Alt News Policy on Hate Speech - Alt News
After five years of extensive reportage of misinformation, Alt News launched UnHate in 2022. We believe that there is a pressing need for fixing accountability among all stakeholders (individuals, media outlets, advertisers, social media platforms, and others) who are directly or indirectly responsible for either publishing or amplifying hate speech.
On November 3, Alt News officially published a preliminary policy document on hate speech. For the time being, the policy is based on the Facebook Community Standards on hate speech. In its reportage on hate speech, Alt News will refer to this document.
This policy will be updated as we continue to report on hate speech.
As per the United Nations, ‘In common language, “hate speech” refers to offensive discourse targeting a group or an individual based on inherent characteristics (such as race, religion or gender) and that may threaten social peace.’
However, the UN adds that ‘there is no universal definition of hate speech under international human rights law. The concept is still widely disputed, especially in relation to freedom of opinion and expression, non-discrimination and equality.’
To provide a unified framework for the United Nations to address the issue globally, the UN Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech defines hate speech as…’any kind of communication in speech, writing or behaviour, that attacks or uses pejorative or discriminatory language with reference to a person or a group on the basis of who they are, in other words, based on their religion, ethnicity, nationality, race, colour, descent, gender or other identity factor.’
While the above is not a legal definition and is broader than ‘incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence’ – which is prohibited under international human rights law — it has three important attributes:
Hate Speech can be defined as a direct attack against people – rather than concepts or institutions – on the basis of what we call protected characteristics: race, ethnicity, national origin, disability, religious affiliation, caste, sexual orientation, sex, gender identity and serious disease. We define attacks as violent or dehumanising speech, harmful stereotypes, statements of inferiority, expressions of contempt, disgust or dismissal, cursing and calls for exclusion or segregation. We also prohibit the use of harmful stereotypes, which we define as dehumanising comparisons that have historically been used to attack, intimidate or exclude specific groups, and that are often linked with offline violence. We consider age a protected characteristic when referenced along with another protected characteristic. We also protect refugees, migrants, immigrants and asylum seekers from the most severe attacks, though we do allow commentary and criticism of immigration policies. Similarly, we provide some protections for characteristics such as occupation, when they’re referenced along with a protected characteristic. Sometimes, based on local nuance, we consider certain words or phrases as frequently used proxies for PC groups.”
Content targeting a person or group of people (including all groups except those who are considered non-protected groups described as having carried out violent crimes or sexual offences or representing less than half of a group) on the basis of their aforementioned protected characteristic(s) or immigration status with:
Content targeting a person or group of people on the basis of their protected characteristic(s) with:
Content targeting a person or group of people on the basis of their protected characteristic(s) with any of the following:
Content that describes or negatively targets people with slurs, where slurs are defined as words that are inherently offensive and used as insulting labels for the above characteristics.