FUEN Presented the Mute Hate Speech Campaign and the renewed Minority Monitor at the Council of Europe

Former Vice President of the Federal Union of European Nationalities (FUEN), Gösta Toft, delivered a powerful address at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg as part of No Hate Speech Week on 19 June. The landmark event, which successfully concluded with a new European pact against hate speech, brought together traditional national minorities, small language communities, LGBTI groups, and new migrant minorities to build a safer, more inclusive continent.

The week featured dynamic cross-sector initiatives, including an innovative hackathon where 20 teams from across Europe sought to curb hate speech using artificial intelligence. Alongside these technological workshops, Toft presented FUEN’s session, titled "Muting Hate Speech Against Minorities in Europe," which highlighted a comprehensive approach to combating the normalisation of discrimination.

In his address, Toft underscored that hate speech is not merely words, but a direct attack on foundational European values of human dignity, equality, and respect. To confront this issue where communities gather and emotions run high, FUEN launched the “Mute Hate Speech!” campaign, leveraging football to challenge discrimination. This message served as a core pillar of the historic 2024 EUROPEADA—the European Football Championship of National Minorities—held in the German-Danish-Frisian border region. The tournament brought together 900 footballers from 24 minorities across 13 countries, who, alongside UEFA and the German Football Federation, championed the 'Mute Hate' slogan directly on the pitch.

To complement grassroots awareness with empirical data, Toft highlighted the Minority Monitor. The centralized platform has processed and presented 46 documented incidents of hate speech, tracking the normalisation of intolerance through social media algorithms, institutional weaponisation by politicians, attacks on linguistic diversity, and the escalation of hate speech into physical vandalism or violent attacks. To map this data effectively, FUEN recently launched a highly interactive mapping tool on the platform.

The event placed a central focus on the Roma community. Toft met with prominent Roma artist Sead Kazanxhiu, who serves as the Chair of the Commission for National Minorities in Albania. Kazanxhiu presented moving artistic works and noted that in the Romani language, a word for "borders" does not exist—an observation Toft described as profoundly impressive.

Toft praised the high-level engagement of the event, particularly noting that the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Alain Berset, took a great deal of time to personally engage with the participants, the majority of whom were young activists.

While celebrating new technological tools like AI and mapping software, Toft concluded with a call for collective human will to embrace diversity and ensure equal opportunity. He urged the Council of Europe, local organisations, and citizens to sustain the partnership, stressing that a society's health is ultimately reflected in how it treats its most vulnerable and smallest linguistic groups.

"Let's get loud, so we can finally mute the hate," Toft urged.