The Freedom of Speech in Social Media Essay Example

On January 6, 2021, an insurrection occurred at the US capital in Washington D.C. Donald Trump, the president at the time, encourage his supporters to march to the capitol after one of his rallies. Twitter, Facebook, and a few other social media platforms banned him from their platform after Trump went online and made some Tweets implying an illegitimate US presidential election. There was a debate on whether social media platforms should have the power to do this. On one side people argue that it is a dangerous precedence to set and will limit freedom of speech in America while on the other side people argue that Trump should have been banned long ago for violating any of the platform’s policy for example spreading misinformation. The First Amendment of the United States protects freedom of speech for individuals from the government, but the First Amendment does not apply to social media companies because they are private businesses. In this essay, I will look at social media focusing on to what extent they should allow hate speech on their platform. I will argue for allowing social media to regulate speech on their platform.

What is freedom of speech? Freedom of speech is generally defined as the right of citizens to express their opinions on political and social issues without the fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction (Min, Chen, et al., 2021). The First Amendment protects most speech, but certain types of speech such as threats are not protected. It also does not protect against defamatory statements: slander and libel. Libel is a written defamatory statement while slander is an oral defamatory statement. It is difficult for in the United States to sue an individual for libel and slander defamatory statements because proof of intent is needed to prove libel or slander. It is difficult for individuals to be held accountable due to the anonymity of users. A question to consider is to what extent are social media platforms responsible for allowing certain types of speech to remain specifically hate speech?

Another term that will be used frequently in this essay is hate speech. It is defined differently depending on the social media platform. Hate speech is generally defined as statements intended to vilify, humiliate, or incite hatred against a group (Min, Chen, et al., 2021). One of the problems with hate speech for social media platforms is what is considered hate speech. For comedians, some have jokes are aimed at certain groups of people in a humiliating way, and should companies allow these jokes to remain on their platform? The definition of hate speech used by most social media companies is broad, so these companies need to consider what is hate speech on a case-to-case basis. The problem for social media platforms is should they allow hate speech to remain on their platform?

When companies are allowed to remove certain types of content there is an issue with censorship that arises. This can be abuse by governments who have weak freedom of speech in their country. Different governments can send a removal request form to social media platforms such as Google. Chen, et al (2021) show that governments with low levels of freedom of speech are more likely to make uncivil content removal requests based on data from “2017 Google Transparency Report”. There is an argument that giving social media the power to regulate speech allows them to censor people whose views do not align with the company’s view. Brain Berkey gives the analogy of Internet Service Providers and Web Hosting Services being like a Public Square. He argues it is objectionable for these private company to allow content which aligns with their view but prohibit hate speech which is not illegal from the online public discourse. Social media companies are like Internet Service Providers and Web Hosting Services however social media platforms are more visible, so a wider range of people interacts with them more often. Social media platforms need interaction between its user and one way is through online discourse. Banning hate speech on social media will create less online discourse. Is it inherently bad to banned hate speech and users for using it?

What are the benefits of eliminating hate speech on a social media platform? One of the benefits is that it creates a positive environment for all users when they use the platform. Users will be happy or at the very least less upset because hate speech will be difficult to find on the platform so there would be one less thing to be upset about. Parents would feel less concerned about their children using the social media platform for children 13 years old and above. It would also be more brand-friendly so it could attract more advertisers because they would worry less about the content that they advertise being next to a hate speech statement. Those who argue for banning hate speech on a social media website say that users who are banned can go to another website that allows hate speech.

Social media companies should be able to regulate hate speech on their platforms. There is no clear morally good or correct way to allow hate speech on a social media platform. Morality is placed on the user that chooses to use hate speech rather than the medium they use to express it. These companies are private businesses, so it does not make sense to force them to allow speech to be unregulated. The bottom line is that they are responsible to their shareholders and to what extent speech should be restricted should be up to them to regulate. Regulating speech is not a bad thing because it can allow social media platforms to attract as many people as possible to their platform. In an example, let say there are two social media companies; company A does not regulate hate speech on their platform, and company B does not allow hate speech on their platform. An individual goes on company A’s platform and sees some type of hate speech and goes to company B’s platform which regulates speech a little bit stricter. Company A missed out on a potential user because they did not regulate the speech on their platform. For company B, the users of the company will be happy that there is no hate speech on their platforms, but people who are more likely to use hate speech would be banned off this platform and they might choose to use Company A’s platform. Another thing that might be a problem for company B is that fewer ideas are added to the discourse, so minority opinions will not be heard at all. If companies are given the option to police hate speech on their platforms, then individuals can choose freely which social media platform they want to use. 

Some smaller social media companies do not have many restrictions on hate speech on their platforms. They often foster bad people and awful communities. For larger social media companies hate speech is regulated more strictly. Big companies have a reporting system where users can report someone who might violate their policy of hate speech. Some big companies also have an automated hate speech detecting algorithm to prevent hate speech. Ullmann and Marcus discuss the quarantining of hate speech where potential hate speech content will remain for an amount of time for a moderator to verify the content is or is not hate speech. These systems are effective in the removal of hate speech but might not be as effective in the prevention of hate speech from the platform. YouTube has a system where brand-friendly content is easier to be discovered so hate speech will be low in discoverability. Twitter has a system where it warns its users of content that may be sensitive, so users have the option to view the material if they want to do so. 

In conclusion, the First Amendment protects citizens’ Freedom of Speech, but it does not apply to social media companies since they are private businesses, because the First Amendment applies mainly to the federal government. Social media companies have a difficult time deciding what they would consider as hate speech and what to do with it if it not illegal. Companies who allow hate speech on their platform encourage discourse on their platform but leave content up that may be offensive to their users. Companies who banned hate speech from their platform create a positive environment but leave out minority opinions from the discourse on their site. It should be left up to the company to decide if they should allow hate speech to remain on their site or remove it from their site entirely. There is not a morally right or wrong way to handle hate speech on their platform because they must make the decision based on the opinions of their shareholders. Hate speech is somewhat regulated on social media already by a reporting system and by quarantine content an algorithm thinks could be hate speech.