Elon Musk bought Twitter in 2022 with the vision of revolutionizing social media and giving free speech its well-deserved space on the internet. However, the torchbearer of free speech went too far and failed to distinguish between free speech and hate speech.
Twitter was well known for its biases towards left-leaning ideologies, but ever since Elon Musk took over Twitter and rebranded it as X, the platform has shown the true reality of the people behind its algorithm. Twitter’s algorithm is promoting anti-Indian tweets, memes, and accounts, and no one is doing anything about it. Tweets that portray India in a bad light, with filthy and abusive language, receive very high impressions and reach compared to positive content.
The Algorithm’s Role in Promoting Anti-Indian Racism
Indians, especially Hindus, are abused on Twitter with out-of-context images and text. Hinduism, a religion that respects all religions and cultures, is often misrepresented and subjected to misinformation and hate. This hate often comes from individuals in Western nations who perceive themselves as a superior race due to their skin colour. Indians migrating to these countries are generally calm and non-violent and belong to a high-paying tax group. Despite this, they are targeted, named, and shamed, simply because they are seen as easy targets who won’t retaliate violently.
Recently, a group of Indians on Twitter noticed an unusual trend. The platform was promoting tweets with specific negative keywords regarding India. One such keyword/key phrase was “What is wrong with India?”. There were several posts that took out-of-context images or news from India and included the key phrase “What is wrong with India?”. These posts received over 1.5 million impressions on an average and garnered huge number of likes, retweets, and comments. This trend played a key role in spreading hatred towards Indians.
Counteraction and Twitter’s Response
When this trend was spotted by a group of Indians, they launched a countertrend. They posted screenshots and images from Western nations portraying filth and gross activities, accompanied by the key phrase “What is wrong with India?”. As expected, these posts went viral in no time, gaining a huge number of impressions. Even posts from accounts with only a handful of followers were getting massive impressions. This proved that Twitter’s algorithm was intentionally promoting anti-Indian racist posts.
When Twitter’s team realized that Indians had spotted the flaw in the algorithm, they quickly fixed it. However, Twitter then adopted a different approach. Instead of promoting specific key phrases, they began promoting accounts that spread hatred towards Indians, specifically those that were aggressively racist towards Indians. These accounts, often operating from Western nations, openly abuse and spread hatred towards Indians. Some users even advocate for banning Indians from the internet permanently, and some go as far as calling for the total annihilation of Indians, essentially calling for genocide. Yet, Twitter does nothing.
The hatred-filled comments against Indians portray the dark reality of human psychology, revealing a clear lack of empathy among Western masses, coupled with a lack of education. Whenever someone reports such tweets and posts, Twitter sends an automated response stating that the content does not violate their policy. Instead of blocking users who spread hatred towards Indians, the platform promotes them more, giving them greater reach and more followers. Neither Twitter nor the government is doing anything about it.
Why Twitter Promotes Anti-India Racism
Money: Since Elon Musk bought Twitter, he introduced a feature where paid members with blue ticks can earn from their tweets. The only way to earn significant money from Twitter is by getting a high number of impressions. Indians, having the largest non-western population on Twitter with approximately 25.5 million users, are easy targets for increasing reach. Targeting Indians is easy with zero risk, as Indians are non-violent, the abusers will get away without any significant consequences. Negative or false information spreads faster than positive or true information, so spreading sensational false news about a large section of users will definitely garner huge impressions, which benefits the platform by increasing advertisement revenue.
Racism: A section of Western intellectuals believes they are a superior race and that all technological advancements are due to them. Although the reality is far different, this mindset persists.
Business: Twitter has always been a political tool. When Elon Musk announced the Twitter’s acquisition deal, many feared his interference in geopolitics for personal gains. Today, Elon Musk is actually using it for his personal gains. Since the Indian government did not comply with Musk’s demands related to setting up of a Tesla factory in India, he uses Twitter to pressure the Indian government.
Politics: Over the last decade, India has risen on the global stage. The geopolitics have changed drastically, and so has India’s position. India is among the few nations that have maintained a healthy relationship with both Russia and the West, despite pressure from Western powers. The only way to pull India down is by harming its and its citizens’ reputations on an international stage. Character assassination of Indians on the international stage helps both Western powers and Elon Musk achieve their personal goals, making it a win-win situation for both.
What We Can Do About This
Currently, neither the Indian government nor Twitter administration is doing anything about this issue. So, what can we do? We need to put pressure on our government to act decisively. Additionally, we must respond to the haters in a language they understand. Twitter, which intentionally promotes racist slurs and hatred towards Indians, won’t do anything significant on its own.
Twitter’s role in normalizing racism against Indians is a serious issue that needs immediate attention. The platform’s algorithm promotes harmful content, and its reporting system fails to take action against blatant racism. The use of disgusting slurs against Indians is widespread and harmful. It’s time for Twitter to take responsibility and take concrete steps to combat racism on its platform. Only then can we hope to create a safer and more inclusive online space for everyone.