ABSTRACT
In Chapter 6, Networked Hate: Racism, Misogyny and Violence, we explore the harm that occurs when digital mediation intersects with structures of inequality and discrimination. Reactionary world-views common to online communities are increasingly consequential in politics and public places, placing pressure on digital platforms to more effectively regulate their user content. This chapter examines how specific acts of hate, understood as hate crimes and hate speech, increasingly occur through wider socio-technical processes that normalise intolerance and bigotry. This can be seen in examples where traditional institutions of social control struggle to respond to harm and hate that proliferate through digital platforms, morphing and amplifying existing forms of prejudice. In drawing on such examples, we argue that digital hate can thus be understood as a co-productive interaction between informal networks, formal institutions and technological systems. The challenge lies in the inability of networks, institutions or systems to alone determine social norms or cause change. Reducing harm and preventing hate requires addressing all these elements of digital society.
