Hate Filter
Fram Filtros
Issue 48 | September 2018
Agency
Mestica
Creative Team
Creative Director Luiz Parpulov Head of Digital Andre´ Marino Head of Art Eduardo Basque Art Director Marcus Rochah, Fabio Crociati, Ivan Ribolla Copywriter Rafael Prioli Digital Art Director Felipe Higashi
Production Team
Film Production Company Mestic¸a Director Andre´ Marino, Rafael Prioli Editor Andre´ Marino, Ivan Ribolla, Pamella Gomes
Other Credits
Account Toma´s Oliveira, Josuel Luna Planning Leandro Corre^a, Guilherme Freire Advertiser Tatiane Savane
Date
May 2018
Background
Fram was an American brand of automotive oil filters that was also well- known in Brazil and Argentina. Fram filters had been eliminating toxic substances for 85 years.
Idea
Imagine surfing your favorite websites without seeing comment sections filled with intolerance, prejudice and racism?
That’s what Hate Filter did. It was a Chrome extension that blocked hate speech on the internet, transforming it into important information, raising awareness among its readers.
Over six thousand racist, xenophobic, homophobic, sexist or otherwise intolerant expressions were carefully chosen to disappear from the internet. In their place: information. When identified by the tool, the expressions were immediately replaced with articles from Brazil’s most prominent news sources, containing data and information about the violence that was blocked.
Results
More than 136,000 hateful messages have been blocked.
Many car owners who had never thought of oil filters before now knew Fram’s name.
Our Thoughts
Elsewhere in this issue are examples of brands acknowledging that the digital revolution has brought with it mixed blessings. du Communications (pages 58-59) have observed how in moments of crisis, people step forward not to help but to film it on their smartphones. And here is Fram Filtros using online trolls to demonstrate their product benefit, filtering out toxic substances.
The Hate Filter itself is not the point of the campaign. The story of the Hate Filter is what this is all about, a PR idea designed to get a low-interest brand noticed and talked about in mainstream media. Which it has done.