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Viral tweets called on police to shoot Indian protesters

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Protesting farmers call for “shooting” controversial agrarian reforms In India, on Tuesday, there was a trend on Twitter at the time, as thousands of tweets encouraging police brutality against them flooded the platform.

Violence exploded Thousands of farmers in the Indian capital on Tuesday, who have been camped on the outskirts of New Delhi for nearly two months, are protesting against government agrarian reforms that say they will damage their lives after entering the city and clashing with police. Demonstrators crossed police barricades across the city and took the red fortress, a historic national monument. Police used heavy sticks and threw tear gas canisters. Authorities also blocked Internet access in some parts of the capital, according to Indian officials do it often to cancel the protests. At least one protester was killed.

On Twitter, supporters of the Indian nationalist government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi called the protesting peasants “terrorists” and encouraged police brutality against them. “They’re not farmers. They are worms, they wear fake masks of farmers, “read one of the viral tweets that used the hashtag” #shoot “. Modi labeling the right man.

“Hit them with your sticks, Delhi police,” the editor of the pro-government propaganda blog said he tweeted in Hindi. “We’re with you”.

On Tuesday morning, “Shoot” was one of the most important trends on the Indian platform, in addition to the Hindi phrase “Dilli Police lath bajao” – “Delhi Police, hit them with your sticks”.

“Shoot” was on the Trending section of Twitter for at least a couple of hours in India. He disappeared after a public call and an email from BuzzFeed News asking for comments. The company also deleted the blog editor’s tweet, saying it violated Twitter rules, and suspended his account for 12 hours. However, the Hindi phrase that encouraged police to use their sticks remained a trending topic for at least another hour. A “#Shoot” search has revealed hundreds of tweets asking police to shoot protesters.

“Today we have taken steps to protect our service from conversation attempts violence, encourage abuse and threats which can pose a risk offline damage“A Twitter spokesman told BuzzFeed News.” Our team will take over strong enforcement actions in a manner that judicially and impartially violates content, trends, Tweets, and accounts Twitter rules. We encourage everyone on the service to know the rules of Twitter report that which they believe is violated. We are closely monitoring the situation and we remain vigilant. “

A day later, Twitter released a new statement saying it had suspended more than 300 accounts involved in spam and platform manipulation. “We are closely monitoring the situation and remain vigilant, and we urge those on duty to report anything they believe violates the rules,” the company said.

In the United States, various technology platforms Twitter included he was permanently banned from the platform by former President Donald Trump after his supporters attacked the U.S. Capitol earlier this month. Trump was banned from the platform “because of the risk of further violence.” he tweeted Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s head of law, politics and trust and security. Last year, the company put a warning label In a message from the former president about the Minneapolis protests: “[When] looting begins, shooting begins “.

But experts have argued that Silicon Valley companies have companies like Twitter and Facebook double standard when it comes to enforcing their overall policy. In non-Western countries in recent years, which is shifting to authoritarianism under the Modi government, technology platforms are often moving or do not take action against people who use it as a weapon to cause real-world damage.

Last year, for example, Twitter left dozens of tweets doxing interfaith Hindu-Muslim couples continue on the platform until BuzzFeed News asks about them. In December, protesters gathered outside the Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California, denouncing the existence of a social network content censorship Published in support of Indian protest farmers. And the Wall Street Journal reported Ankhi Das, India’s top Facebook official, said the company prevented him from taking action against a Modi party politician for spreading hate speech, saying that doing so would harm the company’s business interests.

“Strong interests everywhere know that Silicon Valley’s tools can be used to create a human rights fire, but the only time they care about platforms is when they have a bad press,” said Alaphia Zoyab, Reset’s defense director. It is a nonprofit technology policy to address the information crisis created by technology platforms, he told BuzzFeed News.

“When Silicon Valley needs to choose to protect the interests of the business or protect human rights, they will be the first to choose,” he added. “In fact, the current business model is fundamentally incompatible with democracy and freedom, because in the camp of those in power, troll army decisions can hijack a platform to demand violence.”

Gadde has not responded to the request for comment, and Twitter does not want to respond to whether accounts that encourage violence in India will be banned altogether.



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