Recent rioting in Great Britain has been fueled by right wing extremists using social media. Right now, Elon musk’s social media site, X (formerly known as Twitter) has been a primary source of hate speech. Hate speech is a ill-defined category U.S. law, but it’s generally protected under the First Amendment, courtesy of our U.S. Supreme Court. In recent history, hate speech on social media has generated enough anger and vitriol, that actual violence has been the result in a number of nations.
As noted by the Council on Foreign relations,
“A mounting number of attacks on immigrants and other minorities has raised new concerns about the connection between inflammatory speech online and violent acts, as well as the role of corporations and the state in policing speech. Analysts say trends in hate crimes around the world echo changes in the political climate, and that social media can magnify discord. At their most extreme, rumors and invective disseminated online have contributed to violence ranging from lynchings to ethnic cleansing.”
One example of hate speech and disinformation leading to ethnic cleansing is from Myanmar, where the Rohingya people were targeted by lies on social media, and ethnic cleansing followed.
More recently, violence in the U.K. was sparked by hate speech and disinformation online:
“The unrest began after a 17-year-old wielding a knife attacked a children’s dance class on Monday in the seaside town of Southport, which is near Liverpool. Three children were killed, and eight were wounded.”
“The suspect was born and raised in Britain, but online rumors soon circulated that he was an undocumented immigrant. To counter those false claims, the authorities took the unusual step of publicly identifying him. But with migration a flashpoint issue in Britain, especially on the far right, the rumors were all it took.”
Immediately after the attack, false claims began circulating about the perpetrator, including that he was an asylum seeker from Syria. In fact, he was born in Cardiff, Wales, and had lived in Britain all his life.
The misinformation was amplified by far-right agitators with large online followings, many of whom used messaging apps like Telegram and X to call for people to protest.
The result? “Around 250 rioters have been arrested in connection to the attacks, which broke out in predominantly English towns and cities, but also in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Far-right groups were seen looting, attacking police and locals, and performing Nazi salutes in the street. As the mobs chanted ‘send them home’ and ‘Islam out,’ they also destroyed mosques, libraries, and graffitied racial slurs on homes.”
According to CNN, “throughout Friday, Saturday and Sunday (Aug. 2 – 4) violent protesters congregated in city and town centers across the UK, many of them apparently intent on clashing with police and causing havoc.”
“The gatherings ostensibly started as anti-immigration marches, organized on social media platforms like X and on WhatsApp and Telegram groups. They quickly turned disorderly and violent.”
“Protesters set ablaze two Holiday Inn hotels, in the town of Rotherham, northern England, and in Tamworth, in the Midlands, central England, that were believed to be housing asylum seekers awaiting a decision on their claims. . .The Rotherham hotel at the time was “full of terrified residents and staff,” according to a statement by South Yorkshire Police Assistant Chief Constable Lindsey Butterfield.”
The U.K.’s Telegraph notes that as of Aug. 7, that “more than 100 far-Right demonstrations and 30 counter-protests are planned for tonight. . .Far-Right gatherings are planned at immigration centres, lawyers’ offices and hotels housing asylum seekers in 41 of the 43 police force areas in England and Wales. . .Almost 4,000 riot officers are being deployed across the country with a further 2,000 on standby.”
Jacob Davey, a director of policy and research at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a group that has tracked online far-right extremism, said many social media platforms have internal policies that prohibit hate speech and other illicit content, but enforcement is spotty. Other companies like X, now owned by Elon Musk, and Telegram have less moderation. For Musk, who champions free speech in social media, has allowed a number of extremists back onto the platform formerly known as Twitter, saying that he is “neutral,” giving equal space to left-wing and right-wing extremists. Several studies, however, suggest that right-wing extremism is far more prevalent, and the mayor of Paris ended her account on X in late 2023, calling it a “vast worldwide sewer.”
The U.K.’s new Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, condemned the violence as “far-right thuggery” and “racist rhetoric,” stopping short of describing the attacks as Islamophobic in a TV address. “Let me also say to large social media companies and those who run them: Violent disorder, clearly whipped up online—that is also a crime. It’s happening on your premises, and the law must be upheld everywhere,” Starmer said.
To which Musk, exercising his free speech rights, said, “Insane.”
Yet, the Center for Countering Digital Hate, a London-based campaign group, found that slurs increased substantially after Mr. Musk’s takeover. The BBC analysed over 1,100 previously banned Twitter accounts that were reinstated under Musk. A third appeared to violate Twitter’s own guidelines. Some of the most extreme depicted rape and drawings showing child sexual abuse. Such content was also a scourge on Twitter for years before Musk acquired the platform.
Content moderation is regarded as “censorship” by Musk and by some U.S. state legislatures, like Texas and Florida, and those legislators would have social media platforms not “discriminate” against “conservative” media posts. But that’s a blog post for another day, as the legal twists and turns of state and federal attempts to regulate social media have largely been thwarted by First Amendment decisions and section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which provides immunity to social media platforms for posts by its users. Along with the legal but wrong proliferation of hate speech and conspiratorial nonsense on social media sites, social media is not creating the kind of “community” that Mark Zuckerberg has often proclaimed as a benefit for people everywhere. “Zuck” and Meta do just enough content moderation to keep Facebook from becoming a “sewer” that would turn off the profit faucet, but no more. Entirely legal, of course. Musk doesn’t even give a poop emoji about truth, and evidently has enough money not to care about supervising the sewer now known as X.