(Pontypridd) (Lab):...In
July 2020, the rapper Wiley posted
a series of antisemitic tweets, which Twitter eventually removed
after an unacceptable delay of 48 hours, but under coverage of
the incident in The Sun newspaper, several explicitly antisemitic
comments were posted. Those comments contained holocaust denial
and alleged a global Jewish conspiracy to control the world. They
remained up and accessible to The Sun’s 7 million daily readers
for the best part of a week. If we exempt comments sections from
the Bill’s proposed regime and the duties that the Bill sets for
platforms, we will send the message that that kind of vicious,
damaging and harmful racism is acceptable.
Similarly, after an antisemitic attack in the German city of
Halle, racists comments followed in the comments section under
the coverage in The Sun. There are more examples: Chinese people
being described as locusts and attacked with other racial slurs;
5G and Bill Gates conspiracy theories under articles on the
Telegraph website; and of course, the most popular targets for
online abuse, women in public life. Comments that described the
Vice-President of the United States as a “rat” and “ho”appeared
on the MailOnline. A female union leader has faced dozens of
aggressive and abusive comments about her appearance, and many of
such comments remain accessible on newspaper comments sections to
this day. Some of them have been up for months, others for years.
