Major Swedish Newspaper Demands Facebook Censor ‘Offensive’ Posts

Sweden’s second largest newspaper–Dagens Nyheter–has claimed that Facebook must address concerns about sexist, homophobic and xenophobic content, and that the social media site must actively work to censor comments from users that fall under the broad rubric of “hate speech”.

According to the paper’s cultural affairs journalist Bjorn Wiman: “The large network company’s refusal to publicly respond to questions about these guidelines–and our acceptance of this silence–is one of the greatest scandals,” he wrote in an editorial for the newspaper’s website DN.se.

“Facebook and other big network companies still have the ability to clean up in this quagmire of sexism, racism and serious threats of violence. That they do not is incomprehensible,” he continues while simultaneously talking about how Sweden has had freedom of the press for 250 years enshrined into law, decades before the American first amendment that guarantees free speech and freedom of the press.

“The events in Stockholm a few weeks ago, when a lynch mob pulled through the city in search of people with ‘foreign’ appearance, shows what it looks like when internet hate is stepping out into the street,” he claims in response to native Swedes who patrolled the Stockholm train station, which by witness accounts has transformed into a centre for migrants who sexually harass women and young girls and often get into violent encounters with young Swedish men and even police.

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