Drivers of hate in the US have distinct regional differences

sciencecodex.com/drivers-hate-us-have-distinct-regional-differences-618920

In a new study, University of Utah geographers sought to understand the factors fueling hate across space. Their findings paint a rather grim reality of America; hate is a national phenomenon, and more complicated than they imagined.

The researchers mapped the patterns of active hate groups in every U.S. county in the year 2014, and analyzed their potential socioeconomic and ideological drivers.

They found that in all U.S. regions, less education, population change, and ethnic diversity correlated with more hate groups, as did areas with higher poverty rates and more conservative political affiliation. The magnitude of the drivers had regional differences, however. The regional variation of the proposed drivers of hate may be a result of diverse ethnic and cultural histories. One surprising finding is that the geographical region seemed to determine whether religion has a positive or negative relative effect on the number of hate groups for the county.

The U geographers assert that organized hate is motivated by the desire to protect a place from the perceived threats that 'outsiders' pose to identity and socioeconomic security. The contemporary expression, 'hate,' is shaped by the intermingling histories and present-day conditions of a place.

"There is a lot of uncertainty in the country today, and a lot of change. For those involved in hate group activities, they see their actions as a way to secure the future of their people. Unfortunately, that fear turns to hate, and in the worst case, violence," said Richard Medina, assistant professor in the Department of Geography at the U, and senior author of the study.

"Hate is a geographic problem. The ways people hate are based on the cultures, histories, ethnicities and many other factors dependent on place and place perception."

The study published online in the Annals of the American Association of Geographerson Feb. 9, 2018.

A grim reality

"When thinking about hate and place, it really boils down to thinking about identity," said Emily Nicolosi, co-author and doctoral student at the U. "Some people have strong feelings about who belongs, and who doesn't belong in 'their' place. When they see people coming in that they think don't belong, their very identity feels threatened."

A hate group is an organized group or ideology with beliefs or practices that malign an entire class of people due to their immutable characteristics, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). Whether it be their race, gender, religion, ethnicity, disability, or sexual orientation, a hate group expresses prejudice against people with a particular identity. Though hate has always existed, 2016 saw a near-high in the number of hate groups in the United States, according to the SPLC. There is still much to learn about how Americans hate, and why.

The researchers mapped active hate groups for every U.S. county using the SPLC database from 2014. They compared the relationships between these groups with the county's socioeconomic factors, meant to represent diversity, poverty, education level and population stability, and ideological factors, represented as religion and degree of conservativism.

"People hate for different reasons because U.S. regions have different situations and histories. For example, the Northeast is a place of power that may be seen as elitist and well-educated. Is there still hate? Yes. Some of the reasons people hate there are different than in the South, where there's a different history of the Confederacy, of discrimination, and so on," said Nicolosi.

While this is not the first study to quantify hate groups at the county level, it is one of the first to look more regionally and analyze variations in space explicitly. Previous research has focused on why people hate, but all populations are typically analyzed together in a national model. Until now, the drivers of hate have never been differentiated for specific places.

What's next?

Medina and Nicolosi want to analyze the differences between different types of hate groups, and whether hate groups are linked to violent behavior.

"First and foremost, I want our paper to help people understand how much we don't know about hate--hate is not a uniform phenomenon. Hopefully this study motivates people to start asking more questions, especially right now," said Medina. "We have a long way to go before we really understand the drivers and patterns of hate in this country."

Internet History Reviewed - We Screwed Up

I'm from New York, but I have lived online since dial-up networks, and continuously and deeply for over 15 years. I know my neighborhood. I know where to get good pizza and bad sushi. I know the internet that way too.

In the early days of the internet, and especially Web 2.0, we were optimistic, energized, enthused, and mostly wrong.

We were convinced we had ideas that would revolutionize the world and allow the best, strongest and most inspired human ideas and aspirations to become the predominant ethos of our world. 

Everyone was desperately protective of their products, ideas and companies. Each company built barriers, supremely convinced their idea was unique and needed to be secured. But we also built isolation.

In our optimism we forgot basic philosophy, that inescapable yin and yang of reality; good cannot exist without evil.  Within all good resides some bad.

With the lurking evil summarily ignored, we happily moved on.  More than 10 years later, the mantra that the best will rise to the surface and good voices will prevail over bad, was still being uttered in the corner offices  of the major companies.

This despite mounting evidence that disruptive, caustic, malicious players had established a long lived, strong foothold on the internet in major places. In the isolated company environments,  the shared industry-wide nature of the problem went undetected. Perhaps even ignored. And in quiet, fertile ground of the ignored digital places, the problem grew. Even the groups who had dedicated themselves to monitoring hate online questioned themselves about the extent and impact of hate online.

