{"id":988,"date":"2022-11-09T09:36:25","date_gmt":"2022-11-09T09:36:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/?p=988"},"modified":"2022-11-09T09:36:25","modified_gmt":"2022-11-09T09:36:25","slug":"twitter-and-elon-musk-why-free-speech-absolutism-threatens-human-rights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/2022\/11\/09\/twitter-and-elon-musk-why-free-speech-absolutism-threatens-human-rights\/","title":{"rendered":"Twitter and Elon Musk: why free speech absolutism threatens human rights"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the scale of Elon Musk's proposed changes to Twitter come to light, <\/em>Sarah Glozer<\/a>, Emily Jane Godwin<\/a> and Rita Mota<\/a> reflect on what his takeover of the social media platform might mean for its users. They argue that his plan to scale back content moderation - in the name of freedom of expression - will lead to harm in the form of hate<\/em>\u00a0speech, misinformation and dangerous content. <\/em>This piece was originally published by The Conversation<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

For a man who made a fortune from electric cars, the Twitter takeover has turned into a fairly bumpy ride so far. Soon after\u00a0buying the social media company<\/a>\u00a0for US$44 billion (\u00a338 billion), Elon Musk said he had \u201cno choice<\/a>\u201d about laying off a large proportion of the company\u2019s staff.<\/p>\n

He has already faced a backlash over his move to charge Twitter users a monthly fee for their \u201cblue tick\u201d verified status. And those users should also be concerned about plans from the self-proclaimed \u201cfree speech absolutist<\/a>\u201d to\u00a0reduce content moderation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Moderation, the screening and blocking of\u00a0unacceptable online content<\/a>, has been in place for as long as the internet has existed. And after becoming an increasingly\u00a0important and sophisticated feature<\/a>\u00a0against a rising tide of hate speech, misinformation and illegal content, it should not be undone lightly.<\/p>\n

Anything which weakens filters, allowing more harmful content to reach our screens, could have serious implications for human rights, both online and offline.<\/p>\n

For it is not just governments which are responsible for upholding human rights \u2013\u00a0businesses are too<\/a>. And when different human rights clash, as they sometimes do, that clash needs to be managed responsibly.<\/p>\n

Social media has proved itself to be an extremely powerful way for people around the world to assert their human right to freedom of expression \u2013 the freedom to seek, receive and impart all kinds of information and ideas.<\/p>\n

But freedom of expression is not without limits. International human rights law prohibits propaganda for war, as well as advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence. It also allows for restrictions necessary to ensure that rights or reputations\u00a0are respected<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So Twitter, in common with other online platforms, has a responsibility to respect freedom of expression. But equally, it has a responsibility not to allow freedom of expression to\u00a0override other human rights<\/a>\u00a0completely.<\/p>\n

After all, harmful online content is often used to restrict the freedom of expression of others. Sometimes, online threats spill over to the offline world and cause irreparable\u00a0physical and emotional harm<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Any moves to remove content moderation therefore risk breaching corporate human rights obligations. Unlimited freedom of expression for some almost inevitably results in the restriction elsewhere of that exact same freedom. And the harm is unlikely even to stop there.<\/p>\n

Musk claims that Twitter will now become a more democratic \u201ctown square\u201d. But without content moderation, his privately owned version of a town square could become dysfunctional and\u00a0dangerous<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Twitter \u2013 again, like most other social media platforms \u2013 has long been linked to overt expressions of\u00a0racism and misogyny<\/a>, with a flood of racist tweets even surfacing after Musk\u00a0closed his deal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And while Musk reassures us that Twitter will not\u00a0become a \u201chellscape\u201d<\/a>, it is important to remember that content moderation is not the same as censorship. In fact, moderation may\u00a0facilitate genuine dialogue<\/a>\u00a0by cracking down on the spam and toxic talk which often disrupt communication on social media.<\/p>\n

User friendly?<\/h3>\n

Moderation also offers reassurance. Without it, Twitter risks losing users who may leave for alternative platforms considered safer and a better\u00a0ideological fit<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Valuable advertisers are also quick to\u00a0move away<\/a>\u00a0from online spaces they consider divisive and risky. General Motors was one of the first big brands to announce a\u00a0temporary halt<\/a>\u00a0on paid advertising on Twitter after Musk took over.<\/p>\n

Of course, we do not yet know exactly what Musk\u2019s version of Twitter will eventually look like. But there have\u00a0been suggestions<\/a>\u00a0that content moderation teams may be disbanded in favour of a \u201cmoderation council\u201d.<\/p>\n

If it is similar to the \u201coversight board<\/a>\u201d at Meta (formerly Facebook), content decisions are set to be outsourced to an external party representing diverse views. But if Twitter has less internal control and accountability, harmful content may become a harder beast to tame.<\/p>\n

Such abdication of responsibility risks breaching Twitter\u2019s human rights obligations, and having a negative impact both on individuals affected by harmful content, and on the overall approach to human rights adopted by other online platforms.<\/p>\n

So as one (extremely) wealthy businessman claims to \u201cfree\u201d the blue Twitter bird for the sake of humanity, he also gains commercial control of what has been conceived as being a relatively democratic social space until now. What he does next will have serious ramifications for our human rights\u00a0in a digital age<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Content moderation is by no way a panacea and the claim that social media platforms are\u00a0\u201carbiters of the truth\u201d<\/a>\u00a0is problematic for many reasons. We must also not forget the emotional and psychological toll of human content moderators having to view \u201cthe worst of humanity<\/a>\u201d to protect our screens. Yet, sanitisation of social platforms is also not the answer. The internet is a better place when the most successful platforms engage in human rights-focused screening \u2013 for everyone\u2019s benefit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the scale of Elon Musk's proposed changes to Twitter come to light, Sarah Glozer, Emily Jane Godwin and Rita Mota reflect on what his takeover of the social media platform might mean for its users. They argue that his...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1361,"featured_media":989,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,167,38,95],"tags":[4,54,67,247],"class_list":["post-988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-and-society","category-communication","category-human-rights","category-social-media","tag-business-and-society","tag-human-rights","tag-social-media","tag-twitter"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/133\/2022\/11\/akshar-dave-mkTqZN1NzhY-unsplash.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd4Pj1-fW","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1361"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/988\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/business-and-society\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}