Why Facebook DP Change Only For France?

After terror attacks on France, Facebook gave an option to change our profile pictures in a way to show our support to France. If you noticed the pattern, initially people felt "good" when they were changing their profile pictures. Gradually I saw a trend - people were seen criticizing Facebook for being "selective" in its initiatives.

In order to prove their point, some people, pages, journalists etc started posting ghastly images of mass violence from African or Islamic countries and started asking - Why did not FB give an option to display support to "these" countries?

If you think about their reasoning, it appears "correct". Why did not Facebook do it right "every time"? Why "only now"? I think this is a classic case of seeing a glass as "half empty" instead of "half filled".

I think through the profile picture change option, Facebook was giving a harmless means to express grief and solidarity towards a victim nation. If it worked well, it would make sense for FB to do the same next time for other countries also. After all, such activities keep users engaged and it is good for business. But if FB gets mostly criticism and faces a negative campaign against it after this episode; it will not be encouraged to give such options in future all together!

In the event of a humanitarian crisis, if by changing display picture a user feels less burdened; it helps in 'healing'. It does something 'good' even if small or inconsequential in total impact. So I think our criticism for FB does more harm than benefit to this world. Instead of asking "Why only towards France" and in a way insulting French people, or "Why not towards Iraq" and in a way insulting Iraqi people, and spreading negativity at the time of a humanitarian crisis, we should choose constructive feedback like, "I like this feature and hope they give this option even in future."

- Rahul