The view from the other side: The border between controversial speech and harassment on Kotaku in Action

Abstract

In this paper, we use mixed methods to study a controversial Internet site: The Kotaku in Action (KiA) subreddit. Members of KiA are part of GamerGate, a distributed social movement. We present an emic account of what takes place on KiA: who are they, what are their goals and beliefs, and what rules do they follow. Members of GamerGate in general and KiA in particular have often been accused of harassment. However, KiA site policies explicitly prohibit such behavior, and members insist that they have been falsely accused. Underlying the controversy over whether KiA supports harassment is a complex disagreement about what “harassment” is, and where to draw the line between freedom of expression and censorship. We propose a model that characterizes perceptions of controversial speech, dividing it into four categories: criticism, insult, public shaming, and harassment. We also discuss design solutions that address the challenges of moderating harassment without impinging on free speech, and communicating across different ideologies.

Human-Machine Collaboration for Content Regulation

“…Because the moderators 9 who help achieve content curation are responsible for adjudicating what millions of users see and, just as importantly, what they do not see, they play an important role in modern free speech and democratic culture. Indeed, the impacts of content regulation transcend online experiences and the question of freedom of speech [53,109]. Prior research has suggested that failures in content regulation may cause irreversible professional damage [55,109] or they may result in disabled or elderly users losing the ability to communicate with their family networks [109].…”

“…Worse still, Blackwell et al found that using automated approaches to identify abusive language can result in situations where the concerns of only the dominant groups are emphasized and existing structural inequalities are exacerbated [8]. These systems are also vulnerable to the same challenges that human moderators face-many moderation decisions are complex, subtle, and contested, and different users may feel differently about the appropriateness of the same content [39,53].…”

“…In this way, current automated tools miss out on the opportunities to examine the social and psychological factors that lead to hateful discourses. Instead, we call for researchers to find ways, which may go well beyond simply a deployment of automated tools, to change offensive or uninformed users' perspectives on socially relevant issues [53,57,95] and help shift norms in positive ways.…”

“…It is necessary to examine the sociotechnical practices of how human workers configure and use automated tools so that we can identify the structural challenges of current regulation systems. At a broader level, it is crucial that we understand the moderation apparatus that social media companies have built over the past decade if we hope to provide practical solutions to the hard questions being asked right now about how regulation systems can distinguish freedom of expression from online harassment [53], or how they can make decisions on content that may be too graphic but is newsworthy, educational, or historically relevant [40].…”

The Effect of Expressive Biosignals on Empathy and Closeness for a Stigmatized Group Member

“…These include popular social media sites like Twitter that encourage broad discourse using hashtags, blogs that collect and disseminate stories like Humans of New York or Hollaback!, anonymous forums like microaggressions.com, or Facebook groups that function as online support for health-related issues. While these platforms provide opportunities and outlets for people to share their experiences, the audience who will read or respond to those stories may not necessarily be able to connect with or understand them-as evidenced by known challenges in polarization, harassment, implicit biases online [4,30,41]. This can be exacerbated with the growing possibility to encounter diverse others online who may perceive them as stigmatized or part of an out-group.…”