We're constantly told the trolls, bigots, attention seekers, derailers and trouble makers are simply a vocal minority and any community can police itself and keep their spaces clean. It's a sentiment intended to foster open dialogue and free exchange of ideas and opinion.
The idea is we decent folk, of any political, religious, sexual or social orientation can speak freely, oppose one and other in a civil way and keep the noise to a minimum given the right tools.
From comment section voting options, to flagging and reporting on social networking sites, we are responsible for making sure the quality of the discourse remains high.
But over the last few weeks I've started to get the impression the truth isn't so rosy.
Celebgate
...or The Fappening, as it has been dubbed over on Reddit, the mass leaking of nude photos of several celebrity women has proven to be the latest episode to test the theory of community decency.
I would be lying if I said I had not seen some of the pictures myself, more as a consequence of observing the story rather than sexual gratification, but I am sure the vast majority of people have not seen or sought out these pictures. This hasn't stopped the response from being overwhelming. The story has spread and run and distracted from other arguably more serious matters as the mainstream press, celebrity gossip press and technology press all scramble for their angle on the story.
One thing that became apparent was the different approaches some sites took to handling the initial release. Reddit immediately took a hands off approach letting community moderators handle it. Some subreddits outright banned the posting of the pictures, others revelled in whatever humour could be obtained from the fiasco. In the midst of all this someone created /r/TheFappening, a central hub for all things connected with the story. For the Reddit admins this was a godsend, a convenient central point which they could actively hide from the "front page" as their only action on the topic. Reddit as an organisation only hinted at taking action when it came to light some of the images leaked were taken when certain women involved were under-age, but this ultimately didn't elicit any actual reaction from them.
Despite only existing for two days the /r/Thefappening subreddit has over 130,000 subscribers and approximately 10,000 viewers at any given time. To put that in perspective /r/Pics, a Reddit default subreddit, has a little over 6,000,000 subscribers, yet right now only 10,000 people are viewing the subreddit.
Imgur, the go to image hosting site for the majority of Reddit and set and run by a Reddit user, took the initial step of immediately deleting any of the images that were hosted there. Sarah Schaaf, one of the community managers at Imgur tweeted "So happy to be getting in bed after a long day of deleting celebrity nudes.", but the tide has seemingly turned with so many reposts of the images happening that the staff simply can't keep up.
The Zoe Quinn Affair
Games are serious business. No really. In 2013 the video games industry generated $66 billion of revenue worldwide. With the growth of mobile and "indy" gaming it is also no longer the sole purview of reclusive shut-ins and nerds. But with broader appeal comes the need to reflect a more diverse and inclusive world. To that end there has been a recent movement to question and highlight the lack of diversity in gaming, the rampant misogyny and the troubling reliance on tired stereotyping.
This hasn't been received well.
To say there has been some push-back is an understatement. Once again the notion that the decent open minded commentators will lead the conversation regardless of which side of the argument they fall has been brought into question. What should be civil disagreement, reasoned rebuttal and valid criticism of a given position has given way to death threats and harassment.
In the case of Zoe Quinn, a games developer embroiled in a scandal that accuses her of sleeping with gaming journalists for favourable coverage of her games, the outcry and rage of the gaming community was so fierce and overwhelming even those unsympathetic to Quinn have had to back off from the whole affair.
On The Escapist message board the following warning has been posted, such is the overwhelming task of keeping the users in line:
- Mod edit: Due to the high amount of repeat rule-breaks in this thread, from now on any penalties incurred here in this thread will result in a MINIMUM of a probation. You have been warned.
Even amongst friends the trolls and vandals rule the conversation.
What has been clear about this particular case is the insistence of those involved to drag elements of Quinn's personal life that have no relevance to the story into the public eye. This has forced even Reddit to attempt to stifle the conversation in some way, but once again the sheer number of people who wanted to disrupt and troll was simply too much and everyone simply gave in.
With this scandal the decent majority have been utterly drowned out, from Twitter to gaming messages boards, by those hell bent on demonizing a single woman rather than the gaming journalism industry that should reasonably be the target of their ire.
Reddit and Racism
XKCD is a popular online comic strip by the artist Randall Munroe. Reddit is a popular content aggregator and social networking website. The overlap between the fans of each is massive.
