Women of color running for Congress in 2024 faced a disproportionate number of anti-X attacks compared to other candidates, according to a new report from the nonprofit Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) and the University of Pittsburgh.
The report sought to “compare the level of offensive and hate speech targeting different groups of congressional candidates based on race and gender, with a particular focus on women of color.” For this, the authors of the report analyzed 800,000 tweets covering the three-month period from May 20 to August 23 of this year. This data set represented all posts that mentioned a congressional candidate with an account on X.
The report’s authors found that more than 20 percent of posts directed at black and Asian women candidates “contain offensive statements about the candidate.” It also found that black women in particular were subjected to hate speech more often than other candidates.
“On average, less than 1% of all tweets mentioning a candidate contained hate speech,” the report said. “However, we found that African-American female candidates were significantly more likely (4%) to submit to this type of position than any other candidate.” This roughly coincides with X’s latest transparency report After Elon Musk took over the company — it said content that violated the rules made up less than 1 percent of all posts on its platform.
It should be noted that the CDT report analyzed both hate speech that violates X’s policy and “offensive speech”, defined in the report as “words or expressions that humiliate, threaten, insult or mock the candidate”. While the latter category is not against X’s rules, the report notes that the volume of suction attacks may still deter women of color from running for office. It recommends that X and other platforms take “special measures” to prevent such effects.
“This should include clear policies prohibiting attacks against anyone based on race or gender, greater transparency about how their systems respond to such attacks, better tools and means for accountability, regular risk assessments with an emphasis on race and gender, and privacy. preserving mechanisms for independent researchers to conduct research using their data. The consequences of the status quo, where candidates of color face significant online attacks at higher rates than other candidates, create a major obstacle to creating a truly inclusive democracy.”
