Don't Regulate Hate Speech
Recently, Facebook announced its intention to create a “Supreme Court” in order to combat hate speech on its platform. Like many, I have a strong aversion towards hate speech and would rather that it never see the light of day. The idea proposed by Facebook entails a group of people—selected by Facebook—who have the final say in what should or shouldn’t be taken down, with the ability to override Mark Zuckerberg’s opinion. I am sure that they will appoint people with adequate ability in measuring society’s tolerance for disagreeable speech. However, it occurred to me that the real Supreme Court would probably not regulate speech at all. It follows that the entire idea of the regulation of hate speech is the wrong way to address the subject.
One could argue that in the last 60 years, prior to the emergence of the internet and social networks, there was no free speech in the United States. No doubt, we could converse freely. But conversations are not speech in the practical sense. One could only converse with those we knew or those immediate to us. Speech that can influence was mostly available to those who controlled the news channels—the editorial boards of the major newspaper and television companies.
In the past, the limiting nature of these print and television news publications made mass input impossible. With the advent of the internet and social media, however, this is no longer true. These new technologies give all voices the possibility of finding an audience, arguably the first time that free and unfettered speech, and its ability to reach a wide platform, has been possible in human history. Thus, having a “Supreme Court” of Facebook seems to return us back to consensus speech of the few. The question is not only whether we can trust these individuals on which speech should be blocked, but also whether we want to lose the opportunity to know that those who disagree with us exist and perhaps lose our chance to understand why.
Hate speech does not become magically more persuasive just because it appears on Facebook. Hate speech is effective only when it reaches a receptive audience. Facebook is responding by creating this “Supreme Court” because of past incidents where its platform was utilized to reach and mobilize receptive audiences. Facebook has removed multiple postings promoting hateful speech, however in August 2018, Facebook removed a political posting of a group organized to confront white supremacy. Facebook stated that it was necessary to prevent “inauthentic operators” and to prevent another white-supremacy related march similar to the one in Charlottesville, Virginia that turned deadly. Ultimately, we will never know if the removal of this post prevented a second Charlottesville-like march, and whether or not Facebook made the right call.
The lack of “Supreme Court” censorship in the first Charlottesville march did, however, give us an opportunity to determine how many of those white-nationalists in Charlottesville were there because of economic insecurity or poor educational guidance. I dare say that none of the marchers were investment bankers or startup founders.
Is the failure of the police in Charlottesville to control violence a good reason to suppress the messages given out by free speech? Is it okay to allow the millions of members of Facebook—one of the first platforms for truly free speech—to be edited into another newspaper-like source by its “Supreme Court?” Should we again go back to a time when speech was controlled by a few corporations?
It is too easy to deny our fellow citizens their clarion calls by imposing paternalistic censorship boards. Rather than bury it, should we not deal with the discontent that lies beneath? Perhaps that is impossible in our practical world, but one would hope that our government—police force, social workers and members of the education system included—would at least attempt at a solution that preserves what is arguably the most fundamental principle of the United States: free speech.