If You Have Nothing Nice to Say, Say it in the Comment Section Accountability is a powerful tool. Being held responsible for one’s actions can powerfully effect how individuals make decisions and social accountability relies on how society interoperates behavior. When it comes to the internet, anonymity often dissolves that accountability. The internet provides an abundance of benefits, including access to an overwhelming amount of information, communication and access to educational tools. Also available are numerous social outlets and ways to connect with a seemingly limitless number of people. However, this effortless ability to voice opinions and beliefs is not without repercussions. Many times, content found in the comment section of
In his article, The Online Disinhibition Effect, Dr John Suler reveals an in-depth analysis of this newly trending behavior. Dr. Suler categorizes the online disinhibition effect in two ways. The first way, benign disinhibition, “… can indicate an attempt to better understand and develop oneself, to resolve interpersonal and intrapsychic problems or explore new emotional and experiential dimensions to one’s identity” (Suler). The second way, he labels as toxic disinhibition, which he describes, “…may simply be a blind catharsis, a fruitless repetition compulsion, and an acting out of unsavory needs without any personal growth at all” (Suler). While there are possible positive outcomes resulting from benign disinhibition, much of what is seen online, such as cyberbullying and what has been labeled, ‘trolling’; defined as the act of posting inflammatory, derogatory or provocative messages in public forums (Zhuo), results from toxic
Message boards, discussion groups, and comment sections are often overwhelmed with people who post bullying, lewd, and often extremely offensive comments, in an attempt to upset other commenters and draw attention to themselves (Timpane). They intentionally disrupt what should be considered a forum for respectful communication between like minded individuals. Instead, comment sections are over run with negative posts and heated arguments. Many people attempt defend their opinions and beliefs, only to be demeaned and disrespected through often ignorant and hateful comments. Some websites have deactivated their comment sections due to the individuals who troll the internet and look for ways to ignite controversy by making intentionally rude and crass arguments against
Zhuo begins her essay with an anecdote about reading an insightful story on your favorite website. With positive thoughts in your head you scroll down the page to find an anonymous hateful comment, this is an internet troll. The authors main point in this essay is that since we can post comments without anyone knowing who it is, will inevitably lead to immoral behavior. She supports this idea with an argument put forth by Plato in fourth century B.C. As well as psychological
Someone’s mistakes can easily be debuted online, making the levels of public shame go beyond its limits. In Source C, “Is the Internet a Mob without Consequence?”, there is an article about an adult who got a massive amount of hate for an inappropriate tweet. In the document, the adult named Ms. Sacco received intense reactions and consequences: “Yet as soon as it was clear that she had made similar comments in the past, the Internet turned into a voracious and vengeful mob. Ms. Sacco was tried and judged guilty in a public square of millions and soon attacked in a way that seemed worse than her original statement. Within hours, people threatened to rape, shoot, kill, and torture her.” (Bilton 9-13). With the negative feedback, the lady realized her tweet was an awful mistake; however, when dealing with the internet, there is no “deleting” mistakes. Also, being shamed to the extent of having millions watch her in a public square and then threaten to do so many wrong actions like killing is just brutality wrong. The responses following the tweet are in fact far more disgusting than the single tweet posted which started the entire breakout. Furthermore, with the rise of social media, Monica Lewinsky also had her fair share in being harassed and humiliated online. Monica shares with the audience, “But the attention and judgement that I received, not the
With large social issues like online harassment it is incredibly easy to reduce the problem to a personal level and make banal statements like “Just don’t take naked pictures of yourself,” or “If you simply ignore the harassment, it’ll go away.” While both of these are ideal solutions, they are simply not practical, given our nature as human beings. For example, you can also ignore a broken toe in the hope that it will “get better”, but, in the long run, it will not heal properly without some form of medical attention. The same metaphor applies to this and most other social dilemmas as well. The cultural problem of Internet harassment is more of a public issue for a variety of reasons. The biggest obstacle that we, as a society, have to overcome is this notion that being persecuted online is “just part of the culture of the Internet”. While it will never be possible to completely eliminate all forms of negativity and pestering online, it still is possible to reduce it to a more manageable level. Like on a fair number of other social issues, America could learn a lot if it strove to emulate its European brothers and
In the essay “Say Everything” written by Emily Nussbaum, the author presents the argument that young people in this generation do not have a sense of privacy and tend to post whatever they like on the internet. She presents 3 different ideas of what happens when young adults are on the internet.