We were wrong.

Government and law enforcement were largely ignorant of the problem.

Victims struggled to cope with a system which offered few substantive, reasonable channels for recourse to their problems.

It was as if  we were hearing completely different things with no one translating.

Fortunately, the disciples of hate, bias and discord were not smart or patient. When President Trump was elected in an atmosphere of social divisiveness, they took that as their signal. Over the years they had interpreted society's lack of serious response to their movement as an indication of tacit approval. They miscalculated and badly overplayed their hand.

In 2017 the hate movement managed to demonstrate what the social movement watch-dogs had been saying for years, violent words lead the to violent action. Although not all keyboard racists are violent, Charlottesville and other events have proved that they truly act as the cheerleaders for a deeply malevolent and viscious segment of society. 

This is now clear, for anyone brave enough to look. The tools for exploring the depths of the internet are available as never before. Identities can still be hidden, but the nature, extent and vectors of malice are now easily documented.

Yes, there is much good online. The benefits we have derived are beyond knowing. We  have discovered that good does not flourish without help, but evil does. However, good grows quickly with the slightest attention while hate and bias stagnate and struggle under the same conditions. The number of dark unobserved places online is shrinking, not because of censorship or control, but because people, companies and governments have seen the true cost of hate and finally agree it is unacceptable.

Time for a Universal Online Code of Conduct

Is there anyone who feels we don't need a Universal Code of Conduct (UCoC)for the internet? Probably. But those are most likely people who make a point of facilitating the abuse of others. Almost every civil society, community protection, civil rights or anti-hate group has considered, drafted or published such a thing. Many government agencies have created such documents and even some companies have policies stated as universal across their services.

These policy statements go by various names; Terms of Service, Code of Conduct, User Agreement, and Community Guideline. With minor variations, it all boils down to the same concept; an agreement on what the companies, users, community and government can expect from each other - or it should.


All the groups, agencies and companies who build such agreements do it from a highly subjective and self serving perspective.  Everyone has an agenda. This immediately compromises any hope of creating an agreement with parity. Understandably, no one is readily willing to accept a Code of Conduct they had no hand in crafting.  Despite the ultimate advantage of a combined effort, there will always be companies, people, groups or governments who will never accept anything but their own concept of free speech. That is ironically, an example of free speech too.

There are companies ready and willing to cooperate and experiment in collaboration on a UCoC. Let's call them Tier 1 companies. The next group of companies agrees that some form of standards for on-line behavior is needed, but have reservations about anyone but them defining those limits on their platform. Then there are the Tier 3 companies who don't feel such a UCoC applies to them or object to such an overreaching policy on principals of free speech and freedom of choice. Ultimately companies are businesses and only responsible for acting within the law, but they also need keep to customers in order to stay in business

Communities need to stay aware of the power they have over companies and the responsibility that power contains. Enough users and public sentiment can make of break an on-line company. Any company. Consumers can push companies to mold policy in a desired direction. The trap is pushing a company to where their service is no longer competitive or the policies are so restrictive as to be unmanageable. Unprofitable businesses have a habit of closing.

Terms of Service as a contract has never been successfully tested in court. The companies don't want to lose and find the that ToS or other term are legally enforceable. Civil agencies and consumers don't want to lose and find that ToS are meaningless.  Odds are a court challenge is just a matter of time.

It is a far better idea for a congress of involved parties to establish an agreed, mutual UCOC than to wait for some disaster to push us there.

Deleting Hate Does Not Stop Hate

The EU is, rightly, very excited about their efforts to push the internet companies to better address hate speech has resulted in an estimated 70% removal rate. But the grim reality is that removing hate speech does not stop hate.

If only it was that simple.

Hate speech on-line is a manifestation of real world sentiments.  Removing it does not, by itself, change the reality creating it. During the period of EU's increased online enforcement,  far right groups and candidates still flourished in the European political arena and anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant and anti-Semitic displays blossomed across EU. The American experience over the past year, with neo-Nazi groups re-branded as alt-right, marching in average communities, also shows that muffling hate speech alone does not address the root problem of racist propaganda and divisive politics.

By focussing on the outward manifestations and not the underlying issues, the public and the governments are handing the companies a job they can never complete.

Perhaps the most productive aspect of the EU efforts is to demonstrate to the tech companies that more investment was always needed. Now it is more obvious than ever that investing in better ideas and more advanced automated methods is far more cost effective and manageable than any army of reviewers.  The companies have always maintained that the answer  was in social solutions. Finally perhaps we are arriving at a place where  the two tactics are, for the first time, meeting. 

