The Internet is enabling us to witness an ever-evolving new era, and now we are accessible to diverse services like instant messaging, online shopping, and telecommuting. But it has been a mixed blessing because some side effects emerged. As Flew (2021) explained in Regulating Platforms, “Online hate speech and its amplification through digital platforms and social media have been identified as significant and growing issues of concern”. It is hard to overstate the hazard of hate speech. According to the UN Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech, the term hate speech is defined as “any kind of communication in speech, writing or behaviour, that attacks or uses pejorative or discriminatory language with reference to a person or a group on the basis of who they are, in other words, based on their religion, ethnicity, nationality, race, colour, descent, gender or other identity factor”(Guterres, 2019).
There are plenty of reasons why netizens say bad words towards strangers online, one of the reasons are that they are those who come across something terrible, and they tend to ease the burdens or bad moods through this way; or some people have stereotypes about a certain type of thing. Featuring anonymity and low risk, the Internet is a hotbed of them, in which they can protect themselves from being penalized. In such a context, they are more dare to express hateful views. But one thing they do not pay attention to is the endless damage to the abused.
Based on the report of online hate speech, in Australia, it was estimated that about 14% of the adults have been targeted by online hate speech, while in New Zealand, this was around 15%. And in these two countries, younger adults were more likely to be under attack of hate speech. Also, in the European SELMA Project, 18% of young people had experienced hate speech over a period of three months (eSafety Commissioner, 2020). As time goes by, these numbers will only increase.
So what will happen if hate speech spreads around society? For individuals, those who are hurt by hate speech would suffer from anxiety and depression, leading to a decreased sense of self-identify. And they are more likely to commit suicide. For the society, even worse, some individuals or organizations disseminate hate speech to expand their own influence, thereby advocating some activities that neglect the laws and social rules, gradually leading to the erosion of democracy, justice, and equity. We all recognize the right to free speech, but the danger arises when those bad ones spread speech that is harmful to others or to society for a certain specific purpose (Tsesis, 2002).
Now it is urgent for governments or organizations to deal with such a severe issue. In fact, Asia-Pacific countries have already released related laws and rules. For example, published in 2017, the Myanmar Hate Speech Prevention Bill stated any hate speech through information communication technology is strictly prohibited (Sinpeng, Martin, Gelber & Shields, 2021). Of course, it is not enough if we simply based on those rules or regulations. Therefore, a study analysed the regulation of hate speech on Facebook in the Asia-Pacific region to find out its limitation and future improvement. Facebook has its own content regulation team to detect hate speech. But although Facebook is expanding its staff pool, the accuracy and efficacy of hate speech detection remains uncertain. And then, the researchers focused on LGBTQ groups in Indonesia, the Philippines, Australia and India and they found that they were more vulnerable to hate speech on Facebook. And to some extent, Facebook failed to manage hate speech even with the help of its regulation process (Sinpeng, Martin, Gelber & Shields, 2021). The reason is that the regulations are not perfect enough when it comes to minorities like LGBTQ groups. So even when someone is troubled with those problems and tries to ask relevant staff for help but finally ends with nothing. That gives power to hate speech and makes it more rampant on the Internet. Why Facebook offers no protections for them? It is probably because AI is just a mechanism, and it is not able to recognize all hate speech let alone some that are more complex. Also, the context among countries, nationalities and regions is quite different, but it does not have specific measures to fit in diverse situations. If they refuse to deal with problems based on different conditions in different countries and just simply rely on AI auditing, these issues will not be solved properly. And, as a social platform, Facebook has no or little desire and no power to manage those issues. Besides, these problems can also be found in many other platforms. The emergence of AI makes everything easier, but it does not mean that we can let it handle everything without human thinking. So, what they need to do is make joint efforts with governments and professionals to make more targeted regulations in different regions. At the same time, collaborating with minorities to make sure their real needs instead of relying on algorithms.
It seems that hate speech against women is more common. Body Shame towards women can be found everywhere online from their appearance to outfit. And women are more likely to come across sexual harassment than men in the both real and digital world. They will be abused for being mammonish, slutty or teased while they may just share their selfies on social apps. More severely, misogynistic attacks become more rampant in these years in every aspect of women’s lives. It not only leaves women’s lives harder but also triggers gender confrontation finally posing a threat of social unrest. We can see it from a growing number of news online.
In May 2022, a student called Linghua Zheng from Zhejiang Normal University wanted to look different when taking the graduation photo, so she dyed her hair pink. As an outstanding student, she was recommended for admission to postgraduate qualifications at Huadong Normal University. After receiving the admission notice, she was happy to show her grandfather who is in hospital. Then she took a photo with him and posted it to the social platform. Then tragedy happened. A wave of netizens insulted her by replying “slutty”, “unethical” or “dirty” just because her hair was pink. They even thought she and her grandfather were in a relationship. Under the pressure of these comments, she finally dyed her hair black but the hate speech did not stop, on the contrary, it became even more severe. On January 23, 2023, she failed to fight against the depressive disorder and chose to suicide. Can you imagine a person will be under the attack of hate speech because of pink hair? Her 24 years’ beautiful life just ended but those haters can still sit in front of the computers without any punishment.
