Why didn’t Google realize that an anti-hate live stream would get overrun by hate speech?

Earlier today, Google counsel Alexandria Walden testified before Congress in a hearing titled “Hate Crimes and the Rise of White Nationalism.” The House Judiciary Committee streamed the video live on Google’s own YouTube platform, complete with a live chat feed. Anybody who’s even passingly familiar with YouTube might have flagged this as a bad decision. Hateful, racist comments are notoriously common on the site, and, unsurprisingly, some of YouTube’s worst users