Governments and society are finally beginning to understand how vast and complex the problem is. Companies are coming to grips with the scope of the impact and damage a weaponized internet can cause. Everyone sees that no single solution, and certain no one approach alone is working. The problem mutates and adapts too rapidly.

We have managed to come together in the past to defeat a daunting enemy. Looks like we need that attitude again.

Bring Out Your Bots - We Can Play This Game Too

Weaponized social media is being used to destabilize cultures, societies and governments. Yes, by Russia, but many others as well. It is obvious that physical invasion or overthrow is too expensive. Forget spies and infiltration, that is too unpredictable.  The internet is a cheap, powerful and effective weapon.

People and governments investigate what is happening, when it started and how it was done. There is no question it happened and continues to happen. These weapons are equally available to everyone.

Rather than study, discuss or ague, perhaps it is time to initiate our own bot armies.  Engaging in botwars comes with responsibilities. These are powerful tools of war. How much destruction and collateral damage we can stomach. As Westerners, once we embrace weaponized bots, we will become very good at using them.

Think about  nuclear weapons.  We determined early on that the only sane, conceivable use was defensive and hopefully as nothing more than a deterrent. What about bots? What are the limits? How far are we willing to go?

Hate Is Not An Accident

Ignorance of what is hate is somehow expected to be an acceptable apology. When someone significant, influential or just "known" gets caught saying something awful, hateful or racist the most popular excuse is, "I didn't know that was hate. It was an accident. I didn't mean it." Such ignorance is only achieved through intentional inattention. 

Giving air to hate is promoting hate.

Admitting ignorance of what is hate does not un-type or un-say the words. Anyone who objects to hate speech has an obligation to know what it is. If someone is truly sorry about uttering hate, they need to work against hate. The apology is in the actions.

In the world of hate and racism, speaking hate is considered a slip which betrays the speakers true feelings. Retraction or denial is seen as bowing to pressure from "society's masters."  So when Donald Trump, Mel Gibson, Roy Moore or Louis Farrakhan post hateful videos or say things bolstering racism, whether they claim it is an accident, a mistake, misspoken or not, makes little difference. The hate  immediately becomes spray-painted on a psychological wall in our society. Removing it takes cleaning not simply disowning.

Sixty days after Donald Trump re-posted anti-Muslim videos from the hate group Britain First does he now admit it "might" have been a mistake. If it was unclear if the videos were hate, the source he pulled them from certainly clears up any confusion for anyone paying attention.

It is hard to believe an intelligent "least racist person ever" could have done something this problematic, not addressed it for two months and then expect any apology to be accepted as genuine.

Hate is not accident. 

A Critically Realistic New Year To All.

Things Go Wrong On The Internet.

No other industry in history has had such an impact, grown as fast or involve such complexity as the internet, smart and mobile devices.  The next best example is the auto industry which equally transformed the nation. The difference is that it took the car industry 70 years to reach the dominance the internet has achieved in 20 years.

Moving at such a high speed, things are going to go wrong.

The first automotive safety standards were self-imposed by the industry in the 1930's when Ford made safety glass mandatory in all it's vehicles, GM started doing crash test and Chrysler recessed dashboard controls.  Government-mandated safety standards in the U.S. and in most of the world did not occur for another 20 years.

Was it appropriate for government to impose regulations? Absolutely. Was it right that consumers had input? Certainly. Until the government created a workable regulatory framework and the public collaborated on their needs, the industry took matter into their own hands.

So it goes with the internet.

Unfortunately, most safety measures, in almost every industry, are in response to knowledge gained through unfortunate incidents.

Today's internet looks and acts nothing like the internet of 1995, 2005 or even 2015! The speed with which government would have to enact safety regulations regarding today's internet is very uncharacteristic, if it is even possible.

The public is much more interested in finger-pointing and embarrassing companies than they are in understanding the underlying causes of the issues and the complexity of solutions.  They are not interested in understanding that solutions can, by themselves, cause more problems.

Solutions must involve the companies. Whether the companies, the public or government like it or not. If left unassisted, the companies will make their own decisions.

There is no magic wand, but there is an answer.

Responsibility - all the way around.

Companies need to take responsibility for the content on their services. Even if they are not legally responsible, they are still profiting from the content, good or bad. Public education is also critical. 

Users need to take responsibility for what they post. They need to take responsibility for being informed about the platforms they use.

Governments need to take responsibility for being informed and protecting consumers from undue threats and harm. Train law enforcement properly on cyber issues and develop laws to protect our vulnerable populations.

Our one voice can be a chorus, or it will be a mob.