Internet sites that allow commenting should do a better job of barring hate speech, writes Michael Gerson in the Washington Post.

“User-driven content on the Internet often consists of bullying, conspiracy theories and racial prejudice,” Gerson writes. “The absolute freedom of the medium paradoxically encourages authoritarian impulses to intimidate and silence others. The least responsible contributors see their darkest tendencies legitimated and reinforced, while serious voices are driven away by the general ugliness.”

He quotes Clive Hamilton, an ethicist, as saying that while “the Internet should represent a great flourishing of democratic participation … it doesn’t.

“The brutality of public debate on the Internet is due to one fact above all — the option of anonymity. The belligerence would not be tolerated if the perpetrators’ identities were known because they would be rebuffed and criticized by those who know them. Free speech without accountability breeds dogmatism and confrontation.”