It's Time to Do More to Control the Hate Industry

Sami Al-Abdrabbuh, after re-election to the Corvallis, OR school board last May, began receiving death threats, which he attributed to the board’s COVID policies and teaching about racism.  “I love serving on the school board,” he said. “But I don’t want to die for it.”  Staci McElyea in the Nevada Secretary of State’s office called police after receiving three calls from the same man after the 2020 election: “I hope you all go to jail for treason. I hope your children get molested. You’re all going to f------ die,” he said.  The police said it was protected speech and he had violated no law.

Legal and social sanctions are used to address dangerous or negligent behavior by commercial enterprises.  Businesses understand the free market, including their free speech, comes with obligations and restrictions.  Yet we don’t recognize the generation, marketing and distribution of hate as an industry.  We should.  Billions are spent on it every year.  It’s organized, well-funded and dangerous and it’s undermining democracy.

·        In 2020, the Southern Poverty Law Center identified 833 hate groups in America.

·         In 2019, the Justice Department recorded 8,052 single incidents of hate crimes, many committed by those radicalized by hate-producing websites and organizations.  This is an undercount since well over 1,000 federal and local police agencies don’t report such incidents.

·        A Reuters survey recorded 102 threats of death or other violence against 40 election officials in eight of the most contested states in the 2020 election – again many provoked by organized purveyors of hate. 

·        During 2021, the FAA investigated 1,021 unruly passengers, nearly a ten-fold increase over 2020.  A survey of 5,000 flight attendants last July found 17 percent who reported being physically attacked, many enraged by angry anti-masking campaigns. 

·        Bullying, trolling and doxing (sharing personal information to encourage threats or violence against individuals) are widespread techniques often launched by the “hate industry”.

COVID and the 2020 election may be contributing factors, but the rise of hate began earlier. Hate comes from the political left and right. Too many Americans are angry, paving the way for hate which paves the way for violence. In 2019, 58 percent of Americans reported being angrier in the past year; 84 percent said Americans are angrier than they were a generation ago.  A 2018 Axios poll found nearly a quarter of Republicans and Democrats regarded those who belong to the other party as “evil.”  

Some parts of the “hate industry” are easily recognizable: 

·        Internet platforms, algorithms and social media:  Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, prominent examples, apply algorithms to push content based on user “likes” and characteristics, even if what they “like” promotes hate.  Hate groups, including foreign governments/actors, use ads and fake news to foment extremist views and conspiracy theories. Social media encourage hate speech (and worse) and help connect strangers who would otherwise never be able to organize hate campaigns.  Monitoring internet sites, de-platforming hate groups, redirection toward less hateful content and other methods have been only mildly successful.

 ·        Cable TV and talk radio:  As recounted in Sen. Ben Sasse’s book, Them: Why We Hate Each Other and How to Heal, a senior producer at a major cable news network described "rule one" of segment selection: "We only do two kinds of stories . . . those that make people who love us love us more and those that make people who hate us hate us more."  What’s good for their bottom line is devastating to the bottom line of democracy - trust, moderation, collaboration and compromise. While the demise of the Fairness Doctrine enabled more varied programming, it helped people enter echo chambers isolated from views that challenge and broaden their thinking.

·        Hate groups: As neo-Nazis have shown, hate groups form, raise funds and plan violence under the First Amendment’s protections. Many operate on the “dark web,” largely unrestricted through encrypted communication. Domestic terrorist groups operate in an environment with laws weaker than for foreign terrorists.

 ·        Politicians and parties:  Party organizations and candidates deny they foster hate, but their often false, nasty and demeaning rhetoric does just that.  The have billions of dollars to do so.  

 The “hate industry” defends its Constitutional rights to speak and assemble, but Americans have the right to live free from intimidation, fear and violence. That right was denied 32 year-old Heather Heyer, killed on August 12, 2017, by James Fields, Jr. as he drove his car into a Charlottesville, Virginia crowd at the neo-Nazi “Unite the Right” rally. Fields had earlier held a shield with the “VA” logo, standing for Vanguard America, a neo-Nazi group. Now renamed “Patriot Front,” that group continues its campaign against those “who are not of the founding stock” of America.

While parents (the first and sometimes the last line of defense) and schools play a critical role in preventing hate, they struggle against a “hate industry” funded by small and large donors, ad revenue, membership fees, and sales of merchandise. Current legal protections are insufficient to deal with what too many Americans face from those who use “free speech” to threaten and intimidate them. While many groups and individuals deny they generate hate, it is a result of what they do. Our citizens and our society pay the price. 

Photo Credit: wokandapix@pixababy.com