As online platforms continue to accelerate real-world violence against vulnerable communities, the UN Secretary-General has issued a stark warning: freedom of expression must never be invoked to justify hate speech.

“Hate speech is the first step down the path of dehumanisation,” António Guterres declared in his message marking the 2026 International Day for Countering Hate Speech. It is, he said, a tool of division deployed against women, migrants, refugees, LGBTQIA+ people, persons with disabilities and other minorities, often for political gain.

The digital environment has made containment vastly harder. Algorithms reward outrage and division, incentivising falsehood and promoting violence, while anonymity online shields perpetrators from accountability. Artificial intelligence is amplifying these dynamics. Kalliopi Mingeirou, Chief of the Ending Violence Against Women Section at UN Women, described the “manosphere” not as a single platform but as a broader ecosystem of algorithm-driven content that spreads misogyny and opposition to gender equality with speed and apparent normalcy. AI, she argued, did not create misogyny but is accelerating it, enabling abusers to produce and distribute deepfakes, sexualised synthetic images and other forms of image-based abuse faster, more cheaply and with less technical skill than ever before.

Guterres has long rejected the argument that tackling hate speech infringes free expression. In 2019 he launched the UN Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech, aimed at coordinating efforts across the UN system to identify, prevent and confront such content while respecting international human rights standards. More recently, the UN Global Principles for Information Integrity have called for greater individual control over media consumption, online experience and personal data, challenging the dominance of a small number of companies over global information flows.

Source: UN Secretary-General’s message for International Day for Countering Hate Speech; UN News, 17 June 2026