Tech biggies condemn racism but Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg retains Trump's controversial post

Racism is an American reality and theongoing riots are holding up a mirror to those in denial, from the streets of America to social media, thousands are joining hands to say enough is enough!

Hundreds of Facebook employees staged a virtual walkout on Monday. They logged in to their systems only to leave a message that they would be out of the office in a show of protest.The employees were unhappy with the action, or rather inaction of the leadership afterCEO Mark Zuckerberg refused to take down Donald Trump's posts.

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Last week, the US president wrote: "When the looting starts, the shooting starts". Themessage was shared on Facebook and Twitter.

While the latter slapped a warning on the post, Facebook left it intact. In a post, Zuckerberg said he is "struggling with how to respond". He said: "I know many people are upset that we have left the president's post up, but our position is that we should enable as much expression as possible."

Facebook employees were quick to voice their disagreement.

Ryan Freitas, who leads Facebook's news feed design team, tweeted: "Mark is wrong, and I will endeavour in the loudest possible way to change his mind."

Similar tweets were put out by other employees.

Jason Toff who joined Facebook last year as a director of Product Management pointed to a broader surge in employee activism.

"We are making our voices heard", he said.

The head of design for Facebook's portal video-phone saidhe disagrees with the position of his leadership.

There was also an intense debate on Facebook's chat system known as Workplace. Some employees argued that Trump's post violated the spirit of Facebook while the others said that Facebook is making concessions for the president.

All of this nudged CEO Mark Zuckerberg to act.

Zuckerberg committed $10 milliondonation to groups working on racial justice. That said, Trump's Facebook post has still not been taken down.

Meanwhile, Google and YouTube homepages in the United States are sporting a black ribbon. CEOSundar Pichai said it was in solidarity with the black community.

He tweeted: "For all those feeling grief, anger, sadness and fear, you are not alone."

Microsoft put out a statement on May 31. The company said that CEO Satya Nadella addressed the issue of racism in a monthly employee townhall.

Nadella himself has been retweeting voices from African American employees at Microsoft.

In one of the tweets, he said: "There is no place for hate and racism in our society. Empathy and shared understanding are a start, but we must do more."