Washington, D.C. — From Charleston, South Carolina, and Charlottesville, Virginia, to this weekend’s planned white supremacist rally in Washington, D.C., there’s no question that much of modern-day hate and white nationalism spreads and is fomented online.
Ahead of this weekend’s anniversary of the 2017 Charlottesville rally and the planned follow-up rally in front of the White House, the Center for American Progress has released an issue brief for policymakers and the technology industry to combat racism online and break barriers in the digital world.
Top-line recommendations include:
- Media and technology companies should implement clear terms-of-use policies for hate speech and expand enforcement mechanisms.
- Online platforms and advertisers must be mindful of algorithms and policies that unfairly target racial minorities, such as allowing search engines to display racially biased ads in their results for black-sounding names.
- Technology companies should increase workforce diversity through more inclusive recruitment and by retaining workers of color by building safe and inclusive workplaces.
“As our society becomes more reliant on technology, we must ensure that we fight against stereotypes and racism manifesting itself online,” says Danyelle Solomon, co-author of the brief and CAP’s senior director of Race and Ethnicity Policy. “In writing this report, we found that there are a number of simple, concrete, and actionable steps that both policymakers and the tech industry can take to reduce racism and mitigate hate online.”
Click here to read: “Combating Hate and White Nationalism in the Digital World” by Aastha Uprety and Danyelle Solomon
For more information on this topic or to speak with an expert, please contact Julia Cusick at [email protected] or 202-495-3682.