Antonio Guterres; Social Media Needs Policies To Regulate It

Social Media Needs Policies To Regulate It – UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres

Posted by: Eninu William in News September 26, 2022

The United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres has proposed the arrival of strong policies to regulate these numerous social media platforms currently existing.

According to Antonio Guterres, social media based on a business model which monetizes anger and hate are causing untold global suffering.

With the evolution of social media, the world has become a global village. Communication has really eased up and a lot of opportunities have been presented to mankind.

However, we all know that everything has pros and cons and so does social media. Misinformation and hate speech are on the rise. Therefore regulatory frameworks need to be designed as soon as possible.

“Social media platforms based on a business model that monetizes anger & negativity are causing untold damage to societies. Hate speech & misinformation are proliferating. Our data is being bought & sold to influence behaviour. We need regulatory frameworks to change this,” said the UN Secretary General.

And truly, misinformation and hate speech are some of the biggest challenges on these platforms. These are likely or have brewed chaos, anarchy, violence and suffering in different societies across the world.

Without going far away, a case in Uganda is toxic bloggers such as NUP affiliated blogger, Fred Lumbuye.

For a long time, Lumbuye has been spreading poisonous propaganda whose effects might not be felt for now but later on in the long run.

This is because people who listen to such influencers and bloggers are driven by emotions and do little fact checking. After being fueled by this toxic and poisonous information, they resort to action which leads to chaos.

Social media platforms have done little in putting in place policies against such actions. The existing terms and conditions are so weak that they are violated and broken by these perpetrators.

Lots of calls have been directed at these platforms to step up and crackdown on such people but since these platforms are manned by humans, they are times biased and have several times expressed double standards in their operations.

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