22 Policy Brief No. 22 Toda Peace Institute/Alliance for Peacebuilding Extremist groups use well known social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, but they also use less well-known sites that allow anonymity, like Reddit, YouTube, 4chan, and 8chan. Social media programs may profit from high traffic to controversial posts. In April 2018, Facebook testified to the US Congress that it was removing extremist content. But in July 2018, the Counter Extremism Project found that Facebook was not taking down material denying the Holocaust or promoting terrorism and violence against women. Analysts noted that extremist content is sometimes removed but that profit-generating extremist content is often left in place. (Counter Extremism Project 2018) 42. Calling for and Directing Violence. In India, a rumor about child kidnappers spread on WhatsApp led to mob violence killing at least 29 people. When the government hired someone to counter the rumors to stop the killing, the crowds lynched him too. (Vij 2018) In Myanmar, pro-government, anti-Muslim Facebook accounts called for ethnic cleansing of the Muslim-minority Rohingya population, including boycotts of Muslim-owned businesses, a ban on interfaith marriages, and limits on rights of Muslims. Despite reports to Facebook complaining of these posts and asking for their removal before the explosion of violence against the Rohingya, Facebook initially did little to stem the tide of hate. (McKirdy 2018) Social Media: Social and Political Goods vs Evils Dante's Inferno defines evil as pride, envy, anger, laziness, greed, over-consumption, and lust. These evils undermine social and political goods. Dante's list of evils reads like a litany of problems exacerbated by social media. People use social media platforms to boost their ego (pride), compare themselves to others (envy), express outrage (anger), procrastinate work or real relationships (laziness), be bombarded with advertisements (greed and overconsumption), and share pornography (lust.) (Vaidhyanathan 2018) While social media holds the potential to support and expand social and political goods, it also has the potential to hijack democracy, polarize society, and concentrate wealth and access to power among an elite group at the expense of others. The Policy Recommendations found in the Executive Summary for this report lay out an agenda for civil society, government, and business to work together to address these challenges. Bibliography Aaker, Jennifer, and Andy Smith. 2010. The Dragonfly Effect: Quick, Effective, and Powerful Ways to Use Social Media to Drive Social Change. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Alliance for Peacebuilding. 2016. "ReWiring the Brain for Peace." Washington DC. Alter, Adam. 2017. Irresistible: The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked. New York: Penguin Press. Amnesty International. 2017. "Amnesty reveals alarming impact of online abuse against women." November 20. Accessed September 16, 2018.