#MyNameIs 2 Favorite 

Facebook came under fire when its authentic-name policy led to San Francisco drag queen Sister Roma and others being barred from the social network. The policy allows users to report people they believe are using fake names. This caused a stir when a group of drag performers suddenly found that their Facebook accounts had been deactivated. Among them was Sister Roma, who had not registered on the site under her legal name, Michael Williams.

“I was forcibly logged out and told that I had to enter my legal name,” Roma says. “But nobody knows who Michael Williams is. I don’t identify as that.” She reluctantly entered the name, but after finding that the change wasn’t merely administrative, and that her profile on the social media site now read “Michael Williams,” Sister Roma and others said LGBTQ+ users were disproportionately targeted. Trans people, drag queens, drag kings, and others in the LGBTQ+ community often go by a name that is not their legal name, but one that reflects their identity.

San Francisco drag performer Miz Cracker found herself locked out of her profile while she was onstage.

"I found out that my account had been suspended on Wednesday night, right in the middle of a show, when a fellow queen texted to ask 'Why is your Facebook profile gone?'" Miz Cracker told Slate. "Facebook was letting me know that I had a choice: I could either select a name they liked, or lose touch with the contacts, creative content, and memories that my name has earned me over the years."

Roma took to Twitter, registering her anger with a hashtag: #MyNameIsRoma. “I really just wanted to get Facebook’s attention,” Roma says. “I had Googled ‘How do I contact Facebook’ and all it did was direct me to this little help button. So I went to Twitter.”

Soon, other users were expressing anger about the policy, the hashtag became a rallying cry, and media outlets took notice. “Two weeks ago, I printed out 28 pages of emails from people who were affected by this policy,” Roma says. “That’s when I realized it wasn’t just drag queens bitching about using their stage names. I got emails from bullied youth who had found new identities on Facebook, a political activist from China who said she can’t use her legal name, and a woman who was a victim of domestic violence and didn’t want her husband to find her online.”

With hyper speed, Roma and her cohort, which included San Francisco Board of Supervisors member David Campos, raised enough of an outcry that they were invited to meet with representatives of the company. “By the time everyone introduced themselves and said a little something, the hour was practically up. They were like, ‘OK, thanks for coming!’ And I said, ‘Woah, woah, woah. We’re not leaving this conference room until we have another meeting.’” As Facebook stood by its policy, Roma and other activists encouraged users to change their Facebook profile photos to a purple sign that read "#MyNameIs."

Members of the #MyNameIs campaign group congregated outside Facebook HQ in California to protest the rules embedded within the social media company's policy that says accounts that don't use the name on their birth certificate can be suspended.

"If people want to use an alternative name on Facebook, they have several different options available to them, including providing an alias under their name on their profile, or creating a page specifically for that alternative persona," a spokesperson for Facebook said. "As part of our overall standards, we ask that people who use Facebook provide their real name on their profile.”

It is not yet clear what exactly the company now plans to tweak. But it is clear that Roma and her cohort will be ensuring that the adjustments are made to their satisfaction. “I still feel reservations about the rest of people that are affected by this policy, so I’m hoping that this will help everybody who needs a more inclusive policy,” Roma says, noting that she has opted not to join Ello, the social media site that benefited from what DailyDot called “the great gay Facebook exodus.” “I didn’t join Ello, even though I got a million requests,” Roma says. “I couldn’t leave Facebook—how would it look? I had to stick around and fight the fight.”