Boundaries of Hate: Ethical Implications of the Discursive Construction of Hate Speech in U.S. Opinion Journalism

The eradication of hate speech on social media: a systematic review

“…The former has developed regulations to prevent hate speech. Meanwhile, in the USA, the commitment to uphold the First Amendment has led, especially since the mid-20th century, to a more permissive legal system (Bleich, 2018; Johnson et al , 2021). Paúl Díaz (2011) and Teruel Lozano (2018) have analysed the 1969 Brandenburg v. Ohio trial, which ruled that freedom of speech should be restricted because there was an imminent risk it would give rise to an illegal act; the judges declared that the hate speech involved is not and will not be protected by law because it “is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action”.…”

“…Drawing on his analysis of various ethical models, Slagle (2009) argues for the need to balance the approaches of "critical race theorists" with those of "free speech libertarians" to avoid assimilating "hate speech" (not protected by the right of freedom of expression) to forms of offensive and unpopular speech (protected by the right of freedom of expression). As highlighted by Johnson et al (2021), the distortion of the "unassailability" of freedom of expression comes from a certain biased vision within the American libertarian tradition, according to which hate speech is believed to be part of the "market of ideas", and that the only way of counteracting this is through "private censorship". This latter view threatens public debate and gives rise to the normalisation of hate messages as a "partisan weapon" in the hands of populist demagogues (the paradigmatic case these authors analyse is that of Donald Trump's tweets).…”

“…Hate speech is encountered in public spaces in multiple forms, for example, in acts of vandalism against public or private property, as insults or slurs directed against those who belong to stigmatised groups and finally in the form of indirect defamation against such groups. Traditional media such as television (Pavlides, 2019) or opinion journalism (Johnson et al , 2021) can also serve as channels for hate speech. However, it has been with the advent of the internet, and especially with the rapid spread of information and the increased permissiveness facilitated by social media, such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, that hate speech has had an increasing and far-reaching social repercussion.…”

Metajournalistic Discourse and Reporting Policies on White Nationalism

“…While some studies examine how journalists cover groups like the "alt-right' in the United States and find that their struggles are in part a result of the expectations for speed in reporting, lack of training and fear (Johnson et al, 2021;Perreault et al, 2020aPerreault et al, , 2021, related research focuses on journalistic coverage in other Western countries (Baugut, 2020(Baugut, , 2021Perreault & Bell, 2020). In Germany, Baugut (2020) found that Jews perceived that local journalism actually fostered the thinking of antisemitic groups.…”