For all the positives that the Internet has granted us–a sense of community, quick analysis, and broad access to information–it has also helped to encourage some altogether less positive traits.
Indeed, the Internet’s anonymity has emboldened trolls with an endless audience and a protected platform. Information overexposure has left people constantly enraged by or permanently desensitized to events. Technology’s growth has even resulted in a selfish sense of entitlement for many who expect amazing services to work perfectly when they didn’t even exist few years ago. Why is this happening, and what can we do about it?
Anonymity
Faceless abuse is old news to people who have spent any significant time online. Groups like Anon and /b/ are so prevalent that even the New York Times has a 7-page article on the art of trolling, why it’s done (for the lulz), and who partakes. If you haven’t come across it yet, read it–it’s stellar.
Two female Yale Law School students have filed a suit against pseudonymous users who posted violent fantasies about them on AutoAdmit, a college-admissions message board. In China, anonymous nationalists are posting death threats against pro-Tibet activists, along with their names and home addresses. Technology, apparently, does more than harness the wisdom of the crowd. It can intensify its hatred as well.
The power of anonymity has even been used to drive others to suicide. A person online approached Megan Meier, and their interactions blossomed into a friendship… until, that is, the other party flipped a switch, cut the friendship off, and began hurling insults at Megan all across the Internet. The most horrifying detail of the story, however, is the perpetrator–the mother of one of Megan’s friends. It’s baffling that a parent could find a place in her soul to destroy another child, but anonymity’s protected power made it a very attractive medium.
In the information age, playground poundings have moved to online chat rooms and instant messages. Nearly half of all teenagers report they have been the victims of cyber attacks. Everything from text messaging to e-mail can be used to bully victims. Some people even create Web sites solely dedicated to harassment.
So, why do we use anonymity to the detriment of others? For lulz? For power? For no reason at all?
What happened to standard human decency?
On outrage and desensitization
We all know what happens when a major event gets covered to death by the media: Either it fuels your fires, or you get so tired of the drivel that you stop caring entirely. Dave Matthews talked with CNN recently about the state of global news coverage and he hit the outrage part right on the head:
Everyone’s outraged all the time. Why are you outraged? There’s war–there’s always been war, as long as most of us have been alive. There have always been people being abused; there’s always been horrible things in the world. Why are we outraged? We should just be quiet and figure it out, and work it out together.
There has always been war. Wars in Darfur and Rwanda have raged for decades. What has suddenly made us care? Is it a simple matter of hearing more about it? Are we being conscientious about our increasingly visible selves? Do we need to express outrage to fit into the “moral majority,” lest we be seen as ambivalent or uncaring?
If we’re not getting outraged, we’re getting complacent. Psychologists across the country are acknowledging the concept that 24-hour TV news networks and the constant stream of Twitter and RSS updates are leading to ambivalence in many of today’s news watchers.
“Some people have seen so much on TV that they don’t even believe it anymore, like in England where terrorists were planning to blow up 10 or 12 airliners. That’s a reverse problem.”
Likewise, some turn away from painful images of starving children in Africa or broken bodies after a Baghdad bombing.
“We should be (psychologically) healthy enough that we can experience some inner sorrow and distress when we see people mutilated or injured or tortured or attacked,” Cline adds. “But after a while people get numb. It (repeated exposure) blunts conscience.”
Our overexposure can control our emotions to enrage or cocoon us. Are either of these correct responses? More importantly, can it even be reversed? Our trend towards connectivity and community shows no sign of slowing. Only the news networks can control their content, but with 24 hours of news, what can you do besides repeat?
Entitlement
Do you remember your first TV? How about your first cordless phone, or your first cellular phone? It was wonderful for me–I still remember my sense of wonder for these devices. As a generation, however, we seem to have recently outgrown that feeling.
We can see NASA blowing stuff up on the moon ON OUR COMPUTERS, yet people complain about how long it took to view it
Louis CK said it best in a sketch on late night: Everything is amazing right now, and nobody’s happy.
I was on an airplane, and there was Internet–high speed Internet, on the airplane. That’s the newest thing that I know exists. And I’m sitting on the plane, and they go, “Open up your laptop, you can get on the Internet.” And it’s fast, and I’m watching YouTube clips, and it’s ama-, I mean, I’m in an airplane. And then it breaks down, and they apologize, “The Internet’s not working.” The guy working next to me goes, “Pff, this is bullshit.”
Like how quickly the world owes him something that he knew existed only ten seconds ago.
He mentions people that complain about slow downloads on their mobile phone while failing to appreciate the fact that the signal is traveling to satellites miles above the earth. He continues with people that complain about menial air travel issues (like boarding delays) while ignoring the amazing feat of flying in the air.
Has the rush of technical progress pushed us from appreciating the true miracles of our current environment? When you really think about it, even walking is amazing. Thinking is amazing. Designing planes is amazing. Making wireless calls is amazing. Checking your email is amazing. Email is amazing.
Technology has exploded in the last decade, and people just take it for granted. The next time you make a phone call, think about what exactly that signal is doing, how many points it’s passing, and how many people it took for that to happen. Now apply that method to everything else you do during a normal day. Are you still quite as perturbed when your email takes three minutes to sync instead of one?
Inevitable side effect, or modifiable behavior?
While these undesirable traits accompany our connected world, does that imply that they must do so? Icrontic controls trolling and indecency through dedicated staff working to make a friendly, inviting, understanding, and open-minded community. Should the Internet require staff to filter out the dregs?
Abuse in the real world isn’t tolerated, and most of us don’t abuse because we’ve been taught not to do so. Why doesn’t this translate well to the Internet? Can we provide our children with the perspective necessary to realize that today’s problems are quite similar to history’s problems? Can we inspire them with simple wonders–like humans flying through the air–to give them some idea of how good things really are right now?
Ultimately, it seems that (as with most things) education is the answer. As the Internet and technology become more present in our society and our lives, responsible parties should all take active steps to teach their children, wards, friends–everybody–that manners and general rules of decency should take just as much precedence on the Internet as they do in the physical world.
More intelligent and thorough reporting can avoid undue outrage or desensitization, while legitimate news can still stir people when it needs real action. More education and a more thoughtful perspective on technology can inspire understanding, and perhaps even the drive to improve it.
Are these traits as prevalent as they seem? Are they unavoidable, or can they be changed? Should they be changed? Do we need to broadly teach technology appreciation and Internet etiquette?
Or should we keep it all as is, just for the lulz?
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