Commenting guidelines
Swedish Radio has several places where you can comment on or discuss our journalism. But in order to have a good, constructive discussion and to make sure we all understand each other, we do have some rules. Comments that don’t follow them may be deleted, and repeated breaking of the rules may lead to you being blocked from commenting on the page.
1. We don’t allow hateful comments.
We delete comments that are:
- Hateful against minorities, e.g. ethnic or religious minorities, LGBTQ people, or those with various disabilities.
- Racist or xenophobic,
- Derogatory,
- Threatening,
- Personal attacks against individual people.
2. We can delete comments that are off-topic (that don’t relate to the subject at hand).
Comments should stick to the topic and the content of the post or the question asked by Swedish Radio’s editorial staff.
3. We do not allow publishing names that violate our own editorial decisions.
If the post’s publisher decides not to use the name of a suspected, accused or convicted person, this also applies to comments posted by others.
4. We do not allow posting speculative and/or misleading information.
We delete comments containing lies, rumors, speculation as well as manipulated images and/or videos, unless they are central to the discussion and it is clearly stated the content is manipulated.
5. Make sure you cite sources.
To have a worthwhile and constructive discussion, we want statements to be backed up with facts and sources. If you write something but cannot show where the information comes from, your comment may be deleted. We also do not allow the posting of links without explaining why they are relevant to the discussion.
6. We do not allow advertising and/or spamming.
It is fine to express political opinions, but advertising commercial products or events, or businesses and party politics is not allowed. We also do not allow spam, i.e. repeated comments with the same or similar content, whether it be links, comments, emojis, pictures and/or videos.
7. Our comment fields are for our listeners and followers.
The aim of our comment fields is to hear from our listeners and followers, we do not allow commenting by other Facebook pages.
8. We do not allow “dehumanizing” language.
Writing comments saying any individual person or group, mentioned in our reporting or in the comment field, does not deserve, for example, to live, is useless, scum or vermin, is not permitted.
9. Swedish Radio must abide by the Electronic Bulletin Boards (BBS) Act.
The comments function is provided and monitored in accordance with Sweden’s BBS Act. Anyone who makes a post violating the applicable laws may be personally held responsible for it. The BBS Act means Swedish Radio is legally obliged to remove posts that contain
- Incitement,
- Racial persecution,
- Child pornography,
- Unlawful descriptions of violence,
- Breach of copyright,
- Illegal threats,
- Unlawful infringement of privacy,
- Publicly encouraging people to commit an act of terrorism or other serious crimes in accordance with section 3 of the Act (2010: 299) on Criminal Responsibility for Public Provocation, Recruitment and Training concerning Terrorist Offences and other Particularly Serious Crime.
10. Violate the guidelines and you may be blocked.
If, despite warnings, you break any of our commenting rules, you may be blocked from further commenting on our social media accounts and platforms.
11. Leave sensitive information or tips via Radioleaks.
Do not use the comments field to leave sensitive information or tips. If you want to submit news tips to any of our editorial desks, we recommend you use Radioleaks.
Think before you write – a lot of people can see your comments.
If someone disturbs / ruins / creates a bad atmosphere in the comment section, it is the editorial team's job and responsibility to stop this. The posts you write will be visible for everyone to read. Think about how they could be interpreted by others. Please try to be clear in what you want to say.
Be concrete with your criticism.
We love to hear your feedback and criticism about Swedish Radio’s work - but please use concrete examples and instances so that our discussions are productive and we can use them to improve our work.
If you see something that goes against our guidelines, report it directly to the relevant editorial desk by a private message or via the platform’s “report” function. That way we can keep the comment section a place for constructive discussion.
We refer general views or questions to the listeners' service Lyssnarservice: tel. 08-784 84 84, e-mail lyssnarservice@sverigesradio.se, or to the Sveriges Radio accounts on Twitter or Facebook.
This comments function is run by Sveriges Radio AB, 105 10 Stockholm, corporate ID number 556419-3232.
(Last updated June 2019)
