emailed it to an email newsletter known for its anti-Islamic beliefs. Soon after, The Innocence of Muslims was attracting attention from groups in predominantly Muslim countries such as Egypt, Libya, Iran and Yemen which instigated violent protests and riots.72 As Foxman and Wolf acknowledge, the video does not explicitly call for violence or fit into what we might classify as hate speech, but it does reveal the impact of viral hate and the speed that a societal response can be triggered.73 Although Waldron is right to stress the importance of the damaging effects on people targeted by hate speech, the threat from people who are influenced by it is also a concern for the wellbeing of the community. Both the danger of influencing individuals or groups to commit violent protests or attacks, and the damage to the dignity of minorities, are serious consequences of hate speech and need our attention. Although he makes a clear distinction between the two and argues that it is the latter we should be concerned with, violence on the streets that is specifically targeted towards a minority group sends a similar but threatening message of hostility, and acts as what Levinger (chapter one) describes as a divider. In other words: both the violence and the psychological/dehumanizing effects of hate speech indicate that online hate is source of polarization between different groups in society. Fear of the Other So far we have discussed the consequences of online hate and underlined two main problems: violence and psychological/dehumanizing effects on citizens. One of the most significant ways online hate groups are able to achieve this is through the process of ‘othering’. Groups and individuals who incite hatred like Britain First and Myanmar’s Wirathu indoctrinate fear into the minds of their followers and construct a negative image of the Muslim community, or the minority targeted. Hate speech aims to define and limit a group by their ethnicity, religion, race, sexuality, et cetera, and will then associate that group with characteristics that would exclude one from society. Such a process could arguably be described as ‘othering’; a concept identified 72 Foxman and Wolf, (2013) p.38. 73 Foxman and Wolf, (2013) pp.37,38. - 35 -