By James Simons-
Facebook Inc. and Twitter are under increasing pressure to identify and eliminate abusers from their platform, after racist abuse was hurled at England team’s Black players, following the team’s embarrassing defeat in the Euro 2021 final, decided on a penalty shoot out.
Twitter Inc. and Facebook Inc. have been accused of not acting fast enough to take down the abuse, after abuse remained on their platform on Monday- almost 24 hours after they were posted.
Vile racists have used both facebook and social media in the past to vent their racist tendencies The vile comments were directed at players Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka, all of whom missed penalty kicks in the end-of-game shootout. British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, called the abuse “appalling,” while the Football Association said in a statement that it was, “appalled by the online racism that has been aimed at some of our England players on social media.”
In 2018, Mp Diane Abbott expressed shock and anger after receiving so much racial abuse on twitter, and called for the social media giants to address hate on their platform. Her comments at the time came in response to research from Amnesty International which found that black women in journalism and politics were 84% more likely than white women to be mentioned in abusive tweets.
The report warned that such abuse had a “chilling effect” on freedom of expression by women online and “undermines women’s mobilization for equality and justice – particularly groups of women who already face discrimination and marginalization”
Arsenal, Saka’s club, said in a statement:
“The social media platforms and authorities must act to ensure this disgusting abuse to which our players are subjected on a daily basis stops now.” “We have processes in place internally at Arsenal to ensure our players are supported both emotionally and practically on this issue but sadly there is only so much we can do.”
The Football Association echoed those sentiments, saying social media companies “need to step up and take accountability and action to ban abusers from their platforms,” adding that the said companies should be responsible for gathering evidence so users can face legal action. London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, also asked for more accountability for social media companies.
Facebook said in response that it had taken down the offending comments “quickly.” The company added, “No one thing will fix this challenge overnight, but we’re committed to keeping our community safe from abuse.”
Twitter said that over a 24-hour period after the game, it took down more than 1,000 comments and has also banned a number of accounts that issued racist remarks. “The abhorrent racist abuse directed at England players last night has absolutely no place on Twitter,” a spokesperson for the company said.
Nonetheless, Priti Patel, the U.K.’s interior minister, said social media companies can “no longer ignore the appalling, vile, racist, violent and hateful content that appears on their platforms.” She said if something doesn’t change soon, the companies will feel the weight of the Online Safety Bill. Under this proposed legislation, social media companies that are accused of breaching the bill could face a fine of almost $25 million, or 10% of their annual global revenue.