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Top Tech Firms Urged To Step Up Online Abuse Fightback (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report on The Guardian: Top tech companies are talking to grassroots organisations across the globe to organise a fightback on their platforms against online abuse, hate speech, misogyny and stalking. Facebook, Twitter and Google are reaching out to women's groups, NGOs and communities in Africa, America, India, Europe and the Middle East as the scale of abuse online continues to increase. But their attempts to foster a "counter-speech" movement to challenge the violent misogyny, racism, threats, intimidation and abuse that flood social media platforms have prompted some of the communities they are trying to empower to question whether they are ducking their own responsibilities. Sarah Green, of the End Violence against Women coalition, said: "Any moves by social media companies to support, encourage and empower individuals and groups to resist and counter abuse is very welcome."
There will always be people who are inclined to abuse others. Wouldn't it be better to keep that abuse sand-boxed in the virtual world rather than forcing abusers to act out in the physical world?
Wouldn't it be even better to address the root cause, that being the people who are inclined to abuse others?