Several months ago it became clear that the XKCD section of Reddit had been infiltrated and taken over by a holocaust denier. At first his activities went unnoticed, but over time he began to introduce elements of his agenda into the subreddit, one that prided itself on it's adherence to science and logic. A look through that users profile revealed their interests included anti feminism, racism, rape and both anti-Semitic and anti-Islamic sentiment. Cross referencing that user with those they added to help moderate the many subreddits they had infiltrated revealed a larger network of racists, misogynists and general lunatics that had been organising and infiltrating for months and in some cases years.
The bigger picture seemed to be a massive off site campaign to take over as many minority interest groups as possible, and in the case of XKCD, even unrelated subreddits in an effort to spread their hidden agenda. This culminated in a site wide call to arms due to the amount of trolling that was taking place.
This again didn't really bare fruit as the task was just too mammoth.
20-Something Year Old White Males
The main reply I get when questioning all this is "the demographics of this site are 20 something year old white males" as if that alone should answer the query. The prevailing notion that where white males are gathered unhealthy discourse, marginalisation and trolling will follow is one I'm not entirely comfortable with. Are white men in their 20's so utterly irredeemable? Are white males unable to do empathy? What happened to the idea that the majority of us, even white males, are decent well intentioned people and the trolls are just a minority? Surely it shouldn't matter what the demographics of any given site are if that were true.
What I gather is that "decent" is a very subjective ideal. What some of us find to be reasoned discourse is dismissed as small minded bigotry and lack of perspective by others, what is deemed valid criticism by some is seen as baiting and troublemaking by the opposition. We all tend to operate in extremes.
Another thing I gather is that when ever a group or organisation is taken to task about these things there will always be a vocal cry of "hey, don't lump us all in with those guys!". Again the notion being that the trolls are a minority, but a vocal one and the decent people simply chose to sit in silence.
My question is this; can you still call yourself a decent person if your go to response is seemingly always silence? Why is it those voices only ever pipe up when it's time to defend themselves against the accusations rather than defend others during the trolling?
Above we have seen that in some situations the inundation of trolls and general rule breakers will kill any illusion of decency around certain topics, so where does the belief that we're all decent human beings online come from?
What much of this is about is context. When you are using a site, or even in real life when you are at a place that begs a certain type of behavior, you ought not be shocked when you see it. If you go to rock concert you'll see people being loud and raucous. Those same people will be quiet and calm when in a library. So much of the way people behave themselves has to do with their surroundings. Online is no different. If the norm seems to be people yelling and arguing, then you are more likely to argue and yell. If the norm is to discuss in a thoughtful way then you're more likely to do that. Trolls need food. Don't feed the trolls. You have nothing to gain by it. You will not change their mind. If anyone is ever trolled here, I highly recommend using the tools we have provided and not engaging. EDIT: if you do engage a troll, I think you need to ask yourself why you did that? Trolls are a problem, yes but those that engage the trolls and actively combat them can also be responsible for diminishing the integrity of a community. The "anti-troll" sort of becomes a troll via enabling. (End edit) As for whether or not people are inherently decent, I tend to think that they are ...when their environment sets the expectation that they ought to be so. To a varying degree, we are all subject to the pressures of our surroundings. This is why it's so important to surround ourselves, IRL and online with those that share our general values. -We may have differing thoughts on politics, religion etc but if you can share those thoughts in a civil way, I'm all good with ya. If you cannot.... You're heading to "ignore island."My question is this; can you still call yourself a decent person if your go to response is seemingly always silence? Why is it those voices only ever pipe up when it's time to defend themselves against the accusations rather than defend others during the trolling?
Unfortunately, by engaging the trolls all you are doing is encouraging them. What any troll wants, craves and needs is attention and when you give it to them, they are emboldened.
So I think you have it right here, but I'd like to shift your brain and poke you in the neurons if you'd allow me. As an old timer on the internet (as I assume you are), I am well aware of the "don't feed the trolls" rule. You are completely right, if you don't feed the trolls they go away. It makes sense since trolls are sociopaths. You don't give in, and they don't get to have fun. What really makes hubski great and sets it apart from other so called "social networks" is that users are given tools to defend against the nonsense. The hide button is a great great great thing. The other great, but often not talked about tool that we have at hubski is the social aspect "We" don't accept trolls here, they are easy to ignore and mostly we can tell from other people's interactions who a troll might be. This is my number three reason why I use hubski. Where I think you might be mistaken is in the assumption that trolls are always easy to spot and ignore. When I think of trolls I get the image in my head of someone saying something outlandish from the outright, and giving a ridiculous "opinion" trying to get a reaction. But trolls can also start off as quiet entities, starting off with a reasonable conversation, then suddenly divulging into racism, sexism, or other means of inciting reactions in others. These are the hardest trolls to ignore, because on the outset it seems like they are reasonable, respectable even. So yeah you can ignore them at a point, but it takes effort on your part to do so. In regards to engaging trolls. I will engage a troll, but I have grown a tough internet skin, I _personally_ know what the game is and how it will play out because I've seen it played out a million times. I know in the end that the troll will get fed. What I want to do when I engage a troll is to ask them questions and call them out so OTHER PEOPLE will see it. If someone is being sexist, or racist, or otherist, I want OTHER PEOPLE to see why the behavior of the troll marks them as a "no fun poo poo technicality no fun boo over". To summarize, I love hubski.
Regarding your question, trolling on the internet is easy and, I suppose, gratifying for those who do it, while defending people from them and conversing with them is exhausting at best, infuriating at worst. I tend to just not converse online in general, whether it be Reddit, Twitter, or Hubski. I'm very much a lurker. Why participate in the conversation when it often falls to the notoriously low standards of Youtube comments? "Don't feed the trolls" can be seen as giving up, and maybe this is a selfish stance to take, but I'd rather not spend my energy and time arguing with people looking to incite conflict or hurl insults.
Two big issues have already been made in the other comments- the problem of anonymity, and the "don't feed the trolls" solution. I'll touch on the first issue only to say that I came up with a name for it a while back, and a I'm stupid proud of that name: ring of Gyges effect. Story of the ring is worth looking up, I think it sums up the issue nicely. Okay, that's it, others have already pretty much walked that ground. As for DFTT- I've been wrestling more and more with this one recently. From a practical standpoint, I agree with TNG. Trolling invites its own distorted dopamine feedback wherein pleasure is derived from antipathetic response- be that the good ol' downvote (how many can you wrack up for a single post? -thankfully this one isn't an issue in these parts) or else the vitriolic reply. This being the case, the best practical deterrent to trolling behavior tends to be a lack of any response whatsoever. On a purely mechanical level, it works, and I've espoused it in the past. Especially here, where sporadic troll outbreaks have threatened not only the overall tone of the site, but the integrity of our response as a community- we tend to place great emphasis on being decent people interacting in decent ways. By responding in kind to trolling attempts, we kind of belie our adherence to the notion that we're all human and ought to respond to each other as such. This invites a moral quandary, though, doesn't it? In what other environment are we encouraged not only not to respond angrily to bigotry, ignorance, hatemongering, but rather not to respond at all? if we're to treat interactions online exactly like face to face interactions, why are trolls exempt from reproach? Maybe it specifically discourages trolling from our neck of the woods in the short term, but might it also be at a certain point tantamount to refusing to speak out against The Big Issues more broadly? In the wider world, doesn't lack of meaningful response mean being Part Of The Problem? I don't yet have an answer to these questions- I still think the best way to off a troll is to pretend he isn't there. This has been demonstrably effective in the past, at least in this venue. Besides that, I'll continue to advocate for human decency no matter what- even if someone seems hell-bent on stirring the pot, I try to remind myself and others that we don't actually know the motivations, life situation, social standing, etc of the person with whom we're interacting. While somebody might come off as just arbitrarily nasty, they might be bogged down with all sorts of real-life baggage, of which we're only seeing the leather trim. That doesn't mean we have to agree with them or take their views seriously, but it does mean that we ought to respond calmly and with as much empathy as we can muster. Rational debate is hard, as you've demonstrated with the above examples, but it's not impossible. It's also absolutely vital to this arena in particular, and important most of all when we're confronted with something hateful. After all, decency is easy when you're among friends. Much harder when antagonized. That's when it's worth the most. So long story short: regardless of motivation (which we can't divine or else justify), be decent, and in so doing: 1) maintain your own personal integrity, 2) take a vocal stand against that which ought to be stood against and 3) give the trolls insufficient fuel to keep trolling. That's the best I got, so far. Good post, by the way.
