Reining in social media

GERMANY has passed a law under which social media websites such as Facebook could face fines of up to € 50 million for failing to remove hate speech flagged by users. The Network Enforcement Act is to come into effect in October. Many governments around the world would be tempted to follow the example, concerned as they are over the masses getting unbridled access to a tool for spreading “malice” and “venom”. What is found offensive depends on when and where an idea is sought to be expressed. Right now, Angela Merkel’s Germany is hoping to suppress “hatred” against immigrants and the sporadic expression of Nazi thought. But at another time in the same Germany the reverse may be happening, under the same law. What a government does with a law is as important as what the law is.

In India, the Supreme Court in 2015 scrapped Section 66A of the Information Technology Act that could send people to prison for what they posted on the Internet. But we have, depressingly enough, learnt what law can do to suppress even legitimate expression of divergent opinion, with the most innocuous acts and statements being acted upon under the “sedition” charge. We have to take a rather liberal view of what hurts “religious sensibilities” or threatens “national security” for the simple reason it is nearly impossible to judge every nuance of language and thought. Supreme Court guidelines on what may comprise “sedition”, which are rather specific, should be a good reference point.

Nearly every initiative in history that has led to the establishment of democracy in many parts of the world has been met with heavy resistance from the incumbent dispensations. And controlling thought has been the foremost instrument. The Internet promised to be a great leveller in that — giving to everyone the power to bypass a publishing house, media baron, and editor to air his mind. Controlling social media will kill its inherent ways of keeping a check on itself, and put that power in the hands that hold the reins of the government of the day. That could be even more dangerous than an unrestrained medium.