Southern Poverty Law Center speaker to discuss online hate speech

8:01 a.m., April 5, 2016--Alex Amend, director of digital media at the Southern Poverty Law Center will be featured as the University of Delaware’s Hate Speech, Free Speech series continues at 7 p.m., Tuesday, April 12, in 130 Smith Hall.

The title of Amend’s talk is “From Dylann Roof to @realDonaldTrump: How the Radical Right Spreads Hate Online.”

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• June 6-9: Food and culture series
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The dark side of the Internet has very real world effects, according to Amend, who notes that Dylann Roof, the alleged terrorist responsible for the Charleston massacre in June 2015, is likely the first violent right-wing extremist to have been radicalized entirely online. 

The talk will touch on how the Southern Poverty Law Center monitors the radical right online and how extremist activity poses serious questions around the First Amendment online and for major platforms like Facebook and Twitter.

Amend manages the Southern Poverty Law Center’s social media and web development. He works closely with the team of the Intelligence Project, which monitors the radical right and contributes to the Hatewatch blog.

Previously, Amend was the associate director of communications for the public policy organization Demos, based in New York City. 

He has contributed research and reporting to the books All The Presidents' Bankers by Nomi Prins and Third World America by Arianna Huffington. 

Amend is a graduate of the University of Minnesota School of Journalism and Mass Communication and in his early career interned with the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and Talking Points Memo.

The talk is free and open to the public. Those who plan to attend should RSVP.

Contact Jennifer Lambe, Department of Communication, jlambe@udel.edu with any questions.