What to do about Online Racist Abuse?

[JPRouve]

Completely agree, in the current system it couldn’t be workable, because a for-profit 3rd Party could never be trusted with that amount of personal. The worry is that, in a more insidious, back-handed way, they probably have even more info at present!

No they don't have more info, they have a lot and they need people to actively give them the most important, the ones that can actually be used to take loans for example. The funny thing about it is that people aren't ready to go to that type of extreme measures when it happens in real life, in fact witnesses of racism will often act as if nothing happened. If you want fix racism online, you need to fix it in real life, sheltering yourself online is fairly easy in real life it's not.

 

[TheGame]

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[Borys]

You then immediately know who the perpetrator is and can track them down, as you could do with any other crime.

And the police gets thousands of reported incidents per hour.

Some of them are racists, some of them are "you're a moron".

In most countries police will never get near those problems as they're dealing with everyday crime.
You seriously see that working? I think we are far far away from reporting individual incidents as a valid solution.

can track them down

By the way, that's another reason this will never work and I don't even think this should be considered as an option (lynchment).

 

[Jericholyte2]

And the police gets thousands of reported incidents per hour.

Some of them are racists, some of them are "you're a moron".

In most countries police will never get near those problems as they're dealing with everyday crime.
You seriously see that working? I think we are far far away from reporting individual incidents as a valid solution.

So you build in algorithms that weed out the ‘general criticism’ posts and only leave the directly racist posts.

 

[GueRed]

dont know in all honesty..how can you police this shit?

racists especially online are fecking cowards. say that shit to someones face in the real world and you'd get sparked out at the very least

 

[UncleBob]

NO. You are giving 3rd party companies access to hundreds of millions of people's sensitive documents and who knows what they do with that shit. Also what about younger people who don't have ID or those in poorer countries? It then becomes a platform that discriminates like the old voter ID stuff. I dread the idea of companies like facebook (who have been previously exposed) collecting even more sensitive data.

There's several ways of ID checks without that happening.

Young people also have ID's.

 

[UncleBob]

To

?

 

[Borys]

So you build in algorithms that weed out the ‘general criticism’ posts and only leave the directly racist posts.

Ok, what's next? You chase them one by one? You think this will work outside of a very few countries?
Don't take me wrong, I'm asking because I've never discussed this topic before but I don't see this as a solution.

EDIT: The more I think about it the more I am confident this ID is a really bad idea which will create more problems then it'll solve, I hope people don't give away their privacy for false promises.

 

[VorZakone]

Don't these trolls, edgelords etc feed on the controversy they create?

 

[Zen86]

?

I didn’t actually mean to quote there. But basically these tech firms won’t do anything that will negatively impact their user base (and by that I mean their active users) unless they’re forced to. It needs legislative measures.

 

[UncleBob]

I didn’t actually mean to quote there. But basically these tech firms won’t do anything that will negatively impact their user base (and by that I mean their active users) unless they’re forced to. It needs legislative measures.

What sort of legislative measure are you referring to.
1: It's not legal
2: It's already against the user agreement with said companies
3: It's becoming a bigger and bigger issue

 

[Ixion]

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Spot on. Fair play to him for calling out the Government's bullshit.

 

[Stacks]

There's several ways of ID checks without that happening.

Young people also have ID's.

do they really? Like what? Many people generally don't have ID's. The only one I had for years was a birth certificate which my mum possessed and as I said many people in the states are opposed to voter ID due to lack of ID. In poorer countries its even more of a thing

 

[MemphisThePie]

It’s their ideology, unfortunately you cannot be loved by everyone. Freedom of speech and should not be censored, ignore them or hate back.

 

[Stacks]

But your saying our suggestions aren’t possible, so what would your alternative be? If you reject an idea you must surely have an alternate view?

I really don't not if the suggestion is more problematic or extreme and puts us at greater risk

 

[Matthew84!]

I just don't get why anyone would take the time to find their insta or Facebook just to insult them, I'll be the first to admit I was swearing at the TV in my living room when we lost but there is no chance I'd ever send them racist or vile abuse.
Its only a game, somebody at to lose.

I think if everyone who spots something reports it and hopefully be easier to track them down.
I'd ban them from any stadiums and I'd fine them, if they get caught again the fine doubles up.

 

[Josep Dowling]

NO. You are giving 3rd party companies access to hundreds of millions of people's sensitive documents and who knows what they do with that shit. Also what about younger people who don't have ID or those in poorer countries? It then becomes a platform that discriminates like the old voter ID stuff. I dread the idea of companies like facebook (who have been previously exposed) collecting even more sensitive data.

Simple. Don’t use it then. Practically every business has data on you when making a payment.

 

[Zen86]

What sort of legislative measure are you referring to.
1: It's not legal
2: It's already against the user agreement with said companies
3: It's becoming a bigger and bigger issue

And yet it’s still happening, more and more.

 

[UncleBob]

do they really? Like what? Many people generally don't have ID's. The only one I had for years was a birth certificate which my mum possessed and as I said many people in the states are opposed to voter ID due to lack of ID. In poorer countries its even more of a thing

In Europe, we're so advanced that we've had national id's for quite some time...

 

[UncleBob]

And yet it’s still happening, more and more.

What legislative measures were you asking for, again?

 

[Scarlett Dracarys]

They all need the Trump treatment. Blocked from all Social Media outlets.

 

[AFC NimbleThumb]

To eradicate the problem there would first need to be acknowledgement of the gravitas of the issue.

