Social media helping hate groups flourish
Not everything on the Web is good, wholehearted, family fun. In fact, there is a lot of stuff you really wouldn’t want your kids seeing or being influenced by. Unfortunately, hate groups and those advocating terrorism are a growing force on the Web, with social networking sites allowing them to flourish.
I like to think that the Internet has generally been a force for good since its invention. The World Wide Web has opened up communication, education, research, entertainment, and pretty much every other element of our society. However, that inevitably means the Web has also opened up the unpleasant and bad elements of society.
Many people are worried about what effect the proliferation of the Internet is having on children, which are, after all, the adults of tomorrow. I don’t personally believe it’s as bad as the naysayers will have us believe, but there is a definite impact being made on future generations.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center for Tolerance has released its annual report studying how hate groups are operating an spreading online. The Center claims that hate groups – which includes any and all groups promoting or advocating violence, terrorism, or intolerance – have grown by 20 percent in the last 12 months, with 11,500 being a conservative estimate of the number of such groups now operating.
Social networking is where the biggest growth is happening, with Facebook and YouTube being mentioned in particular. Facebook has a somewhat liberal attitude to groups such as these being present on the site. And even if one is closed, they soon create another one under a slightly different name. While YouTube is allegedly being used to propagate guides on how to build bombs and the like.
Fox News suggests a kid of six has been turned into “a hate-filled Islamic fundamentalist zombie” after being brainwashed after striking up an online friendship with a radical terrorist. But I think that’s unbelievable, quite frankly, and certainly not typical of the kind of effect these groups are having on the Web.
Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Center told the New York Times that, “The goal is to get the collective genius of the Internet to help combat this problem.” Which is a worthy ambition and an effort I’m sure many of us could get behind.
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