Zuckerberg uses line from Sorkin’s ‘The American President’ to fire back at ‘Social Network’ screenwriter

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg hit back at acclaimed screenwriter Aaron Sorkin on Thursday, after Sorkin published a fiery new op-ed criticizing Facebook’s policy of refusing to block political ads with incorrect or misleading information. 

Zuckerberg released a post on Facebook Thursday afternoon quoting a scene from Sorkin’s 1995 film “The American President” discussing the First Amendment and the freedom of speech.

“America isn’t easy. America is advanced citizenship. You gotta want it bad, ’cause it’s gonna put up a fight. It’s gonna say: You want free speech? Let’s see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who’s standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours. You want to claim this land as the land of the free?” Zuckerberg quoted. 

{mosads} “Then the symbol of your country can’t just be a flag; the symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the land of the free,” he continued.

Zuckerberg has come under fire in recent months for Facebook’s policy on political ads. The company declined to remove an ad earlier this month from President Trump’s reelection campaign that claimed, without evidence, that former Vice President Joe Biden used his office to pressure Ukrainian officials to drop an investigation into a company where his son, Hunter Biden, sat on the board. 

Zuckerberg testified before lawmakers earlier this month and gave a speech at Georgetown University, explaining that he believes Facebook should build policies promoting “free expression.”

Sorkin, who wrote the screenplay for the 2010 film “The Social Network” about Facebook’s founding, targeted both of Zuckerberg’s Washington appearances in his Thursday op-ed in The New York Times. He said he “admires” Zuckerberg’s commitment to free speech, but Sorkin warned that “crazy lies” could be spread on Facebook.

“It was hard not to feel the irony while I was reading excerpts from your recent speech at Georgetown University, in which you defended — on free speech grounds — Facebook’s practice of posting demonstrably false ads from political candidates. I admire your deep belief in free speech. I get a lot of use out of the First Amendment. Most important, it’s a bedrock of our democracy and it needs to be kept strong,” Sorkin wrote in the op-ed.

“But this can’t possibly be the outcome you and I want, to have crazy lies pumped into the water supply that corrupt the most important decisions we make together. Lies that have a very real and incredibly dangerous effect on our elections and our lives and our children’s lives,” he continued.