Prince Harry hits out at social media for
creating 'crisis of hate'
Duke of Sussex urges advertisers to demand companies
do more to curb hate speech online
Alex Hern
@alexhern
Fri 7 Aug
2020 12.02 BSTFirst published on Fri 7 Aug 2020 11.54 BST
Prince
Harry has hit out at social media companies for creating a “crisis of hate” and
called for “meaningful digital reform” after an unprecedented advertiser
boycott of Facebook.
In an
opinion piece for the US business magazine Fast Company, the Duke of Sussex
revealed that he and his wife, Meghan, had begun campaigning for change in
social media “a little over four weeks ago”.
Their
personal campaign came at the same time as the launch of the Stop Hate for
Profit campaign, which persuaded a number of major advertisers, first in the US
and later globally, to pull their spending on Facebook and Instagram in protest
against the lax enforcement of hate speech policies.
“Some may
ask why a change campaign would take aim at online advertising,” the prince
wrote. “Well, many of us love and enjoy social media. It’s a seemingly free
resource for connecting, sharing and organising. But it’s not actually free;
the cost is high.
“Every time
you click they learn more about you. Our information, private data and unknown
habits are traded on for advertising space and dollars. The price we’re all
paying is much higher than it appears. Whereas normally we’re the consumer
buying a product, in this ever-changing digital world, we are the product.”
The opinion
piece stops short of naming specific companies, although the Stop Hate for
Profit campaign, which is explicitly cited, was targeted directly at Facebook.
It is also
slim on specific proposals for change. “There is huge value,” the Queen’s
grandson wrote, “in advertisers sitting at the table with advocacy leaders,
with policy leaders, with civil society leaders, in search of solutions that
strengthen the digital community while protecting its free and open nature.”
Harry calls
on advertisers “to use their leverage, including through their advertising
dollars, to demand change from the very places that give a safe haven and
vehicle of propagation to hate and division”. But the prince does not
specifically push for advertisers to continue supporting the Stop Hate for
Profit campaign, which expanded to cover the UK and Europe last week.
Since they
stepped back from their duties as members of the British royal family, Harry
and Meghan Windsor have both been campaigning against online hate speech,
although this is the strongest intervention from either to date.
Imran
Ahmed, the CEO of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, which is coordinating
the Stop Hate For Profit campaign in the UK and Europe, said: “Social media
gives bigots the opportunity to spread hate and misinformation to an audience
of millions for free. In this coronavirus pandemic, especially when it comes to
a potential life-saving vaccine, the whole world has been made painfully aware
that lies cost lives.
“Social
media users have in the past been ignored by social media companies because
they are the product, not the customers. Our data, our thoughts and our
sentiments are packaged and sold to their real customers, the advertisers.
“That’s why
the Duke of Sussex is so right to highlight the unique capacity and moral duty
advertisers have to force platforms to do something about the bigotry and
dangerous misinformation. Companies that want to play their part can send a
message by pausing or reducing their advertising on Facebook until they take
credible action.”
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