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I am really bothered by the expression ‘the online hate mob’, as if this was a consistent and coordinated group of people who have an active and positive role i
by bertil 11y ago
I am really bothered by the expression ‘the online hate mob’, as if this was a consistent and coordinated group of people who have an active and positive role in hatred.
It’s just a set of people who a. had a bad day; b. disagree; c. have arguments, or agree with people who do, and resent the fact that those arguments were openly dismissed.
“Troll” was an expression used by feminists (Ellison) 20 years ago, when they switched from presence-based meetings to on-line forum. They were confronted to dissent for the first time, didn’t know what to do with it. And roll all dissent into a intentionally de-humanised collective, where counter-arguments were gladly mixed with abuse to discredit them.
That kind of conflation became so prevalent, that is –ironically– also what drove people to miss Sacco’s cynicism.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago> “Troll” was an expression used by feminists ... The way I remember it, trolling started out on usenet as a way to, well, here's probably the best example : https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.arts.startrek.tech/mw0DWYlchrM%5B1-25%5D https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.arts.startrek.te...
- bertil 11y agoThe on-line forums 20 years ago that I mention were on Usenet. My understanding is that the criticism and grief were less welcome on feminist channels than on Star Trek fan boards.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y agoHow many early 90s trekkies (sorry, "trekkers") did you actually know.
- bertil 11y agoTrekkies? Many, but not one that would call you a rapist for disagreeing with them, i.e. none that think that is it appropriate and fair to you put you in jail, where you’d get beat and raped on a daily basis for a decade, with no possible recourse, for suggesting that their point of view might be partial. Did I mention suicide rates? I know: That got very real very fast, didn’t it? De-humanising your dissenters can have such strangely overwhelming consequences. I mean, just look at every conversation the original article quotes: death-threats are hardly the worst. That’s why when someone claims (proudly) to have invented the key-word for empowering something like that, I pay attention. I couldn’t find the reference where she did, though.
- vcjohnson 11y agoDo you often get death threats from people who are simply having a bad day and disagree with you? Trivialization of the horrific elements of online interaction is just as bad (if not worse) as conflating them with legitimate dissent.
- bertil 11y agoYes. I ride a bike in London, and taxi drivers tend to act on it too. I’ve been agile enough to avoid the worst, but my bike was smashed more than I can count (I use city-wide bike scheme). I’ve ended in the hospital twice: I got my front teeth smashed once; I also got my knee busted another time. I am not trivialising threats, just arguing that putting them in context would help solve the issue — a lot more than putting thousands of teenagers in jail just because they didn’t mesure the consequence of their anger.