Online abuse 'the same as face-to-face': BBC News Review reviews

August 15, 2022



The UK is to prosecute online abuse and face-to-face abuse in the same manner. Neil and Dan teach you the language the world’s media is using to discuss this story.

[Cover image: GETTY IMAGES]

The story:
Prosecutors in Britain are being told to treat online hate crime as seriously as abuse meted out face-to-face.

The guidance issued by the government covers offences motivated by hostility towards people of different races, religions, sexuality, gender and disability.

The Director of Public Prosecutions said online abuse, such as threats of violence, had a ‘corrosive effect’ on society and destroyed lives.

Try our quiz to see how well you’ve learned today’s language here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/english/course/english-you-need/unit-29/session-2

Key words and phrases

trolls
people who intentionally send annoying or insulting online messages

corrosive
causing gradual damage to something

closes (the) net
restricts the movement or activities of

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27 Comments
  1. Reply
    Kim Sejeong (김세정) Kpop August 15, 2022 at 8:59 pm

    I'm so into BBC channel!!!! It's so amazing!!!! It's really helpful for me…. I love this program very much….. I LOVE the two of you… Great accents. I also get both knowledge and vocabularies….. Thank you God for being here BBC team……I love Neil and Dam so much Fighting!!!!!! Thank you for your efforts for people who are learning English… 💜💜💜….. God bless you..

  2. Thanks alot

  3. Thanks 🙏🏻 guys 🤩 from bottom of my heart ♥️
    So useful thanks for your efforts

  4. the new system of education closes the net on students who want to study online

  5. Excellent teachers for adult students of English language learning

  6. What do you think it is the best form or way to learn this words; make sentences or perhaps something more ?

  7. Gracias a todo el equipo de bbc
    Thanks to all bbc team

  8. Law enforcement. that's the great thing when you speak about countries like great Britain

  9. corrosive is about make something or someone weaker, is that correct?

  10. Subtitlies…i need them

  11. why can't I turn on subtitlies here ??

  12. love you

  13. thanks so much.this is intresting way for learning english

  14. Why

  15. 🇬🇧

  16. Thank you 🙂

  17. Hello and welcome to news review the program where we show you how to use the language from the latest news stories in your everyday English

    Hello, I'm Neil. joining me is Dan. Hi Dan.
    What is our story?

    Our story today is about the UK law regarding Online Hate Crimes.

    Ok, Online Hate Crimes. something that lots of people are talking about.
    Let's hear more from this BBC News Bulletin.

    So, The UK has decided to treat online hate crime as seriously as it does Face to Face Hate Crime.
    This will cover sexual,religious,disability,racial and gender crimes.
    and new guidance has just been released by the UK director of public prosecution on this ( ).

    So, you've been looking around the news websites
    to see how the stories are being reported.
    and you've picked out key words, phrases.

    I have in deed. three key words and phrases are
    Trolls, Corrosive and Net closes

    Trolls, corrosive and Net closes.
    So, Trolls in your headline, please?

    Our first headline today comes from The Mirror
    and says 'Crown prosecution Service to unveil new guidelines on hate crime in crackdown on Twitter and Facebook trolls'

    Ok, Trolls: people who intentionally send annoying and insulting online messages.
    Now Dan, I'm confused because I thought that a troll was some kind of, some kind of fictional being, character, nasty one that lives under a bridge.
    What has this got to do the internet?

    Well, you're talking about the popular ( ) characters which actually come from Scandinavian mythology.
    So, you're not wrong to think that troll is a nasty creature that seeks to harm human beings.
    Now that sort of ancient meaning has been brought forward into the 21st century
    and these days we refer to people who seek to harm others online through posting abusive messages as trolls.
    and I would be surprised if many of our viewers weren't familiar with this concept already
    because most people these days use social media.
    however they may not know different word families. or excuse me, different words that come from same word family. so we're gonna talk about those briefly.
    So, we have A Troll that's the person who's doing the activity which is to engage in trolling.
    and finally we have the verb to Troll.
    So if I were the type of a person to do so,
    I could troll for a couple of hours every night of the week.

    Yeah.. you're the type of a person who were doing so?
    Because I went on holiday recently
    and I put loads of pictures up on one of my social media feeds.
    and there were these comments from Dan saying
    "Look at you. you've got a sunburn. you've got a skinny chicken legs. you look a lazy idiot. come back to work."
    You were trolling???!!!

    Well, I suppose… Yes. in some extent I was trolling you.
    But I would like to think of it as a healthy ( ) between two colleagues. a little bit of friendly ( ) that kind of thing.

    Yeah, it gave us an excuse to talk about it.

    Yeah. exactly. that's right.

    Well, before this conversation gets too corrosive, let's move on to our next headline.

    Ok, our next headline comes from The Independent
    and says:
    'Crackdown on 'corrosive' online hate crimes launched by Crown Prosecution Service'

    Corrosive: meaning causing gradual damage to something.

    Exactly. now this is an adjective and actually comes from old french. but exactly same meaning.
    If you think about a chemical very strong chemical. for example acid.
    If you put a very strong acid onto a metal
    the metal will be corroded.
    the acid will eat the metal and make it weaker
    and eventually breaking it.
    so, something which is corrosive literally
    we can use same expression metaphorically
    So, something which is corrosive damages something overtime.
    For example, jealousy within a marriage is corrosive. it will corrode, break the marriage.

    So, that's the verb Corrode

    That is indeed the verb, so we have a nice word family. we have Corrosive the adjective.
    we have to Corrode the verb and we have Corrosion that is the noun.

    Ok, let us now look at our last headline, please.

    Our last headline comes from The Guardian morning briefing and says:
    'Monday briefing: net closes on social media hate crimes'

    Closes the net: meaning restricts movements or activities of

    Exactly.

    Now this is something that we find a lot of in headlines.
    it's ( ), there's a double meaning.

    Indeed. so the double meaning is on the word NET.
    because we have the first meaning of Net as in the ( ) of work of ( ) which is used to catch an animal.
    On the other hand we have Net being the ( ) for the internet.
    Now because this article is all about trying to catch trolls and trolls operate within a online ( ), you can use both of these meanings at the same time to make a joke which is kind of ( ).

    Yes. very good. so this is an idiomatic expression??

    That's right. so, in the same way that NET is used to catch or at least restrict the movement of a fish or an animal,
    the activities that these people are taking or trying to catch or restrict the movement of online abuse by trolls.

    today's transcript has many missing words in it.
    shame on me. sorry about that. 😛

    My twitter account: https://twitter.com/LeeA01040389363

    My google plus:
    https://plus.google.com/114450078621599360403

  18. such an interesting word for me to troll my friends: skinny chicken legs. Thank you.

  19. 5:27 What is "pan"(?)

  20. Reply
    Виталий Слонов August 15, 2022 at 8:59 pm

    Fair enough, the word 'hate' speaks volumes and is key here; therefore, there should be no distinction between the two, regardless of whether it's online or face to face; consequently they ought to be treated equally.

  21. Neil ♥♥♥

  22. thank you … you are really great educators …

  23. I agree with this decision. Action needs to be taken.

  24. Reply
    Ibrahim Ramadan- إبراهيم رمضان August 15, 2022 at 8:59 pm

    The best channel at all ..
    Thanks a million

  25. Good

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