Social media networks are powerful channels for users’ insights, thoughts, and ideas to spread rapidly and effortlessly. Alkiviadou (2018) emphasizes that borderless communication is facilitated by social networks, allowing political, intellectual, cultural, and creative engagement and input of daily news and increased awareness of human rights breaches. At the same time, social networks serve as forums for the transmission and normalization of cruel and false discourse via free speech and the systematic targeting of minority groups, influencing today’s society on the personal, institutional, and community levels (Alkoviadou, 2018). Therefore, the essay will argue that free speech should be regulated on social media.
Essentially, individuals can share messages, photographs, news, videos, and opinions through social networks. Alkiviadou (2018) states that along with the obvious benefits of social networks, such as availability of information and worldwide communication, there are also risks, for instance, hate speech, with such networks providing ideal settings for the development of this problem. Additionally, disinformation can be easily spread via social networks to target specific groups of people. It is widely confirmed that free speech on social media fosters disinformation (Psychogiopoulou & Casarosa, 2020). Sohrabji (2020) acknowledges that even when social media attempts, eliminating information that has gotten too radical is challenging. Psychogiopoulou & Casarosa (2020) argue that harassment, hostility, and provocation to violence based on gender, race, and religion have expanded due to social media activity. For instance, the United Nations has accused social media, particularly Facebook, of contributing to the genocide of the Rohingya people in Myanmar (Sorabji, 2020). Hence, free speech on social media resulted in misinformation spreading and facilitating the genocide.
Free speech should be regulated on social media because, despite benefits, it stimulates the spread of illicit content and exacerbates conflicts between freedom of expression and human rights protection. Because robots can select some undesirable words faster than humans, using online robots to eliminate unpleasant information may appear to be a reasonable solution at times (Sorabji, 2020). Nevertheless, to address the potentially hazardous campaigns, it is vital to hire additional human moderators to handle the potentially dangerous campaigns and publications (Sorabji, 2020). Moreover, governments and institutions should address the problem of illegal online content, hate speech, and disinformation on social media and introduce necessary reforms and regulations.
References
Alkiviadou, N. (2019). Hate speech on social media networks: towards a regulatory framework? Information & Communications Technology Law, 28(1), 19-35.
Psychogiopoulou, E., & Casarosa, F. (2020). Social media before domestic courts in Europe: An analysis of free speech cases. Maastricht journal of European and comparative law, 27(6), 791-805.
Sorabji, R. (2020). Free speech on social media: How to protect our freedoms from social media that are funded by trade in our personal data. Social Philosophy and Policy, 37(2), 209-236.
