Stated in The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, “everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression” (Article 19) but evidently this freedom is often abused, especially on social media, by spreading “not-so-well-intentioned” messages towards individuals or groups of people. And even though, there are laws that limit the freedom of expression when it comes to harassment and hatred, the problem is still highly prevalent.

Hate speech is not restricted to the cyber space, yet it seems like we come across it on the Internet way too often than outside of it. An explanation to that can be provided by Richard Posner, who identifies four features of the internet that “magnify the dangers of irresponsible speech and so should have an influence on how we think about free expression” (Warburton, 2009). Namely those features are: 1) “anonymity” – which makes it easier for the offender to stay hidden and therefore more comfortable to produce offensive content; 2) “lack of quality control” – which allows anyone to post whatever they want online without being approved or filtered; 3) “huge potential audience” – as the Internet connects millions of people across the world and 4) “antisocial people finding their soulmates” – this refers to people with dangerous views, who can easily find each other online and even build a “community” (Warburton, 2009).

Allegedly, Youtube and Facebook have a quite high rate of detecting and removing inappropriate content, which includes hate speech and extremism. However, if illegal content is posted, the person who posted it is at higher risk of prosecution than the platform they used. Some argue that they should be held equally accountable, which might lead to stricter control from social media companies (BBC, 2019).

Despite the actions of censorship, battling this issue appears to be a lot more challenging and indicates that we, as a society, still have a long way to go.

 

 

 

References:

BBC (2019) Social media: How can governments regulate it? [online], BBC [Viewed 5 May 2019]. Available from: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-47135058

Warburton, N., (2009) Free speech: a very short introduction, Oxford: Oxford University Press.