they have to do that across the board. I know of non transgendered people that have multiple accounts, one for their normal everyday life and one for a stage persona.

This article makes it clear that GOOGLE has been doing this a lot lately, especially to businesses doing business "under the name".   William Shatner was kicked off for a while.  I think this article may hold a possible answer for Katie. 

http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/07/25/7161229-google-screwed-up-when-it-cancelled-your-account

Katie, I'm inclined to think someone must have drawn the attention of FB to you. They have so many members. How do they know when someone's used a different name from their birth certificate name, unless someone else tells them?

I don't like what FB have done, and (sadly) I can't see how they can be made to change their mind, so I think I'll just delete my FB account. If you want acceptance and understanding then TGS is the place to be.

Thought you might be interested in this column.

http://ebar.com/columns/column.php?sec=transmissions&article=169

Hey Girls,

you might find that it has to do with using two accounts from one computer and changing back and forth between them. 

I personally have about 5 different accounts and all operate fine but I have to be careful about how quickly I change between them. If it appears to have the same details from one to the next with sutle changes its catches the details and locks you out.

All about being a little savvy with it. My profiles are for totally fictious people who have never existed. 

Good luck with things,

F.

I believe I know the event you are talking about. Or at least one similar to that. There was a case of a facebook TG group where the group owner was sending out a LOT of friend requests, to get everyone who joined the group on her friends list.
Apparently one of the people reported her with the complaint that she was using a false name. That is why the account was dissabled. I find it rather suspicious that it only takes one report to lock a person out of their account. What if you have an acquaintance who decides, for their own personal malice, to falsy report you. Now you end up locked out of facebook and the mean person is grinning at the suffering you now face.

I think facebook has too much power to personally change our lives whenever they feel like it. Unfortunately, it is their network. They write the rules and enforce the policies. I guess the only thing to do is stop using it...

I for one have more than one account, my old facebook account, and my new female one. I've never had any trouble with the network, so I guess none of my contacts have been mean enough to report me, so I'm fine.
Are you still locked out?

:hugz:
Aimée

I was locked out of my facebook  account last year...They  said I was not using my real name....I have a feeling that someone who wanted to be a b*tch did it to me. I am a GG and actually had to prove who was to get my account back...but as of a few weeks ago i deactivated my account...,way tooooooo much drama...and they are constantly changing stuff and it just is not worth the trouble especially for someone who used facebook for only entertainment purposes...It would be different if i used it like you did for business and networking...

I've been on Facebook for 4 years as Vallin SFAS which is not my birth name (but I've been Vallin for 28 years, SFAS for 6; I'm going to celebrate my big five-oh by legally changing it). MOST of my trans-GF's aren't using their birth names. While I don't have any formal business links to Song For All Seasons, it is a group I manage there, and I'm getting links to my LinkedIn account which is also Vallin SFAS. 

This is totally arbitrary and wrong!