Thais 'must realise' dangers of hate speech

Stopping short of calling for a censorship law, Vilasinee, who spoke at a conference on hate speech yesterday, said there needs to be more public education on the adverse effects of hate speech.

Vilasinee said there is no universal definition of what constitutes hate speech and the line dividing hate speech and do-harm speech is blurred. However, she added, certain do-harm speech should be subject to legal prosecution.

Media Monitor, a NGO specialising in observing the media’s role in society, conducted a survey of hate speech on six political websites and four satellite-television stations between June 12 to 18 this year. The survey found three types of hate speech – dehumanising, devaluing and threatening.

Overall, the group found there was more hate speech on political websites than on partisan satellite-television stations. Political TV channels, the group stated, tended to contain more propaganda. Hate speech, when it was used, tended to be aimed at opposing parties.

Media Monitor found four types of dehumanising speech. Examples include portraying the red-shirt members of the Democratic Alliance against Dictatorship as water buffaloes and the Democrat Party as cockroaches. Others are compared to beasts from hell or zombies. Discriminatory class descriptions, such as serfs and slaves, were also used.

Or, people are insulted because of the region they hail from. For example, residents of the red-shirt strongholds in the North and Northeast are alleged to have less mental capacity because they have an iodine deficiency. Southerners, who mostly support the opposition Democrat Party, are branded as untrustworthy.

With devaluing speech, people from various sides are labelled as shameless, stupid, deceitful, cheaters or psychologically unbalanced.

Media Monitor found that both sides of the political divide use threatening speech. On the anti-red-shirt Serithai website, a user by the alias of annykun stated on June 13 that it is acceptable to hunt down “goons” and that “red shirts are like goons”. Another anti-red on the same website using the alias Crime Minister, advocated the use of firearms to gun opponents down.

On the other hand, on the “Internet to Freedom” website, a red-shirt supporter stated that “the people’s army will one day make opponents pay”.

Prasong Lertrattanawisut, a former president of the Thai Journalists Association (TJA), said he is reluctant to ask any state organs to engage in censorship because there is already too much.

Mict, the Information and Communication Technology Minis-try, which has an annual budget of more than Bt300 million, patrols the Internet to enforce the Computer Crimes Act.

“They’re already sitting there acting like Big Brother,” Prasong said.

Jate Donavanik, a law lecturer at Siam University, said the public needs an outlet to blow off steam, and hate speech, as long as it does not enter the grey area where it becomes do-harm speech, should be tolerated.