“Dehumanization enables humans to undertake anti-human activities by reducing [the victim] to a subhuman level, which enables justification of their killing. It means that setting fire to a house with women and kids inside is nothing more than pouring petrol down an ants’ nest. It is an essential step in enabling soldiers – who are human beings – to partake in inhuman acts, and commit atrocities, as we saw in Rakhine state.”154 The proposition that the dissemination of advocacy of hatred and dehumanizing narratives leads to violence and discrimination is also supported by empirical studies of previous situations of mass violence. For example, one study of the effects of the propaganda outlet Radio Television Libre des Milles Collines (RTLM) in the context of the Rwandan genocide indicates that killings were 65-77% higher in Rwandan villages that received the RTLM signal, compared with those that did not receive the signal.155 In 2014, Myanmar-based academic Matt Schissler raised the alarm about the potential for the spread of anti-Rohingya ideology on Facebook to trigger mass violence in Myanmar, citing risks associated with “the invisible algorithms Google, Facebook and others use to filter content”.156 Schissler warned that Meta and its algorithmic tendency to produce “echo chambers” could become a “productive force that contributes to shaping worldviews and political viewpoints, potentially driving polarization and extremism” in Myanmar. 157 He concluded: “If this paper’s analysis is accurate, it would indicate that the expansion of Internet access in Myanmar, particularly the rise of social media, will contribute to dynamics that have the potential to strengthen the ideological justifications necessary for mass violence.”158 In a 2020 study retrospectively examining the role of social media in fomenting violence in Myanmar, Victoire Rio emphasized the broad societal impact that Facebook had in setting the ground for an outbreak of mass violence: “Though it is difficult to tie what happened in Northern Rakhine in 2017 to individual pieces of Facebook content, the sustained campaigns waged on Facebook by both the military and Ma Ba Tha from as early as 2012 undoubtedly played a part in creating an enabling environment for the military crackdown and violence that took place. This is evidenced by the fact that the public opinion at the time was overwhelmingly supportive of the military and its use of force, which many within Myanmar saw as being justified on the basis of the narratives they had been fed for years on Facebook.”159 As the scholarship on genocide and mass violence contends, the dissemination of ideology is core to the creation of an enabling environment for mass violence. This includes narratives of dehumanization, of impending threat or takeover from the ‘other’, and false information regarding the wrongs they have supposedly perpetrated. This ideology influences policymakers in their decision-making, directs perpetrators in their individual acts of brutality and murder, and engages ‘bystanders’ in their support for the violent actions against the target group. In the context of the mass violence perpetrated against the Rohingya, antiRohingya ideology played a central role in enabling and justifying the acts of violence perpetrated by both soldiers and civilians in Rakhine State alike. In respect of soldiers from the Myanmar military, the role of ideology can be most clearly evidenced in the gratuitous violence and brutalization which accompanied the military’s core “clearance” mission. The IIFFMM has noted the “extreme brutality of the acts and campaign against the Rohingya” as part of its finding of genocidal intent, noting that the “brutality of an attack is relevant to whether the perpetrators acted with specific intent”.160 The widespread commission of inhumane acts – including rape and severe sexual violence against women and girls, the murder of children, and even the desecration of victims’ dead bodies – is relevant evidence both of specific intent to destroy the Rohingya, and also the function of ideology in perpetration of mass violence. 154 Amnesty International Interview by video call with Chris Sidoti, 13 April 2022. David Yanagizawa, Propaganda and Conflict: Theory and Evidence from the Rwandan Genocide, 2012, people.su.se/~daya0852/Rwanda_jmp.pdf, cited in Susan Benesch, World Policy Institute, Dangerous Speech: A Proposal to Prevent Group Violence, 12 January 2012 worldpolicy.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Dangerous-Speech-Guidelines-Benesch-January-2012.pdf 155 Matt Schissler, “Echo chambers in Myanmar: Social media and the ideological justifications for mass violence”, 2014, Paper for the Australian National University Department of Political & Social Change Research Colloquium, “Communal Conflict in Myanmar: Characteristics, Causes, Consequences” 156 157 Matt Schissler, “Echo chambers in Myanmar: Social media and the ideological justifications for mass violence” (previously cited), p.4. 158 Matt Schissler, ‘Echo chambers in Myanmar: Social media and the ideological justifications for mass violence” (previously cited). 159 Victoire Rio, “The Role of Social Media in Fomenting Violence: Myanmar”, 2020, Toda Peace Institute, Policy Brief No. 78. IIFFMM, “Detailed findings”, para. 1432. 160 THE SOCIAL ATROCITY META AND THE RIGHT TO REMEDY FOR THE ROHINGYA Amnesty International 33