LICRA Battles Online Racism with AI Poster Campaign

In France this year, racist or anti-Semitic statements have appeared more and more on the streets and social media. But on the internet, these hateful words are shared with virtual impunity due to an obsolete and inappropriate law. Hosts are not aware of their responsibilities and the users, on condition of anonymity, feel untouchable when sharing their hateful statements.

To change the law and condemn online racism, LICRA and Publicis Conseil decided to demonstrate the real impact of these messages with a campaign entitled Post Racism. For this campaign, a unique artificial intelligence has been developed, able to detect a racist or anti-Semitic tweet and to associate it to a propaganda poster from the darkest hours of our history that convey a similar statement.

As such, it demonstrates the real gravity of these messages shared and displayed to everyone. The posters come with an answer from LICRA, highlighting the real impact of these messages, and inviting people to sign a petition in order to change the law and condemn online racism.

To identify a maximum of hateful messages, a great number of propaganda posters have been collected. This was made possible through the participation of museums such as the Museum of Jewish Art and History, National Library of France and the National Archives.

A selection of the most emblematic posters will be on display with the period words replaced by tweets (that have been previously made anonymous). Online racist statements shouldn’t stay unpunished anymore. You can join the movement and sign the petition to condemn online racism here.