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More needs to be done to ban online hate speech
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When is it not okay to stir up hatred against other people online?
According to the EU — along with Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and YouTube, as well as the UK government — it is not okay when those people belong to a limited number of protected categories. Everyone else is fair game.
On May 31 the European Commission and various major Internet companies announced a new Code of Conduct on illegal online hate speech.
Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and YouTube have agreed to clarify on their terms of usage that they will prohibit illegal incitement to hatred. Moreover, they have agreed to put in place clear and effective processes to review and remove or disable access to such content within 24 hours.
For those who find themselves the subject of incitement to hatred, this is surely a welcome move. It also demonstrates the fact that Internet companies have extraordinary technical ability to control content.
However, this new agreement only refers to “publicly inciting to violence or hatred directed against a group of persons or a member of such a group defined by reference to race, color, religion, descent or national or ethnic origin.” That leaves out many other groups that might be the subject of incitement to hatred online, including, among others, gays and lesbians, people with disabilities, transgender identities, and women.
Paradoxically, the current community guidelines or standards published on the websites of Facebook and YouTube both include these other groups when defining hate speech or hateful content.
UK criminal law offers similarly piecemeal protections to victims of incitement to hatred, including but not limited to online speech. It has been a public order offence to stir up racial hatred since 1965, an offence to stir up religious hatred since 2006, and an offence to stir up hatred on grounds of sexual orientation since 2008. No other groups enjoy parity of protection.
It is true that we are not in a situation where there exists comprehensive and methodologically reliable evidence on the extent of stirring up hatred against people on grounds of disability and transgender identity. So we can’t say for sure there is such a problem.
Anecdotal evidence
But, by the same token, we also can’t say for certain that there is no such problem. What we do know, however, is that there is anecdotal evidence that some people are using threatening, abusive or insulting words or behavior to stir up hatred against people on grounds of disability and transgender identity.
No doubt some will say in response to my arguments that in order to justify curbing freedom of expression there has to be a very serious threat to public order or security. Yet the threat posed by incitement to hatred on grounds of disability, gender or transgender identity is not on a par with the threat associated with race or religion. Our society has experienced religious wars and race riots, after all.
But I would respond as follows.
The justification required for the new offences need not be exactly the same as for racial and religious hatred offences. Indeed, in the case of sexual orientation nobody seriously suggested that the UK was on the brink of a kind of sexual orientation war.
What matters is not public disorder in the literal sense of race riots.
That certain groups can be left feeling insecure as a result of incitement to hatred may be enough.
Dr Alexander Brown is a senior lecturer in the University of East Anglia’s (UEA) School of Politics, Philosophy, Language and Communications Studies. The views are his own. Shanghai Daily condensed the article.
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