Private companies are policing online hate without independent oversight or regulation, which has serious implications and poses risks for basic human rights and freedoms.
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After violence in Charlottesville, internet firms are erasing bigoted content. But should private companies serve as unaccountable regulators and be responsible for policing complex social issues?
A man sporting a Nazi tattoo leaves Emancipation Park in Charlottesville, Virginia on Aug. 12, 2017.
Steve Helber/AP Photo
Given recent events, you might have had an inkling that extremist views have been resonating. Researchers from the Center for Peace Studies and Violence Prevention have the hard data to back it up.
White nationalist groups march with torches through the UVA campus in Charlottesville, Va, on Friday, Aug. 11, 2017.
AP PHOTO
Memorials to confederate generals are lightning rods today for the same racist views they fought for 150 years ago.
James Alex Fields Jr., second from left, holds a black shield in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a white supremacist rally took place.
Alan Goffinski via AP
Today’s radical right is remaking its profile, using online communications to spread its message farther and deeper into our society than ever possible before.
Afrikaans singer Steve Hofmeyr (with the yellow t-shirt) in front of a statue of Paul Kruger at Church Square in Pretoria.
Alon Skuy/The Times
The idea of white victimhood played an important part in Donald Trump’s rise. The South African brand of white supremacy has made a tangible contribution to this narrative of victimhood.
US President Donald Trump stamped his inaugural speech with the promise of ‘America First’ – a slogan with an ominous past.
Reuters/Kevin Lamarque
Rhodesia’s white supremacists appealed to the white electorate by taking a stand against African liberation. Similarly, Donald Trump appealed to white Americans who feel overwhelmed by globalisation.
In 2015 Princeton University investigated President Woodrow Wilson’s legacy of prejudice. A historian looks at the widespread racism in the American progressive movement of the early 20th century.
Co-founder and director of Hate & Extremism Insights Aotearoa (HEIA) and director, Master of Conflict and Terrorism Studies, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau