- Thursday, February 27, 2025
By: Shubham Ghosh
INFLUENCERS who sympathise with India’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have taken help of YouTube videos to spread hateful content and conspiracy theories to target Muslims and women, according to a report by the NYU Stern Centre for Business and Human Rights, the US, Bloomberg reported.
The NYU Stern Centre report showcased the Indian case to ask the Google-owned social media platform to consider its recommendations to improve moderation of content and disclose information on how algorithms help in removing such content.
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India is home to more than 450 million YouTube users, which is nearly double the size of the platform’s base in the US. The videos in question have fuelled a conspiracy theory that the Muslims spread Covid-19 as form of “jihad” (holy war), as per the report titled ‘A Platform ‘Weaponized’: How YouTube Spreads Harmful Content – And What Can Be Done About It’.
Anti-Muslim rhetoric has also often played a role in online attacks against women.
“A spate of misogynistic rants by nationalistic Indian YouTube influencers have made such invective popular on the platform,” the report said, according to Bloomberg. “The diatribes, many of which include physical threats, are often delivered as selfie videos.”
A YouTube spokesperson said the recommendations detailed by the NYU Stern Centre report were the platform’s priorities.
“We work to provide ongoing insights into how recommendations work, through blog posts, videos, interviews and more,” the spokesperson said.
The report comes amid an ongoing controversy in India where two former members of the BJP allegedly made derogatory remarks against Islam and Prophet Muhammad on a news channel and on social media, respectively, dragging the Indian government into a diplomatic spat with several Muslim nations, including trading partners in the Middle East. The incident has also led to sporadic religious violence in several parts of India that have even claimed lives.
Police in India recently arrested a YouTuber from the Muslim-majority Kashmir for allegedly uploading a video that showed beheading an effigy of one of the accused former BJP officials, local media reported.
Last month, YouTube’s chief executive officer Susan Wojcicki said at World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that the platform faced a challenge in staying ahead of people creating misinformation.
She also said YouTube missed only about 10 to 12 content-violating videos per 100,000 views of videos on the platform.
