Characterizing usage of explicit hate expressions in social media

ABSTRACT Social media platforms provide an inexpensive communication medium that allows anyone to publish content and anyone interested in the content can obtain it. However, this same potential of social media provide space for discourses that are harmful to certain groups of people. Examples of these discourses include bullying, offensive content, and hate speech. Out of these discourses hate speech is rapidly recognized as a serious problem by authorities of many countries. In this paper, we provide the first of a kind systematic large-scale measurement and analysis study of explicit expressions of hate speech in online social media. We aim to understand the abundance of hate speech in online social media, the most common hate expressions, the effect of anonymity on hate speech, the sensitivity of hate speech and the most hated groups across regions. In order to achieve our objectives, we gather traces from two social media systems: Whisper and Twitter. We then develop and validate a methodology to identify hate speech on both of these systems. Our results identify hate speech forms and unveil a set of important patterns, providing not only a broader understanding of online hate speech, but also offering directions for detection and prevention approaches.