This isn’t simply ‘a bad few apples’ but whilst people marginalise the problem there can be no solution.

There are videos doing the rounds on social media of black people who were ‘turned on’ last night after the penalty misses by people who were more than happy to be in their company moments earlier.

Social media is simply another branch of society. These issues won’t be banished by asking for IDs at sign up.

 

[Jon@thon]

Get banks involved. I'm sure they could set up something for online banking where you can generate a 'Social Media Access Code'. This code, along with your name (sure social media has this info anyway so not giving anything away) is needed to create a new account or verify exisiting accounts. If you post vile abuse then the police or some other authority can request the 'SMAC' and name from the social media platform and obtain personal details from the banks. This way you're not forced to provide more personal information to social media platforms but your details CAN be found by law enforcement if you're a complete and utter bellwhiff.

 

[Zen86]

What legislative measures were you asking for, again?

Legislative measures to force social media companies into proactively preventing this kind of abuse, or requiring use of personal identification on social media platforms. Funnily enough I don’t have the answer, I’m saying social media companies will continue to do what they have been, absolutely nothing, until they’re forced to do otherwise.

What exactly is it you’re suggesting, again?

 

[Stacks]

Simple. Don’t use it then. Practically every business has data on you when making a payment.

The companies themselves won't want to alienate so many people and lose users by forcing them to provide private info just to make a "post." I don't even use my number on social media once I realised people could search me using it.

In Europe, we're so advanced that we've had national id's for quite some time...

Not in England!

 

[TheGame]

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[Superden]

When it comes to silencing dissent on behalf of authoritarian regimes social media companies can be brutally effective....

 

[Stacks]

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I'm not surprised. There is no international rule on emojis and who they can't be used on. They mainly focus on words

 

[Giggsyking]

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For a racist club and a racist owner with racist players (their legend), this must be laughable.

 

[lefty_jakobz]

Nah it’ll never change. Folk either grow thicker skin and brush it off or move themselves offline until such time as it stops.

 

[DJ Jeff]

doesnt seem to be white english guys doing the lions share of it tbh

 

[JohnZSmith27]

Nah it’ll never change. Folk either grow thicker skin and brush it off or move themselves offline until such time as it stops.

It's a difficult situation but I agree that it's not likely to change any time soon with regards to the online anonymous stuff.

I understand why people are calling for ID requirements but there are so many marginalised people who rely on anonymity to be able to use social media. E.g. victims of domestic violence, ex-religious, LGBT who are not out of the closet etc.

 

[Adisa]

Look at this twat.

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[RedorDead21]

Allow no one online without their own specific ID username and password. People can be anonymous to each other but not the higher authority. Youngsters only get a code allowing them to view certain material and then at 18 or whatever they receive an adult code. A complete revamp of the internet basically. Of course this is expensive so racism will always be possible online. And other horrible sharing of things.

 

[Martial'sEmergingSmile]

doesnt seem to be white english guys doing the lions share of it tbh

Lines up with what Southgate said:

"I know a lot of that has come from abroad. The people who track those things have been able to explain that to us."

BBC Newsnight did a similar analysis and found that potentially only 5 of the 105 racist comments they found may have originated in the UK.

During the group stages Hope Not Hate found 44 racist messages out of 585,000 posts analysed. 0.0075%. No country data was available.

Even just looking at the accounts involved is an easy indicator. After the EL final when De Gea and Rashford got sent abusive messages, it was again almost exclusively non-European accounts - and they were begging to be 'included in the screenshot' and boasting 'about to be famous'. From the dawn of the Internet 'don't feed the trolls' has been the mantra, and societally we're instead choosing to ignore that and feed them with the attention they crave.

On the back of all of this, wannabe authoritarian idiots like Piers Morgan, and other reactionaries, are using it to campaign for further online privacy erosions. The 'Online Harms Bill' has already been crucified by multiple leftist organisations and free speech groups - and no doubt it's getting more draconian by the day. I don't think it's a coincidence when you see outlets like The Daily Mail printing Southgate's entire interview about the abuse but leaving out the line about 'a lot of it has come from abroad'.

 

[Moston Red]

Whatever technicals controls are put in place to stop online abuse someone will find away around it. Hopefully time will play a part in diluting the ignorance and people can just get along and be productive. Having said that you’re always going to get certain people that just want to hate everyone no matter what. Maybe thats where we should focus our efforts. What makes people want to hate?

 

[hobbers]

It's common sense that the overwhelming majority (>99%) of racist abuse targeted at Prem footballers is from abroad.

So like has been said over and over in these sorts of threads, mandating ID checks in one country does absolutely feck all towards achieving anything. The abuse it would stop from UK residents isn't even a drop in the ocean. Meanwhile the downsides for privacy are enormous.

Even if Twitter and Instagram did a 180 and enforced some traceable ID system for all their users across the world, you would need to force India, Russia, states in the Middle East etc to pursue and prosecute these people, and they obviously won't be doing that.

 

[horsechoker]

The only solution is restart the British Empire so we can rule over these countries and end racism.

 

[TheReligion]

The issue with online is the anonymity. It makes people feel people much invincible and gives them a platform to say things they'd never dream of doing in person or without the safety net anonymity provides.

Logically the only thing you can do to is reduce this element. Identification, age restrictions and personal detail verification. If you want to use Twitter/Insta provide them, have them verified, and agree they can be shared freely with law enforcement if your account is used in illegal activities.

 

[Ramshock]

Its simple, only allow people who are ID verified to respond to posts by verified accounts.