They
are called “moderators,” but the net effect of their work has not made the
world a more moderate place. These young underpaid workers specialize in flagging
objectionable content from the internet, such as extreme pornography and
incitements to violence. However, any real Free Speech advocate will argue one
man’s hate speech is another man’s trenchant political analysis. Yet, the
really consequential decisions regarding what to block and what to allow
happens several hundred pay-grades above them. The state of the internet as a
public forum is critically examined in Hans Block & Moritz Riesewieck’s
documentary The Cleaners, which
screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
The
major social networks, especially including Facebook, are sensitive about the
word “censorship,” so they all outsource their content moderation to tech firms
in the Philippines (cheap labor, high English fluency, and incidentally
overwhelmingly Catholic and currently supportive of Generalissimo Duterte). One
can argue overwhelmingly egregious images should be policed, but you have to
wonder who would put their names to such vileness in the first place. Of
course, the slope quickly gets slippery when violent or sexual imagery is incorporated
into political commentary.
While
anonymous moderators are flagging naked Trump cartoons, their client bosses are
cutting deals to censor criticism of the increasingly Islamist Erdogan regime
for Turkish IP addresses. Conversely, they allow genocidal hate speech directed
at Burma’s Rohingya minority to continue unabated. Likewise, dubious fake news
(approaching deliberate misinformation) peddled by Duterte’s supporters, including
his high-profile cheerleader, Mocha Uson, a former pin-up model turned Spice
Girls-esque pop-star, are allowed to flow freely.
There
is a great deal of eye-opening and disturbing stuff in The Cleaners, but it is mostly anecdotal and often at odds with
itself. Social networks should censor more in Burma (nobody calls it Myanmar,
except maybe tech company staff attorneys) and the Philippines, but far less in
China and Turkey. Essentially, Block & Riesewieck argue whenever a judgement
call is needed, Facebook and YouTube have almost always gotten it wrong. Most
people can be easily convinced of that (frankly, its like shooting fish in a
barrel), but that doesn’t leave us much in terms of policy implications and action
item takeaways.
Okay,
so Facebook is evil. Now what? Granted, there is some interesting stuff in The Cleaners. Uson with her racy past
and BFF relationship with Duterte cries out for her own, snarkier documentary.
However, the film is too unfocused and contradictory to be an effective
catalyst for reform. We wish this film was better than it is, but it is still
pretty frightening. Despite its flaws, socially engaged viewers might want to
check out The Cleaners anyway, when
it screens this afternoon (1/27) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance
Film Festival.
