The “Futuro Digitale” Social Promotion Association has always been committed to combating the HATE SPEECH phenomenon.Precisely for this reason one of the objectives of the Association is precisely that of breaking down the barriers of racial, ethnic, religious, gender or sexual orientation. But hate speech is not easy. But combating is not easy for the hate speech. The hate speech is often trivialized and made normal,especially online. Rapid reaction, impulsiveness and anonymity make the content of offenses, often directed towards the most fragile, particularly aggressive (and sometimes “viral”).The new forms of peer-to-peer Cyberbullying show this. Equally difficult to identify the boundary between hate speech and freedom of expression, the founding principle of modern democracy. A legal and political condemnation is not enough, although the commitment of the institutions is very important.A tool to be used are schools, in fact it is important to educate children not only to deny hate but also to denounce the same. |
(…) The term “hate speech” should be understood as including all forms of expression aimed at spreading, fostering, promoting or justifying racial hatred, xenophobia, anti-semitism or other forms of hate based on intolerance , including intolerance expressed in the form of aggressive nationalism and ethnocentrism, discrimination and hostility towards minorities, migrants and people of immigrant origin.Council of Europe, Committee of Ministers |
FUTURO DIGITALE AND HATE ON INTERNET
The phenomenon of HATE SPEECH is particularly widespread on the Internet, where the main problem lies in the fact that it is very difficult to control everything on the web. While it is easily identifiable someone who incites hate “live”,let’s say, on the web the speech is much more complex; this is also due to the fact that the controls concerning this theme are less pronounced on the Internet. The reason is that many people still consider the real world separate from the virtual world, in reality this distinction no longer exists, what is done in the virtual world is closely related to the real world and vice versa.
According to the Council of Ministers of Europe,people are incited to spread hate through the Internet simply because of the sense of impunity it provides. In fact, if these people knew that their name was accessible to all probably would not write what they write, instead being convinced of the anonymity they know that they are committing an illicit fact but at the same time they are calm as they are sure not to suffer any consequence.
ACTION OF FUTURO DIGITALE
Futuro Digitale always works with young people and for the young people and it is precisely the young people that are the starting point and the tool to be used to fight the phenomenon of Hate Speech. The majority of hate-incitement campaigns are on the internet, as mentioned, and the biggest visitors are the younger ones, that’s why Futuro Digitale focuses on educating them through a campaign that exploits the use of social networks and the web in general to raise awareness on this topic. This using blogs and social networking sites to raise awareness on the actions that can be taken if you are victims or witnesses of hate speech through the use of human rights language.
During workshops and meetings the stories of people who have been victims of hate speech online are told; this is a tool to be used to inform about the phenomenon and to stimulate the empathy towards the victims.
Futuro Digitale also carries out this awareness campaign for the youngsters hosted for the Erasmus + activity, through actions, training sessions or awareness-raising events, concerning, for example, the general problem of online hate speech, prejudices about a particular target group, methods of combating hate speech, the impact of hate speech, the need for people to take responsibility for their own actions and those of others and encourage students to invent new initiatives to fight hate speech.
The Association also encourages the use of reporting mechanisms or online complaints procedures to alert site owners to the presence of hate speech as well as to report cases of hate speech to organizations working on the issue, or to ‘Observatory on the speech of hate. Promotes boycotting actions of sites that incite hate and urges others to condemn or report incidents of hate speech, expressing solidarity with victims or engaging in other activities, such as using social networks to invite followers to browse sites or publicize positive examples where hate content could be removed from certain sites.
“The combination of hatred and technology is the greatest danger that overtakes humanity. And I do not mean only the great atomic bomb technology, I am referring to the small technology of everyday life” SIMON WIESENTHAL