When Cyber-Hate Leads to Violence
Over the years, the Internet has proven to be both good and bad. On the positive side, the net allows us to get the news, talk to others who are far away, use social media, and use search engines to do research. The problem is that these same features can be used by extremists to spread bigotry, xenophobia, racism and anti-Semitism. The recent events by Robert Bowers, the racist gunman who killed eleven and wounded six, demonstrates exactly how this toxic mix helped lead to one of the worst hate crimes in the 21stcentury history.
Robert Bowers was a habitual user of Gab, a media platform that allows bigots who have been kicked off of other internet and social media platforms, to spread their views of hate and anti-Semitism, allowing users to feed off of each other’s hate and, in the end, increasing their anger and frustration. The power of the net and social media was apparent at the Charlottesville rally were protesters used twitter and web sites to spread ideas to like-minded bigots about attending the rally and to inflict violence on the left. As a result of the violence at the rally, web providers and social network sites began shutting down accounts to stop the spread of hate. As a result, Gab was created by Andrew Toba in the summer of 2016 to provide a platform for individuals to express their biased views.
On Bowers’ Gab account, he made comments stating, “Open your Eyes! It’s the filthy EVIL jews Bringing the Filthy EVIL Muslims into the Country!!” Online Bowers began making conspiratorial comments that the Jews ran the government and were secretly bringing Muslims to the United States and that their goals were to destroy “white civilization” and that this would eventually lead to the eventual demise of “Western Civilization”—this is what the racists refer to as “white genocide”. Bowers is not alone. The net, over the last couple of years, has seen an increase in cyber-hate because hate group, and the alt-right, have worked to reach a larger global audience. Organized hate groups have become tech savvy, the net and social media are their plat forms to incite violence and have others do their dirty work. Their use of the net is to be expected given that 51% of the world’s population—which equates to 3.2 billion people--have access to net and can go on these hate sites.
This is not to say that the net needs more regulating. What needs to be done is more monitoring by site providers. This type of cyber-hate being shared only leads to larger problems; like Dylann Roof, the mass shooter who opened fire on blacks attending service at the African Methodist Church, learned and was fed more hate by like-minded bigots, who met online and used social media. More education needs to be done to combatting hate online as well. Groups like the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty law center are doing this and more people need to become savvy to detecting hate sites. Only education will help prevent future incidents like the Pittsburgh massacre from happening again.
Kevin Borgeson is the Faculty Research Fellow at the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Salem State University. Robin Maria Valeri is Professor of Psychology at St. Bonaventure University. They are the editors of the book: Hate Crimes: Typology, Motivations, and Victims.