Social media is polluting society. Moderation alone won’t fix the problem

Effectively moderating a social computing system isn’t just the right thing to do from an ethical standpoint — it’s in a platform’s best interest. Moderation shapes the platform: as a tool, as an institution for discussion, and as a cultural phenomenon.

At the same time, we’ve seen enough social networks come and go that we now understand the consequences of making content moderation an afterthought. Ask Reddit, which just a few weeks ago thought to explicitly ban hate speech — years after nurturing communities of racists, nonconsensual porn distributors, and other blights on the internet.

Many people correctly intuit something is wrong with social media, and they wonder if it can be fixed with government regulation. It cannot. A federal law prohibiting all politicians at every level from sharing to the popular platforms would be a compelling, partial solution to the specific threat of state-backed, mob-initiated conflict.