Twitter to ban ‘dehumanising language’

Social media major Twitter is in the midst of a new moderation policy explicitly banning dehumanising speech. The company has said it is part of an ongoing effort to promote healthy conversations and curtailing real-world distress stemming from discourse on the platform.

Twitter broadly defines ‘dehumanising language’ as words that ‘treat others as less than human’, according to a recent company blog post, published on September 25.

Sanjay Vasudeva, Founder and CEO, Buzzone, an influencer marketing platform, points out Twitter is one of the highly-engaged platforms with millions of active users. “Since Twitter is used for multiple purposes such as expressing one’s opinion, running political campaigns, brand promotions and influencer marketing campaigns, it is imperative to assure that the quality of the platform remains intact,” he said.

‘Repeated compalints’

Vasudeva said, “In the recent past, Twitter purged many fake accounts which assured advertising campaign runners of authentic traction. Now, due to repeated complaints from multiple users regarding offensive language in tweets being posted without any monitoring, Twitter has decided to expand its hateful conduct policy by adding the dehumanisation speech clause, which will curb demeaning behaviour in posts.”

Hate speech has been a thorn in the side of social media for long. Under the guise of free speech, harassers, stalkers and racists have used it to converse with whoever they wanted to, with impunity.

In July, Twitter removed more than 70 million fake accounts that were reportedly manipulating brand marketers into forking over money to fraudulent social media influencers, and accounts that were indulging in cyberbullying and trolling.

“Facebook and most other social media platforms already have a report-spam button. ,” said Vasudeva.