December 10, 2013: Daniel Vergara, Facebook kritiseras för att inte stoppa rasism, Expo.se (Swedish media) (Translation: Facebook criticized for not stopping racism ), http://expo.se/2013/facebook-kritiseras-for-att-inte-stoppa-rasism_6298.html
Racism directed against minority groups abound on Facebook. A report from the Online Hate Prevention Institute of Australia has mapped Islamophobia on Facebook. The report notes that the company is not acting against the hatred that is marketed in the public groups.
The messages in fifty anti-Muslim groups have been identified in the report “Islamophobia on the Internet – The Growth of online hate targeting Muslims” produced by Online Hate Prevention Institute. The largest anti-Muslim group that has been mapped over 57,000 Likes.
191 examples of hatretorik highlighted in the report. The examples of hate speech are presented in different categories depending on their message. The most common type of hate propaganda is to portray Muslims as a security threat and threat to public order. 42 of the cases examined expressed the nature of the allegations. In 37 cases there were dehumaniserade rhetoric and demonizing Muslims. It is also common for Muslims portrayed as a cultural threat. In 24 cases advocated violence against or genocide of Muslims.
It is often young people who are exposed to racism on Facebook. Those affected often feel excluded from society. The report shows that Facebook is not doing enough to tackle racism that takes place in the open groups.
“Addressing the hate is not just a concern for groups exposed., It concerns us all,” the report says.
The report makes several recommendations for how Facebook handles racism. Among other things, the company must become better at seeing the anti-Muslim rhetoric and train its staff to detect and act against it. It should also be easier for facbookanvändarna require that examines Facebook groups as a whole and not just individual comments. When images are removed by moderators because of racist content then the picture is deleted in all places on Facebook that it occurs on.
Jan B Fredriksson’s PR manager for Facebook in Sweden, said the company has clear rules against racism. He believes that it is the users’ task to report content that violates the rules.
– Facebook does not have a feature that monitors the content. However, it has a well-developed organization that handles incoming notifications. Facebook of course has a responsibility to have clear rules for what to do Finte get on the platform and the handling of complaints in a good way. The rules is close to free speech and human rights law.
Should we not examine what is presented in these public groups and not just put it over completely on the user?
– Facebook is careful not to monitor users. Then you could end up in another extreme situation where users feel they can not express what they want. One has the right to express controversial things, but users must adhere to the rules, such as not to single out individual ethnic groups, says Fredriksson.
According to Fredriksson primarily examines Facebook comments or content that violates Facebook’s terms of use. The point is, he says, that does not erase entire groups based on individual comments. He says that if it comes in several complaints against a group so it can be removed.
– There are things that can be developed from the Facebook page, but also from users’ direction on how to behave on the Internet in general and Facebook specifically. It is a discussion that many need to be in., It is difficult for a single player to take full responsibility for it.
Online Hate Prevention Institute has also published several reports on subjects including anti-Semitism and how Facebook is failing to delete anti-Semitic hate speech.