Violent riots in the UK at the beginning of August 2024 and the decision of the North East Ambulance Service (NEAS) to leave X (Twitter) was announced on the 16th.th August 2024 may seem like completely unrelated events. Yet both reflect widespread concerns that social media is promoting division and networks based on hate-fueled violence. As NEAS said when leaving X: “We feel strongly that the failure to police content at X is allowing the perpetuation of unacceptable and offensive content, which has seen a significant increase in hate speech and misinformation that does not align with our standards” (Mark Cotton , NEAS assistant director of communications and engagement). What NEAS and the riots alike have bought into is the lived reality of the internet for many different types of society and the need to rethink the governance of social media.
The UK government has suggested it may revisit the Cyber Safety Act in the wake of the riots – this is important. Misinformation, hate speech and the coordination of violent unrest on social media were part of the spread of these riots. However, the proposal to expand the scope of the Act – so that social media companies can be held legally liable for failing to regulate algorithms on their platforms that allow misinformation to flourish – will do little to address key issues.
Instead, the UK government needs to review the foundations of social media governance – starting from a revised thinking that free speech on the internet needs to be earned and not automatic. Otherwise, reforms focused on targeting misinformation will continue to support the existing approach to social media security. Historically, the government in the UK and elsewhere has focused on countering terrorism and protecting children (in particular) from illegal, violent and harmful online content (see also Yar, 2018). Current proposals continue this security approach by placing social media companies as accomplices next to dangerous individuals or groups in creating the climate/method in which online violence turns into real-world violence by spreading misinformation. Instead, the governance of online interaction should be guided by the promotion of citizenship for all.
For too long the protection of free speech has been seen as an untouchable principle, with the internet and social media protected as ‘public property’. Initially, this resulted in a widespread hope that social media is important in holding anti-democratic regimes to account and can bring about positive and productive social change, with the high watermark of this hope perhaps being the Arab Spring in the early 2010s (Comunello & Anzera, 2012). Yet social media and the Internet have never been public spaces and have never enabled free speech in the ways that narcissists want. Social media companies are big businesses, driven by ‘surveillance capitalism’ (Zuboff, 2019), with supporting mindsets that profit from interaction and content – and content that is hateful, controversial and divisive creates more interaction than vice versa (Munn, 2019; Ribeiro et al, 2020 for discussion).
The riots and the NEAS response are therefore indicative of the growth of that I here the term ‘toxic citizen’, manifested in extreme ways in the riots and violence that broke out on the streets of the UK in August 2024. Social media has become a place where widespread hatred, misogyny and what I call elsewhere ‘everyday extremism’ are the prices. which must be paid by the majority for the ‘benefits’ that social media receives. Members of the public often report trolling (being subject to malicious interactions from those who want to provoke a response), doxing (unnecessary disclosure of personal information online), and more often being victims of online harassment, for example, in relation to their race. , gender, or political views (Hannan, 2018; Burke, 2015). Riots are therefore an extreme expression of the experience faced by millions every day.
Aside from the mental health value, the effects of active citizenship are profound. The fear of being attacked by others leads many not to talk about problems at all, or to shut down comments in forums full of like-minded people within ‘echo chambers’ (Quattrociocchi et al, 2016). The expectation of most people in society is that if they talk about certain issues, they will be the target of a lot of hate. These effects are more pronounced for women, ethnic minorities, environmental activists, transgender activists and other marginalized groups (Döring and Mohseni, 2020 for such experiences of journalists).
The starting point for a social media management review should be the assumption that all social media platforms are ones that NEAS would like to be a part of. In short, there are deep nationalistic implications that stem from the exclusion and silence on social media of the majority of people who are afraid to talk about issues out of fear of being bullied or worse by a vocal minority. (Griffin, 2023).
Another way forward would be to start with a mindset inspired by the same public sector – that is, the current approach to regulating UK football grounds. This may seem counterintuitive, but we need to start with a strong mindset, not least because it will prevent the inevitable dependence that will arise from changes that are confined to a security-oriented, industry-oriented mindset. But the thinking inspired by UK football rules is also very instructive for other reasons. Historically, football has been highly toxic, with overt racism in the stadiums – such behavior was widely seen as integral to the culture of the game (Jewell et al, 2014). However, these days, although not perfect, regulation of UK football is extensive – for example, courts can issue football banning orders, which prevent offenders from entering stadiums; while hate speech, racism and homophobia are illegal and can be met with criminal prosecution (Pearson, 2021). The result has been a change in football culture that focuses on increasingly policing unacceptable behavior (Pearson, 2012: 162-7).
The lessons are clear. A similar change in social media culture will take a long time but to have meaningful impacts lawmakers must go beyond encouraging incremental change and ask more pressing questions: basically, what kind of society have we become when the ambulance service is being pushed out of society. the media?
References
Comunello, F. & Anzera, G. 2012. “Will the Revolution be Tweeted? A Conceptual Framework for Understanding Social Media and the Arab Spring”. Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations23(4): 453–470.
Döring, N. & Mohseni, MR 2020. “Sexual Hate Speech on YouTube and YouNow Comments: Results of Two Content Analyzes”. SCM Studies in Communication and Media9(1): 62-88.
Griffin, R. 2023. “Public and Private Powers in the Governance of Public Affairs: Multistakeholderism, the Rule of Law and Democratic Accountability”. International Legal Theory14(1): 46–89.
Hannan, J. (2018). “Are we riding ourselves to Death? Social Media and Post-Truth Politics”. European Journal of Communication33(2): 214-226.
Jewell, RT, Simmons, R., & Szymanski, S. 2014. “Bad for Business? The Effects of Hooliganism in English Professional Football Clubs”. Journal of Sport Economics, 15(5): 429-450.
Munn, L. 2019. “The Right Pipe: An Individual’s Journey to Extremism Online”. First Monday24(6).
Pearson, G. 2012. An Ethnography of Football Fans: Cans, Police and Carnivals (Manchester University Press, Manchester)
Pearson, G. 2021. “A Good Law for a Good Game? Revisiting the Football Offenses Act 1991”. Journal of Criminal Law85(5): 362-374.
Quattrociocchi, W., Scala, A. & Sunstein, CR 2016. “Echo Chambers on Facebook” SSRN Papers.
Ribeiro, MH, Ottoni, R., West, R., Almeida, VAF, & Meira Jr.,W. .2020. “Methods for Assessing Radicalization on YouTube”. FAT* ’20: Proceedings of the 2020 Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency Conferencepages 131-141.
Winkelman, SB, Oomen-Early, J., Walker, AD, Chu, L. & Yick-Flanagan, A. 2015. “Exploring Cyberbullying Among Women Using Social Media”. International Journal of Public Health3(5): 194-201.
Yar, M. 2018. “Failure to Regulate? Needs and Issues for Addressing Illegal Content and Behavior on Social Media”. International Journal of Cybersecurity Intelligence & Cybercrime1(1): 5-20.
Zuboff, S. 2019. The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: Fighting for Human Futures in the New Frontier of Power. Profile Books.
Further Studies in E-International Relations
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