We seem to have a major divergence in thinking regarding the control of social media. Elon Musk, since acquiring what we must now call X, has converted it from a web-site making a half-hearted attempt at controlling the sentiments expressed on it to one which no longer really tries. It is now expressly absolutist in its view of what can be published. Early on, he sacked most of its ‘moderators’, taking the view that, short of actual incitement to criminal acts, anyone could express any opinion on it. Full freedom of speech is on offer.

And he has lead the way with his own opinions ranging from ‘liking’ anti-Semitic tropes to forecasting civil war in the UK. Research conducted by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue tells us that anti-Semitic tweets in English more than doubled after Musk’s takeover. And the number of pro-Kremlin accounts grew 36 percent on the platform in the six months after Musk lifted mitigation measures.

His absolutism has though already hurt his investment. The number of people visiting the website has markedly reduced and, more to the point, advertisers have also fled. Mr. Musk noted this summer that ad revenue had fallen 50 percent. He blamed the Anti-Defamation League, one of several advocacy groups that have catalogued the rise of hateful speech on X, for “trying to kill this platform.”.

The advertisers though are simply reacting to their advertisements being placed on X next to hate-filled rants from left and right wing extremists. They, quite reasonably, don’t see this as good for business. And Musk’s response? He is suing those advertisers, alleging that they have ganged together to engage in anti-competitive practices by not advertising on X.

I suppose then that I should be in favour of a very different approach – one which requires the removal of comments which make the internet and social media posts in general into the swamp that it is.

And just in time, we have a new Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper. She has vowed to come down hard on those people who promote ‘harmful or hateful beliefs’; to tackle any online or offline activity that ‘promotes violence or undermines democracy’. In her statement, she said:

I have directed the Home Office to conduct a rapid analytical sprint on extremism, to map and monitor extremist trends, to understand the evidence about what works to disrupt and divert people away from extremist views, and to identify any gaps in existing policy which need to be addressed to crack down on those pushing harmful and hateful beliefs and violence.

The Home Office says it will look at the rise of both Islamist and far-right extremism in the UK, as well as wider ideological trends, including extreme misogyny or beliefs that fit into broader categories like fixation on violence. Inciting violence is already illegal. If you do it you’re in trouble.

But Cooper’s other categories of ‘harmful or hateful beliefs’ are troubling. And what does her promise to tackle ideologies that undermine democracy actually mean? Democracy has no single form. It can take many shapes. Members of small political parties may well feel that first past the post democracy is unfair and undemocratic. Larger parties will see that proportional representation can allow extremist parties to prosper, so triggering the sort of action taken in the second round of the French legislative elections to block them from taking power. But is that not to undermine democracy?

And what about people calling for us to rejoin the EU? Are they not calling for the result of a referendum to be reversed? The government made a promise. To go back on that promise any time soon would surely undermine democracy in the eyes of those who voted to leave. Democracy depends in part upon trust in institutions.

Of course we have looked in the past at the changes in our nationally accepted form of morality. In earlier times, I have no doubt that the promotion of rights for the gay community would have been regarded as the promotion of harmful or hateful beliefs. It still is so regarded in numerous countries. So then on that basis, calling for such change as we have now seen actually come about would, on this proposed new definition, have been unlawful.

Going further back in time, rights for women were not easily come by. The whole idea of women having the necessary intellectual capacity to take part in voting for a government, rather than sticking to their natural role in life of bringing up children, would have been regarded as a harmful belief.

These days we are most used to censorship in the setting of the cinema. But censorship of a more serious kind existed well-before we had the silver screen. Under the watchful eye of the Lord Chamberlain, play-houses had to be very careful not to upset the aristocracy who ran the country. Any criticism had to be dressed-up as comedy.

There is an underlying problem with censorship: it is that we have to entrust officialdom to sort ideas into categories marked ‘acceptable’ or ‘unacceptable’.

Placing such faith in government rarely produces a good outcome. It gives government the power to shape public discourse to its own ideological tastes. Censorship is always portrayed as a heroic effort to protect the public from ‘harmful’ ideas, but in truth it is about ensuring the public is primarily exposed to ideas the government approves of.

Galileo was told that he could not believe the evidence of his own observations which told him that the earth was not the centre of the solar system. He had instead to believe the Church’s interpretation of God’s infallible word.

And it is only three years since Starmer told us that it is ‘not right’ to say ‘only women have a cervix’. That is ‘something that shouldn’t be said’, he asserted after one of his MPs – Rosie Duffield – committed that very blasphemy of stating basic biological facts.

If we are told by the person who is now our prime minister that basic biology was ‘something that shouldn’t be said’, are we seriously expected to trust a government to rule on what is a harmful belief and what is an okay belief?

Of course he is not a scientist but a lawyer, so who knows what goes on in the dark recesses of his mind? But I do wonder what perfectly normal, scientifically correct belief he might rebrand as ‘harmful’ in the near future.

To add to my concern we are now about to have the reinstatement of the obligation for the police to record non-criminal hate speech - whatever that may be.

I seem to recall that evolution was once considered hateful by many people because it was very damaging to the image of ourselves as God's special creation.

It has been noted that the specialist vocabulary of wokeness was mainly missing from the Democratic party conference this year. Such concerns were seemingly overtaken by a feeling of euphoria that the blessed Kamala had come to save them. (So unexpected was her promotion to this position that my spell-check dictionary doesn’t recognise her name.)

But in this country we still have many hyper-fragile people who claim to be ‘harmed’ by words all the time. If someone expresses doubt about biological males being involved in boxing with women at the Olympics, the supporters of the trans movement will claim that they are being ‘erased’.

So then if the government sends the signal that ‘harmful’ beliefs will be legally unacceptable under its watch, we are likely to see an expansion of grievance-mongering.

At the moment we see quite vicious on-line attacks against those who express views that are not currently acceptable. Those social groups will be simply unable to resist the temptation to demand that the full force of the law be used to suppress the expression of beliefs that make them feel ‘erased’, a feeling which in truth is simply anger at being contradicted.

A war on ‘harmful’ beliefs would give the government dangerous powers to silence views that are unfashionable but nonetheless arguable or just not very PC.

I would far rather be exposed to ‘harmful’ ideas than be ‘protected’ from them by this government or any other.

26 August 2024

Paul Buckingham