Hate Speech on Social Media – Know Your Rights

What Is Hate Speech?

Hate speech is content that attacks, degrades or dehumanises people based on protected characteristics such as race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation, disability or nationality. It ranges from explicit slurs and calls for violence to more subtle forms of dehumanisation – such as comparing a group to animals, portraying an ethnic group as inherently criminal, or denying historical atrocities such as the Holocaust.

What separates hate speech from merely offensive or unpopular opinion is intent. The speaker promotes intolerance or discrimination against a protected group by using hateful slurs, insults or inciting violence against it.

That makes context decisive. Satire, journalism, counter-speech and educational material about hate speech, including quoting a slur in order to condemn it, are generally protected expression. Automated moderation systems operating at scale routinely fail to make that distinction. A journalist who documents racist abuse by posting a screenshot has the post removed. An LGBTQ+ activist criticising discrimination has the video taken down for breaching the platform's hate speech policy. Both are textbook false positives, and both can be challenged.

Protected characteristics – covered across major platform policies

• Race and ethnicity
• National origin
• Religion
• Gender and gender identity
• Sexual orientation
• Disability
• Caste
• Immigration or citizenship status

Since the Digital Services Act (DSA) came into force, users can challenge unfair moderation decisions through a certified out-of-court dispute settlement body. User Rights is the first such body certified under Article 21 DSA in Europe, certified by the German Federal Network Agency (Bundesnetzagentur). The procedure is free of charge for users. The platform bears the costs. You do not need to complete the platform's internal complaint procedure before turning to User Rights. All we require is proof that you submitted a report or filed an internal appeal through the platform's complaint mechanism.

Cases are currently reviewed for Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, LinkedIn and Pinterest. Our assessments are based on platform Community Guidelines and, where relevant, EU law as well as national law – including German and Italian law in applicable cases.

Examples of Hate Speech

• Dehumanising language or comparison to animals: Individuals or groups from marginalised communities are degraded by being compared to animals or described as subhuman (e.g. comparing people with Black skin to apes).
• Generalising negative characteristics: Entire groups are portrayed as criminal, dangerous, or inferior based on identity (e.g. “All young migrants are rapists and sex offenders.”).
• Claims of superiority: A person presents themselves or their group as superior while making derogatory or discriminatory statements about a marginalised community (e.g. sexist insults or discrimination against members of the LGBTQIA+ community).
• Trivialising or endorsing violence against protected groups: Acts of violence, persecution, or historical atrocities against protected groups are downplayed, justified, glorified, or mocked (e.g. trivialising the Holocaust).

Hate Speech Policies on Social Media Platforms

All platforms covered by User Rights are subject to the DSA, which requires them to give reasons for moderation decisions and to cooperate with certified dispute settlement bodies. Each platform also maintains its own community standards, which set out what content is prohibited.

Meta: Instagram and Facebook

Meta's Hate Speech policy ("Hateful Conduct") prohibits content that dehumanises people based on protected characteristics, including comparisons to animals or pathogens, calls for exclusion or segregation, and use of slurs. Sharing hateful material in order to condemn or report it is permitted, but only where the speaker's intent is clear, and automated enforcement at scale regularly fails to read that intent correctly.

TikTok

TikTok's Community Guidelines on Hate Speech and Hateful Behaviour prohibit explicit and implicit attacks on a protected group, including slurs and dehumanising imagery. Beyond outright removal, TikTok may make content "ineligible for recommendation", a moderation action which can be reviewed by User Rights, and one that is more challenging to see for the creator.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn's Professional Community Policies prohibit content that incites hatred or demeans people based on protected characteristics. Posts discussing structural discrimination, gender pay gaps or religious minorities in a professional context are generally permitted, but LinkedIn's report-driven moderation can lead to removal of legitimate critical commentary.

Pinterest

Pinterest's Community Guidelines prohibit content that promotes hate based on identity attributes. Pinterest extends that prohibition to mocking or attacking the beliefs, sacred symbols, movements or institutions of protected and vulnerable groups. Moderation errors particularly affect content related to minority cultures and religious practices, which may superficially resemble prohibited material to automated classifiers.

What Can You Do if You Are Affected by Hate Speech?

There are two distinct situations in which you may experience problems with hate speech on a platform: your own content is wrongly removed or restricted, or you report hate speech and the platform fails to act. Both are reviewable by User Rights.

Scenario A: Your own content was removed or restricted

1. Document the moderation action: Screenshot the removal notice, including the stated reason and the content concerned. Under Art. 17 DSA platforms are required to give you a specific reason for their decision.
2. Appeal internally: Use the platform's appeal or review function, available via the notification or the platform's help centre. Keep a record of your appeal and the platform's response.
3. Submit to User Rights: If the internal appeal was unsuccessful or the platform did not respond within seven days, submit your case to User Rights. The review is free of charge for you.
4. What User Rights examines: Whether the removal was consistent with the platform's own policies and applicable law (e.g. European, German or Italian law). If not, the platform will be asked to restore your content or revise the measure. Our review is bounded by the ground the platform relied on. If it removed your content for breaching its Community Guidelines, we assess it against those guidelines. If it removed your content as unlawful, we assess it against the law it invoked. We do not substitute one standard for the other, so a removal that was justified under the guidelines is not overturned merely because the content was lawful.

Scenario B: You reported hate speech and the platform did not act

1. Report the content: Use the platform's in-built reporting function and take a screenshot of the content and the date you reported it. When you report, check whether the platform's rules or local or EU law is most applicable to your case. 
2. Follow up: If the platform dismisses your report, appeal the decision via its help centre. You can also submit a case with User Rights if the platform does not react to your report within seven days.
3. Submit to User Rights: If the platform's inaction was inconsistent with its own stated hate speech policy, you can submit a complaint. User Rights reviews both directions: decisions to remove and decisions not to remove.

A full overview of what falls within scope is available on the scope of review page. Direct messages (DMs) and moderation actions that were taken more than six months ago fall outside the scope of review.

Was your content removed for alleged hate speech – or did the platform fail to act on hate speech you reported?