Don't feed the trolls should be taken as "do not give them what they want" not "do not speak to them" Respond with a well thought out, disconnected, and good argument. Do not resort to name calling, bigot calling, etc. Just state a position and back it up. A troll isn't going to get much out of it unless they aren't a troll at all and are honestly trying to debate a point, and in that case keep on with the debating and the keeping honest and disconnected.
I don't know. Everyone's talking about trolls. Not everything on your list has to do with just trolls. It is, in my opinion, pretty natural to be curious about what Jennifer Lawrence looks like naked. It is unnatural to, say, follow her around and try to take pictures, which is why very few people do that. But if the pictures are just sitting there on reddit, then tons and tons of people are going to click. It's not right, per se, but it's understandable. I clicked. I had this vague hope that Lawrence's cell phone pictures would be tasteful, because I like her and she seems more in touch with normality than most actresses, but they were instead kinda creepy, and I was sad. I like to think that if I took cell phone pictures of myself naked, I would at least smile, use good lighting and, you know, try to make myself look more attractive than with clothes on. I'm not sure why so many people who send pictures of themselves around don't do that. But that's an irrelevant digression. The point is that I don't feel like proving your opinion, because I disagree with it. Social norms exist to hold in check the many vices of humanity. It's all in Mandeville, although he took it in entirely the wrong direction with his talk about positive economic benefits.
My two cents? The internet is no different from the real world except for the anonymity. That is key. Speaking for myself, the real world is full of ugliness and hate but with fleeting moments of beauty and love. The bad, while plentiful, will never triumph over the good. People online are the same people in life just hidden in shadows. Me? I always search for the best but expect the worst, which is why I like it here with you guys and gals. It's scary out there. I'm sure someone else will address the real meat of your question. I'm looking forward to it. That's what this is all about. Finding an oasis in the desert. Just like real life.
Everyone has quirks Everyone has areas they are ignorant Everyone seems to be most willing to express themselves in these aspects, because they are often areas of conflict. Look at politics, look at reddit, look everywhere. People have, and will, always appear to be absolute shitheads in some places, but be amazing in others. What you are seeing is not that people are horrible, but that most people have good areas and bad areas. Explains why the smaller subreddits also tend to be less bad, because when a person seeks out something to talk about it, it's because that is a "good area". However, when you get a bunch of people from nowhere, with no binding attribute, you get shitheads, lots and lots of them. I am starting to get a "we are better than them" vibe from this site. I'm not liking it.
I recently deleted my reddit account. On the deletion form, there is a field asking why you are leaving reddit. I think my response is relevant here: After reposting, I have been subjected to extreme homophobia, racism, and a downvote brigade. While I understand the reddit community's opposition to reposts, the fact that such homophobia, racism, and vindictiveness are not only accepted but encouraged has convinced me reddit is not a platform suited for rational, well-adjusted people but instead is a forum where unsavory individuals are able to exercise their bigotry without fear of the reprisals that would be expected in civil society. Many have told me that "OP is a faggot" and such terms are not offensive because they are not intended to express homophobia. This is not the case. Imagine if a user attempted to start "OP is a nigger". They would be shut down in seconds, because while reddit won't tolerate the use of that term due to its racist overtones, homophobic slurs are encouraged. This leads me to conclude the reddit community does not care about homosexuals to the same degree. The downvotes on all my other, unrelated comments demonstrate that reddit is less concerned with meaningful discourse than with accumulating karma. Downvoting my entire post history serves only to cheapen discussion for the sake of punishing me. While I accept that punishment for having violated reddit's ethics, I do not wish to be part of a community that will sacrifice quality discussion for the sake of vindictiveness. I can only assume that this is a common phenomenon. I have used reddit for nearly two years now, and over that time my opinion of it has evolved. After the initial period of leaving the defaults for more niche-oriented communities, I thought I had found the perfect forum. However, my recent experiences have convinced me that this is not the case, and I wonder how many other posts and comments have been manipulated as mine have. I have had many wonderful debates on reddit. The platform has been a profound tool for increasing my knowledge and intelligence, but I cannot tolerate the level of bigotry, vindictiveness, and manipulation I now know it to contain.
