Social media and online hate

Social media host alarming degrees of hate messages directed at individuals and groups, threatening victims' psychological and physical well-being. Traditional approaches to online hate often focus on perpetrators' traits and their attitudes toward their targets. Such approaches neglect the social and interpersonal dynamics that social media afford by which individuals glean social approval from like-minded friends. A theory of online hate based on social approval suggests that individuals and collaborators generate hate messages to garner reward, for their antagonism toward mutually hated targets, by providing friendship and social support that enhances perpetrators' well-being as it simultaneously deepens their prejudices. Recent research on a variety of related processes supports this view, including notions of moral grandstanding, political derision as fun, and peer support for interpersonal violence.