If we block abusive language on the parts of the internet most people use, it will just move to the shadows where we can't monitor for extremists, writes Joanne Wilkes
In How to argue in a free and open society, published on Newsroom on October 5, Dr David Bromell offers suggestions as to how people of opposing views can get along in debates, tolerating each other without descending into rancour and violence. They include recommendations such as ‘no bullshitting’, ‘no shouting down’, ‘no dirty fighting’, and ‘no final truths’. These ideas are to me very sensible. But such practices are likely to operate mostly in face-to-face contexts, in which people generally register others as fellow human beings, and/or are conscious of possible reputational damage if they become violent or abusive. In an online environment, things are very different.
Some of my own research has focused on the British political and literary world of two centuries ago. In the early 1800s, Britain was a divided and turbulent society. But a combination of increased literacy and a flowering of talent made for a burgeoning of newspapers and magazines that could be both well-written and entertaining. On the other hand, the convention of journalistic anonymity meant that much discussion was virulent and personally insulting - writers would get away with a great deal because they usually could not be identified.
It strikes me that on social media today, the virulence and the insults remain, but since these are concentrated less in the journalism than in the online comments, they are rarely leavened by talent. Or sometimes the journalism serves to dog-whistle the insults, and those delivering abuse are, like their 19th Century forbears, protected from retaliation.
This point was well-illustrated for me recently on the Facebook page of New Zealand’s Free Speech Union. It shared Bromell’s article, and regularly features high-minded posts citing figures like Michel de Montaigne and Lady Bird Johnson. The comments sections, by contrast, are often very low-minded and give rein to the dehumanising kind of online ‘free speech’ that has no consequences.
A target in recent posts has been the address PM Jacinda Ardern made to the UN General Assembly in the wake of the Christchurch Call. These posts represented Ardern as a danger to democracy. They then produced in the comments such characterisations of the PM as: "perhaps fit as a leader in the Tanzanian zoos [sic] chimp compound", "a dangerous communist", "that crazy bitch", "a piece of trash", "a very dangerous psychopath", "Satan Ardern", "a maggot", "intolerable c**nt".
Anyone familiar with social media will recognise this kind of bile, which is regularly directed at the PM and many other public figures. Would it not be preferable if the internet’s legion of free speech warriors expended their energy on the world’s many flagrant violations of free speech, such as the current persecution of demonstrators in Iran, or the suppression of democracy in Hong Kong? They obviously don’t care about free speech at all, simply taking a cowardly pleasure in being abusive for the sake of it because they know there is no comeback.
So am I arguing for consequences, that people should be censored for calling the Prime Minister ‘Satan’, a ‘psychopath’, or a ‘c**t’? Not at all. But nor do I believe they are expressing ‘free speech’ of any value whatever. The problem we face, however, is that if we block abusive language on the parts of the internet that most people use, it will just disappear to extremist sites or the dark web. So if there is another Brenton Tarrant in the offing amidst the abusive drivel online, it is best to maximise the chances of identifying them in advance. We should let them call public figures c**ts as often as he likes, rather than discovering after a murderous event that he has been active online where Tarrant was. This is hardly an ideal solution, but it is what seems practicable at the moment. And it is certainly no triumph for free speech.
And back in early 19th Century Britain? On May 11, 1812, British Prime Minister Spencer Perceval entered the lobby of the House of Commons, and was shot dead.