To be honest I don't think I've ever had a wonderful debate on Reddit. It certainly has increased some of my knowledge and intelligence and there are some places on it that are very, very nice places to inhabit, or used to be, but the only arguments I have gotten into on Reddit have resulted in a lot of blood-pounding and stress for me. The sort of "Ugh he replied? I don't want to check my inbox" arguments.
I frequently find myself asking, "How many 'isolated incidents' does it take to equal a pattern of behavior? " The corollary in this case is, "How many 'vocal minorities' does it take to equal a significant and/or influential segment of the whole?"
Well, yeah, sure, if you decide to take all vocal minorities that represent subsets of the population, treat them as one, and see how they compare to the total population, they might make up a majority, but that's like adding together all the different racial minorities, comparing them to the total population number, and then saying that because that number actually/factually/numerically represents a majority, they're not minorities. It appears to change the context but does not in actuality. There are some people that are nasty about every subject, but that doesn't mean they agree with each other.
This was excellent. The part where he realised the overly simple "don't feed the trolls" retort was subject to who you are and what platform you were on is one point I find getting across to people is very hard.
It's mostly about anonymity. When we can hide behind a username that's not linked to our identities, lots of people spill their guts. Sometimes their guts are pretty, but generally you're right: the idiots are the ones shouting the loudest, throwing their ugly guts around wherever they go. When they're AFK they usually try to hold it all in, so as to not alienate themselves from the moral majority... a moral majority that I do believe exists. It's typically futile to engage these people, especially within the "communities" they're frequenting. You aren't going to change many (if any) opinions, and you'll become increasingly infuriated in the process. Some of these people literally get off on trolling/baiting/cranking/whatever, they don't even believe the things they're saying, but if it gets you in a tizzy, they'll give it all they've got. The eradication of their shitty beliefs is a battle that will be overwhelmingly fought by the ethical institutions of our society and the wear of time. I'm not claiming we'll ever reach utopia, but every generational iteration is slightly better than the last. Re: Your Post Title, I can't empirically prove which side is the minority or majority, but even supposing that the horrible people are a majority, we at least seem to have a "fake it 'til you make it" mentality that applies to how we conduct ourselves in public. This is stifling enough that the (very poorly expressed) horrible opinions and actions we've all seen online should die out... although never soon enough. I usually tip-toe around these issues, so I'm a little bit clumsy in expressing my views. And yep, I'm a 20-something white male... the privilege is real, and it's not fair....can you still call yourself a decent person if your go to response is seemingly always silence?
Well, you don't have to, it was more a jump off point for a discussion.
Well, I do think that Reddit is a bad place to look if you are looking for a site that actively attempts to retain a high quality of discourse especially site-wide. I think you're spot on with this. Is this basically, "Is Reddit and/or its moderaters really a decent site/decent people if they don't do anything in the face of the really nasty stuff?" I think that Reddit tries to cover its ass legally when it becomes apparent that Reddit might need to. And otherwise I think they don't want to interfere. I don't think that makes them decent people, I think it makes them very self-interested. Good things can arise from such freedoms but also, very very bad things, as you've observed. Because people believe we're all decent human beings offline, and they don't consider that perhaps there's a difference or a loss in such an idea when we take it virtual. This does present an interesting question of "does being online make us less human?" Which could go all sorts of fun ways. We know that taking the face, and the voice out of interactions makes them less personal: that's why people these days love texting and hate the phone, and eye contact is so hard, and etc. I think it's easier to be mean, and/or do nothing, online. For the lack of personalization and the anonymity everyone is trumpeting on about. But just because it is easier to be mean and more people are mean, does not mean that as a whole humanity is more bad. Maybe?What I gather is that "decent" is a very subjective ideal. What some of us find to be reasoned discourse is dismissed as small minded bigotry and lack of perspective by others, what is deemed valid criticism by some is seen as baiting and troublemaking by the opposition. We all tend to operate in extremes.
My question is this; can you still call yourself a decent person if your go to response is seemingly always silence?
where does the belief that we're all decent human beings online come from?