Today, the world is connected digitally through the internet. Here, we can see many cases of anger and or racism daily. The Internet helps us see the severity of the issue with anger and “symbolic racism”, for it is widely understood that it does not matter what race or gender you are to experience or express the emotion anger in a racist way towards others. (Redlawsk. et al. pg. 681). Many racist acts are displayed daily on social media, yet no solid understanding is presented as to why it happens in its totality. It is more common to see these types of acts nowadays, even though we are more educated on the matter. It may be that “people use the internet as an artificial platform to express their emotions” including anger and racism. In an article published in the UK, Shakuntala Banaji claims Social Media is a “potentially therapeutic resource, for those needing the validation of their racist or anti-racist views”. (Shakuntala n.p.) Based on Shakuntala’s observation, technology is playing an instigative role in this phenomenon. Some use the internet to release, and more times than less fuel their anger. Even so, social media isn’t necessarily just a negative factor on the issue of anger and racism, for it also exposes other factors that may help understand the subject in a broader spectrum. The internet allows us to view these acts of anger being portrayed by
Instead, Bok suggests that we address the problem by communicating with those who are causing these disturbances and understand . Also in the essay, “Freedom of Speech Means Freedom to Hate”, Christopher Hitchens explains why banning those hate speeches may be an unwise decision for society as a whole as freedom of speech does sometimes prevent the tyranny of majority from happening. While the essay, “Why Women Aren’t Welcome on the Internet”, Amanda Hess makes for the argument that the internet have become a new and terrifying way for people to bully women who uses it. The last article, “The Case for Censoring Hate Speech,” Sean McElwee argues that censoring is required to help protect the minorities and to foster a better society. Freedom of expression should not be limited for limiting speech does not help solve the root problem and it would be near impossible for any person to regulate what people are allowed to say and not allowed to say without having any sort of bias against anyone in
In the recent years, technology has changed the world. We have discovered new diseases and viruses, and found cures and remedies for them. We have made technology to go into and research outer space and its resources. We have even made devices that can fit in a normal persons pocket and can text, call, post, tweet, or message anyone from anywhere! But this recent boom in technology has created a new battlefront for bullies. Now, Bullies can post or comment hateful words or embarrassing photos on social media. The effects are much worse than most forms of bullying , because the amount of people who can see it is so much more online than in person. Now, bullies can argue against prosecution by saying that they have the right of the first amendment. Cyberbullies should be punished for cyberbullying because it
This is an even more difficult problem today, because, as Andrejevic (2002) predicted, the forms of information gathering and surveillance being used are incredibly inconspicuous (245). However, one might ask whether this labor is really free. Certainly, no monetary payment exists; however, users have granted access to a community that they willingly take part in. This could be understood as the exchange taking place. The problem here is that communities, like Facebook, are manufactured and they represent the privatization of “general intellect.” Nowadays, not being a Facebook user can often be social
Virginia, Bendel Draa, and D. Sydney Tara. "Cyberbullying: Challenges and Actions." Journal of Family and Consumer Sciences 101.4 (2009): 40-6. ProQuest Central. Web. 12 Dec. 2012.
Technology has provided our society with numerous innovations that have been created to improve the quality of life on a daily basis. One such innovation is the Internet. The access to a wide variety of information is perhaps the most valuable tool, as well as the most important tool, that we have entering the twenty-first century. There are virtually no limits on how much can be achieved through the use of the Internet. This is not, however, necessarily a good thing. Most people find that offensive material such as child pornography and hate-related propaganda can be viewed by people too easily via the Internet. While child pornography is a detestable subject, it does not have the sort of appeal that a hate group website does in that there are stricter guidelines preventing individuals from attaining child pornography material from the Internet. These stricter guidelines include the Communications Decency Act (1995), which forbids the use of the Internet for such purposes as attaining material of a child pornographic nature (Wolf, 2000). This law can also be used to monitor the hate group websites, but since the law is too broad, it is rarely held up in court. The hate group websites do, however, have a large enough following that there is legislation being formed to specifically target the material on the sites. Despite the highly offensive nature of hate group websites, the sites should not be censored because the right to free speech must be preserved. In this paper we will define what is considered to be hateful content; why this hateful content should be protected; what else can be done to monitor this material on the Internet; and when are the people cr...
"Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use." Issues: Understanding Controversy and Society. ABC-CLIO, 2011. Web. 21 Jan. 2011.
Social media can cause some great trouble for some people. Some people can become bullies over the internet, while others are the innocent victims for these emotionless
Free speech on the Internet is a very controversial subject and has been the key problem surrounding the Internet today. The attempt to regulate and govern the Internet is still pursued by government officials. This subject has been intensified due to terrorist attacks against the United States and around world within the past years. The government believes that by regulating the Internet, it will protect the general public from criminal actions and eliminate the exposure of children to pornography or vulgar language. Senator Jim Exon of ...
messages and images can be posted anonymously and distributed quickly to a very wide audience. It can be difficult and sometimes impossible to trace the source. Deleting inappropriate or harassing messages, texts, and pictures is extremely difficult after they have been posted or sent” (Dealing with Cyberbullying 1). Cellphones and computers are not to blame for online bullying. Social media sites can be used in a positive way, depending on how...
Social media has changed the way people communicate with each other and in turn, has affected our ability to empathize in both negative and positive ways. One of the most harmful consequences is the rise of cyber-bullying, which can be found from a hateful Facebook post by a classmate to anonymous trolling in the comments sections of websites. Some argue that social media is a breeding ground for this type of behavior while others say it would still take place even if you removed the medium.