Racism enters the electoral debate on Twitter

The scenario was predictable, but no less worrying: with the presence of Afro social leader Francia Márquez in Colombia's electoral campaign, racism and discrimination entered fully into the conversation on Twitter. Worse, those who wanted to defend the vice presidential candidate from these attacks ended up amplifying them. The protagonists deleted the tweets, but walked on the edge of a sanction from the platform.

On March 28, Colombian singer Marbelle shared an image of presidential candidate Gustavo Petro and his vice presidential running mate Francia Marquez. In the text, the singer referred to Petro as "poop" while Marquez was called "King Kong". As expected, the latter provoked a barrage of criticism for racism. Marbelle ended up deleting the original post which, however, ended up being shared in images and press releases. 

Despite the fact that there is no proven link between the massive reports and the platforms' sanctions, dozens of outraged users requested that the singer's account and tweet be collectively reported. Marbelle did not seem to care much that her account of more than 400,000 followers was sanctioned. In the following hours she posted tweets where she ironically wondered why she had not been suspended, and assured that in case that happened she would open another account to continue criticizing Petro and his followers. 

To make matters worse, Senator Gustavo Bolivar, one of the main leaders of the coalition to which Petro and Marquez belong, published a tweet that provoked as much criticism as mockery. He took an image of King Kong, representing Francia Marquez, to send a message of tolerance to Marbelle (for the sake of illustration, the image can be seen here). 

As he explained shortly thereafter, Bolivar wanted to reject racism "by applying a semiotic message with reverse psychology". What came out the other way around, however, was the reaction the tweet generated, which earned the senator accusations of racism and, again, calls for his account to be suspended. After polling his followers, Bolivar ended up deleting the post. 

Platforms against racism and discrimination

Neither outrage nor calls to report accounts are enough for a platform to remove a post or close an account. Much less a user's defiant comments. If collective reports were a determining criterion, it would also be a risk: a coordinated action by a group of users would be enough to report an account and thus silence critics or political opponents. To understand how these processes work, it is necessary to look at the community norms of social media and the sanctions they provide for. 

The depiction of Afro people as animals is a form of discrimination that platforms take seriously and address in their hate speech policies. Facebook, for example, expressly prohibits comparing them to apes or similar creatures, while YouTube punishes those who dehumanize others by comparing them to animals.

In the case of Twitter, the prohibition consists of "dehumanizing, degrading or reinforcing negative or harmful stereotypes about a protected category." Ethnicity, like attributes such as nationality, gender, religion and others, is indeed considered a protected category. 

The publications of Marbelle and Gustavo Bolivar could fit this description. The senator's case is more complicated, because although his purpose was to defend Marquez, he used a prohibited comparison precisely because it is a racist characterization.

Twitter's rules indicate that sometimes what appears to be hate speech may not be hate speech when its context is taken into account. Like other social media, Twitter allows certain expressions when members of a protected category target others, reappropriating insults or stereotypes to turn them into a badge of their own struggle. For example, some homosexuals have taken the word "queer" as a form of empowerment. 

Contrary to what many might think, and even wish, violations of the hate speech policy do not lead to a person immediately losing their account. Twitter takes into account the severity of the infraction and the user's background. As a first step, the person who posted a hate speech tweet will be asked to remove the content, and will be prevented from posting for a period of time. An account will only be permanently suspended if it repeatedly violates this policy, if it posts a violent threat or if its main activity is to engage in abusive behavior.

Both Marbelle and Gustavo Bolivar deleted their tweets shortly after having published them. Under the rules set forth above, there would no longer be an object for a sanction, since what the platform could have required them to do -remove the content-; they had already done it on their own initiative. In a way, the users' own pressure served as a self-regulatory mechanism on the platform.

This does not detract from the seriousness of the expressions, as racial discrimination transcends the rules of social media. At the beginning of March, an English citizen was convicted for insulting ex-footballer Rio Ferdinand on Twitter with emojis of monkeys and bananas. For the time being, Marbelle was denounced before the Colombian Prosecutor's Office for her tweet against Francia Márquez. The controversy will end up being absorbed by the campaign, but the seriousness of this issue cannot be lost sight of. As Marquez stated shortly afterwards, racism hurts and racism kills.

(More information on the platforms and the campaign: Here are the platform rules for this election)

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