It may be my fault but the focus shouldn't really be Reddit, this has repeated itself in Twitter, Facebook, various message boards, it was basically the downfall of Digg. In terms of Facebook they seem to be very much stricter in what they do and don't allow which insulates them legally. Want to show a beheading? Nope. Breastfeeding your baby? Nope. Someone flagged your WorldStar sourced video too many times? Yoink. Looking at the real world we see it even with the ISIS militia in Iraq. Even they, feeling they're righteous in their deeds, cover their faces, seemingly still needing the cloak of anonymity to carry out their most barbaric of activities. It's not only on the internet where we give in to our most base instincts when no one knows our names.Is this basically, "Is Reddit and/or its moderaters really a decent site/decent people if they don't do anything in the face of the really nasty stuff?"
Why is it awful? I think the thing that most struck people here in the UK when the July 7th bombings happened was the regular mundane lives the terrorists lived until the day they did the deed. The same with people caught in the recent child grooming rings. My contention is against the phrase "normal people". Do we all simply live in societies that reward good behaviour and decency in opposition to our nature? Are we mostly polite not because we really want to be but because we'd like it in reciprocation?
I wasn't saying that it was offensive. Just that a religiously and ideologically crazed radical isn't at all comparable to the average person. Not even the "lol phaggots suck dix" type. And I don't see anything wrong or disingenuous about treating people well in the hopes of being treated well in return. Reciprocation is the basis of every relationship and friendship I've ever had. It doesn't mean I'm fighting some suppressed nature to be an asshole.
Just like Pastafarians though; how do we know who is trolling vs just speaking their mind?
Right before you mentioned Zoe Quinn you mentioned death threats, by those I assume you're talking about Anita Sarkessian (sp?) and those were proved to be fear mongering or attention-whoring by her because her story didn't add up. I still don't know anything about Zoe Quinn other than she's a bastion for... certain groups on Tumblr and parts of Reddit hate her fiercely for that. Anyway regarding Zoe Quinn, IF she did sleep herself into getting certain favours and help in an industry, I have to admit that's kind of grimy, because it paints a bad image. IF she didn't, then it's just Reddit being the schizophrenic asshole that we all know, love and probably hate. I'm on the middle of the road with my opinion regarding ZQ. The Fappening, again with this one, I'm of the opinion that IF you're going to post sexually explicit content for a closed audience (ie a spouse, or SO) then don't post it into the "cloud", if anything use a Snapchat like service or, (GASP) just save all of that for when you're back with them, and use Polaroid! I mean to be fair, from what I've read about this story, Apple has shit security. The other thing I've read (and mostly thanks to a few SJWs that have infiltrated my circle of friends) is that you're literally ass-raping these poor women by viewing their nudes, and you should suffer the same consequences which would be dealt to someone if they actually ran up to Jennifer Lawrence (for example) and... Pardon the crude language, fucked her right in her sweet little ass in the middle of a busy LA thoroughfare. It's a scary thought when you have THAT kind of mindset floating around out there. I haven't followed anything regarding to XKCD so I'm going to move on over that point.
I'll say it up front, I'll say and support whatever I want on the internet, regardless of how inflammatory it is, I feel like it was warranted. For example, there's a video of a cop basically bull-rushing a chick and slamming her into a wall because it looked like she was reaching into her bra or something for knife. I digress, the chick in question had walked up to another one and beat the living shit out of her, and then walked away casually as if nothing was wrong. As she was walking by she reached into her shirt or bra and started to pull out what a near by cop was a weapon. He used enough force as he thought was appropriate (since he was presumably on his way to quell the conflict) and then found out two things (what I can assume) was a few hours after the fact: the assailant was 13 and reaching for her phone. He wouldn't have known that until he brought her in, and he got fired for reacting to someone who might have had a lethal weapon, which she didn't, but he's not a psychic, so he didn't know that. I think the cop used reasonable force in the given situation, but has to lose his job for basically paralyzing a minor. What I'm trying to say there is: I'm a "troll", or at least I'm vocal about my opinions where it's called for. This thread seems like one such place. So no, I'm not a decent person "online" at least in forum type environments at least not when a hot button issue comes up. There might have been a point to this but I lost it sometime ago. EDIT: Regarding Anita's "death threats" found this in an Imgur area I still browse regularly. EDIT: Alternate screncap:
You can post tweets as quick as you like with several after market twitter apps.
I suggest you just watch Anita's videos and see that they are fairly innocuous