In April 2024, a man called Pangmao committed suicide because he did not want to break up with Miss Tan. Later his sister posted their chat records online showing Pangmao transferred her money many times. From then on, Miss Tan was verbally abused for a long time even after the police declared that there was no fraud between them. Those hate words had already put her in a dangerous place because someone posted and spread her private information including her phone number, address and company online. Moreover, some netizens considered she had a relationship with the head of the police commissioner.
Such stories happen from time to time. So why women are more possibly to be attacked by hate speech online? A line from a Korean drama called When Life Gives You Tangerines said, “Though it was a couple running away together, the boy would be called a hero, and the girl would only be blamed for the shameless.” It best describes a situation when something goes wrong, women are always those who are pointed at. Ironically, women are often seen as sex objects, and people are always judging their hair, breasts and hips (Louise, 2021). Women have always been told to be what men want them to be or what this world wants them to be from the past to the present, so when women perform “unusual”, others start to assault them. Another reason is that women are under much pressure from the whole society. Everyone including every woman themselves, considered them as omnipotent immortals: women can handle everything at the same time they need to be beautiful, hot and kind. It has to be said, that quite a part of the hate speech online is posted by women. Women themselves have a higher qualification towards females than men mainly because of the influence of the whole society or jealousy. Also, netizens do not have a high risk of being punished due to the anonymity of the Internet. And some of them like to speak or act on hearsay. There is another key reason certainly is that the government pays less attention to hate speech against women. And the absence or the ineffectiveness of the relevant laws or rules leaves women in a dangerous place.
How to reduce hate speech against females online remains a tough task. The most effective method is to make tougher legislation. Although we can ask the existing law for help, those rules are imperfect. As we talked about above, many countries have released baskets of laws, but they are still shortcomings. Due to the rapid development of the digital world, it is also hard for the police to track offenders online, making it more difficult to protect women under attack (Lousie, 2021). It is impossible to ban all the hate speech online in a short period of time. There should be a clear definition of hate speech and relevant departments need to enforce the laws strictly, imposing punishment like fines and detention. At the same time, platforms need to play their role in detecting hate speech. Take Facebook as an example, we know that Facebook divides hate speech into three levels. The first level prohibits dehumanizing statements, the second level includes swearing, expressions of contempt and generalizations of inferiority, and the third level involves appeals to exclusion and defamation. But it is hard to define each behaviour’s level and how serious the results would be (Lousie, 2021). So, it is necessary to filtrate hate speech relying on a monitoring system then to clarify the level of severity and impose the penalties depending on different levels. Meanwhile, a report portal accompanied by a specific team needs to be set up to quickly address the report received and give feedback. In this way, women’s rights could be better protected. But this is not enough, in order to change the traditional mindset of the public about women which has been rooted deeply for thousands of years, schools can set up relevant classes to make sure students can use the Internet correctly and nourish a sense of respect to others online. Parents also have the responsibility to educate their offspring. Besides, the whole society should take part in those campaigns or activities themed network civilization to spread information or knowledge about it. By doing these, everyone can pay attention to their posts online and create a better Internet environment. It is widely acknowledged that women have been treated unfairly in many aspects. To fight against inequity such as hate speech cannot solely rely on society’s help, self-strength is quite vital too. Women can learn how to deal with hate speech and try not to be influenced by those terrible sentences and use laws to protect themselves.
In conclusion, hate speech threatens social security while doing harm to human rights especially to women’s safety and dignity online. To solve this problem, it is essential for individuals, social platforms, organizations, governments and even the whole world to work together. Only through strict laws and effective enforcement together with public education can we reduce the hate speech online, can we build a more harmonious and inclusive society, and can we step into a brighter future.
References:
Flew, T. (2021). Regulating platforms. Cambridge: Polity
eSafety Commissioner. (2020). Hate speech: Report. https://www.esafety.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-01/Hate%20speech-Report.pdf
Guterres, A. (2019, June 18). United Nations strategy and plan of action on Hate Speech. United Nations. https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/advising-and-mobilizing/Action_plan_on_hate_speech_EN.pdf
Richardson-Self, L. (2021). Hate speech against women online: Concepts and countermeasures. Rowman & Littlefield International
Sinpeng, A., Martin, F., Gelber, K., & Shields, K. (2021). Facebook: regulating hate speech in the Asia Pacific. (Final report to Facebook under the auspices of its Content Policy Research on Social Media Platforms Award). Department of Media and Communication, University of Sydney, & School of Political Science and International Studies, University of Queensland. https://r2pasiapacific.org/files/7099/2021_Facebook_hate_speech_Asia_report.pdf
Tham, J. V., & Ahmad, K. (2021, July 16). Managing online hate speech in Malaysia requires detecting it [Image]. Centre for Research and Development. https://www.centre.my/post/managing-online-hate-speech-in-malaysia-requires-detecting-it
Tsesis, A. (2002). Destructive messages: how hate speech paves the way for harmful social movements. New York University Press.
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