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Hate in the Information Age

Thursday, May 15, 2008, 4:00 am
Witnesses
Rabbi Abraham Cooper
Associate Dean
Simon Wiesenthal Center
Mr. Mark A. Potok
Director
Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project
Mr. Christopher Wolf
Senior Lay Leader
Anti-Defamation League
Mr. Tad Stahnke
Director
Human Rights First Discrimination Program

The briefing provided an overview of hate crimes and hate propaganda in the OSCE region, focusing on the new challenges posed by the internet and other technology. Mischa Thompson led the panelists in a discussion of the nature and frequency of hate crimes in the OSCE region, including the role of the internet and other technologies in the training, recruiting, and funding of hate groups.

Panelists - Rabbi Abraham Cooper, Mark A. Potok, Christopher Wolf, Tad Stahnke – discussed how best to combat hate crimes and hate propaganda and highlighted internet governance issues in the United States and Europe and how the internet extensively contributes to hate propaganda. Issues such as free speech and content control were at the center of the discussion.