ချစ်စကရ ို ှညစ ် စ၊ မိုန််းစကတ ို စ ို စ1: Structures and vocabularies of counter-speech on Facebook in Myanmar Thant Sin Oo, Zaw Myo Min, and Matt Schissler Article 19 Working Paper, November 2020, Bangkok Contents 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 3 2. Research process ..................................................................................................................... 5 Limitations .......................................................................................................................... 7 3. Some structures of counter-speech on Facebook .................................................................... 7 3.1 – Links between anchoring posts and comment threads ................................................... 7 3.2 – Engagement with comment threads ............................................................................... 9 3.3 – Trajectories of comment thread conversations ............................................................ 11 3.4 – Views on how to manage hate speech online .............................................................. 12 4. Some vocabularies of counter speech ................................................................................... 14 4.1 – Human Quality ............................................................................................................. 14 4.2 – Positivity and Positive Human Qualities ..................................................................... 17 4.3 – There is Good and Bad in Everything.......................................................................... 18 4.4 – Criticizing extremism................................................................................................... 19 4.5 – The concept of Karma .................................................................................................. 19 4.6 – Pity vs. Compassion by counter-speakers .................................................................... 20 4.7 – Whataboutism .............................................................................................................. 21 4.8 – Criticism of “Human Rights” and “Democracy” ......................................................... 22 5. Annexes..................................................................................................................................... 23 Annex 1: List of Interview Participants ................................................................................ 23 Annex 2: List of Posts from the Facebook Study ................................................................. 25 Annex 3: Examples of well-development counter arguments .............................................. 28 1 “ချစ်စကို ရှည်စစ၊ မိုန်း် စကို တစ ို စ” (chit-za-go-shey-ce; muon-za-go-to-ce), which translates directly as “Let love be long; let hate be short,” is a common Burmese saying advising an individual to not perpetuate hatred but instead focus on the good side of someone in order to have harmonious relationship.