"Hate Speech"
Stories
Meta Fined $25 Billion Over "Hate Speech" and Privacy Claims
The privacy scandal is familiar. The speech counts are where this case gets genuinely unsettling.
UK: Woman Visited by Police Over Post She Says She Did Not Make
In Britain’s speech-policing era, even authorship has become a matter of suggestion.
New Mexico Found a Way to Fine Platforms for Speech It Didn't Delete
Lying about user data is one thing. Leaving up speech a state doesn't like is supposed to be protected.
New York Social Media Law Survives X Lawsuit
New York’s law stops short of telling platforms what to censor, but it gives the Attorney General a remarkably detailed window into how they decide what survives online.
Australia: Royal Commission Presses Meta to Censor More Content
Meta’s policy director flew in by video link to defend leaving posts up, which is a sentence that would have been unthinkable a year ago.
EU-Backed Appeals Center Accidentally Confirms the DSA Censorship Regime Is Unworkable
The body Brussels built to make its censorship regime work just published the numbers proving it can’t.
TikTok Removes Reform UK Campaign Video Using Online Safety Act “Hate” Censorship Rules
The law Parliament sold as a shield for children just became a sword against a political campaign.
Spain’s HODIO Program to Monitor and Rank Social Media Platforms on “Hate Speech”
Spain’s government will now grade tech companies on speech removal twice a year, with the same officials defining what counts as hate setting the scores.
BC Tribunal Clears Student of “Hate Speech” Charge Over COVID-19 Video
A student who shared a pandemic video in a private chat walked away cleared, with a tribunal drawing a line that offended feelings and illegal discrimination are not the same thing.
UK Consults on Social Media Age Verification While Directing Parents to Report “Hate Speech” to Big Tech
The consultation closes in May, but Parliament already handed ministers the power to act in February.
Macron Calls Online Free Speech Argument “Pure Bullshit”
The pro-censorship French president is now the most eloquent voice in the West for the idea that free speech, unregulated, is a problem to be solved.
Australia Passes New Hate Speech Law, Raising Free Speech Fears
By redefining hate as a matter of perception, the new law risks making emotional response the measure of criminal guilt.
