It's Not Facebook, It's the People Who Use Facebook
All the Internet does is reflect -- and amplify -- human behavior.
It's easy to be anonymous online, as anyone who's ever been a victim of online slander knows. It's also easy to threaten the life of the sitting American president. And the controversial Facebook poll asking users if President Obama should be killed underlines two emerging ethos of the connected, free-wheeling, open-like-an-open-wound Web.
First, people do what they do online because they can. A Facebook spokesman said "the offensive poll" was put up on Saturday, drawing some 700 responses ranging from "yes" and "if he cuts my health care" to "no." The poll was created by a third-party application, and Facebookers had previously used the poll to ask questions like "What should I wear on Friday?" and "What do you think about health care?", the Facebook spokesman said. Both the individual poll and the application were taken down when Facebook officials were alerted of them Monday morning. The Secret Service is now investigating the case.
Second, because of the relative newness of our social networking era -- in which what you fire off on Twitter may end up on someone's Facebook status page before finding its way to some blog and then becoming the subject of a YouTube video -- there's no agreed upon code of behavior online. There's no censoring hub, no stop light to stop the madmen on the virtual freeway from veering off the lanes. What's acceptable to say in the company of your friends or relatives can go public. And spreads. Then hits a collective nerve.
Some HuffPostTech readers are asking others to boycott Facebook for allowing such a poll to possibly exist on its site. A HuffPost reader named "nevergiveup" posted a phone number for Facebook and urged people to call and "leave a message that this is unAmerican and treasonous and they are responsible."
In an interview with HuffPostTech, Facebook spokesman Barry Schnitt said: "People are certainly entitled to their opinions, but we argue that we acted responsibly. We took it down as soon as we found out."
A quick search on Facebook found that Obama is not the only political target on the popular social networking site, which now has 300 million users. Type "Sarah Palin" and "kill" on Facebook, for example, and an anti-Palin group called "Sarah Palin will Kill us All" pops up. It has 55 members. But Obama, by far, has been the subject of the most persistent and continuous attacks and rumors. During the presidential campaign, a widely debunked rumor that Obama is a Muslim was pervasive. In recent months, Obama's place of birth has been questioned by the so-called "birthers."
And here's the third emerging ethos of our social networking era: Online, clinging to their own set of facts, connecting within their own networks, people believe what they want to believe -- one click at a time.
"Society has always had extremists. They just haven't had a public venue that we could all see before," said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, an expert on presidential communication and director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania. "Language is evolving because of the Internet, and people have no sense of what's appropriate or not. But you would expect that anyone who would ask people if the American president should be killed is fully aware of how extraordinarily serious that is. You would expect."
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Somehow, this argument sounds very much like "Guns don't kill people. People kill people."
The technology and providers are not solely at fault, but they do carry some blame for providing services without much regard to the consequences.
Online bulletin board systems and the like have been around for nearly 30 years now. This isn't so new that there isn't experience with it.
Facebook is child's play compared to some of the garbage you see written on LinkedIn's Question boards.
Your argument is a little like saying, "guns don't kill people, people kill people." That's true, but if the guns weren't in their hands to begin with, it's unlikely the other person would be dead.
My point is, for all its wonders, there is a dark side to the Internet. Its accessibility and its anonymity make for an irresistible combination in the hands of people who bear a dangerous grudge. On some level, policing needs to be in place just as much as we need police in the real world: to thwart would-be ne'er do wells and catch people who cross the line into real hate speech or bullying. I'd like to think that sites like Facebook are doing their own policing, but it's also the responsibility of users to discourage destructive behavior.
This story is part of a larger story not being covered in the media. Not huffPost not anywhere. There has been one small piece in time magazine back in 2006 but the issue essentially died on the vine.
User generated content and social networking are two parts of the new culture of networks which offer a platform for collectives to operate in new ways. as Vargas points out above ""Society has always had extremists. They just haven't had a public venue that we could all see before,"
The second and more important story is about how "Language is evolving because of the Internet." and specifically how the coded use of language referred to as Dog Whistle politics has gone viral and is now being used in MSM and pop culture.
This culture of coded language is the use of the rights guaranteed by the first amendment to to subvert those guaranteed by the rest of the bill of rights. Not unlike the cases of mob violence ad targeting on facebook this coded language is being used as a platform to harass those targeted official enemies of collectives.
Like the story of teens using facebook to control the social life of a classmate, this use of language in conjunction with social networking is being used to single out and torture those targeted.
http://mashable.com/2009/09/25/fake-facebook-profile/
The rest of the story is posted at the following link.
http://www.princeofnetworks.com/
great post.
This story is part of a larger story not being covered in the media. Not huffPost not anywhere. There has been one small piece in time magazine back in 2006 but the issue essentially died on the vine.
User generated content and social networking are two parts of the new culture of networks which offer a platform for collectives to operate in new ways. as Vargas points out above ""Society has always had extremists. They just haven't had a public venue that we could all see before,"
The second and more important story is about how "Language is evolving because of the Internet." and specifically how the coded use of language referred to as Dog Whistle politics has gone viral and is now being used in MSM and pop culture.
This culture of coded language is the use of the rights guaranteed by the first amendment to to subvert those guarantee
Jose, thank you for a thought provoking article. Many of the comments are food for thought, as well.
Our youth, a savvy techie generation know the power of social networking. They can set marketing trends, and in a moment influence their FB friends or wherever to boycott or buy. The emotional dynamic to be part of a culture of like-minds in any niche of interest is very seductive.
FB removing the Obama questionnaire is a hopeful sign: that there is some control. But, erring on the side of caution is solid advice.
FB chose Friend as the connector, again appealing to human nature to connect. In life a real friend is someone we interface with overtime, and have real experience.
In Cyberface cleverly written words can be very manipulative, or sincere. Some monikers are photos of a puppy or a peace sign...Who is it really lurking, responding? Ah! There lies the danger and the folly.
"Our youth, a savvy techie generation know the power of social networking."
Yes. Those who have grown up with information technology are quite comfortable with it and know better than to scream "fire" in a crowded theater, thank you oldsters very much! (not you, Merrie) These problems are coming from the generation that grew up without computers, and with Jim Crow. Ted Kennedy was right. It certainly is time to pass the torch to the new generation. Long overdue, as a matter of fact. To expand on something Albert Einstein said the significant problems we face will not be solved with the type of thinking, nor by the type of people, who created them.
As a 21-year-old, I have to say that I am worried about my generation. Too many kids my age spend WAY too much time online mindlessly surfing the web, and when they aren't doing that, they're chatting with their friends about crap that means nothing in the real world (and what's worse: they manage to misspell just about every other word in the process). My generation is of self-centered idiots with the attention span of an 8-year-old with ADD.
If dIs wE dOeSnT gEt OuR aCt 2gEtHeR, wE'rE sCrEwEd. OMG!!!!!!!!!!1111111
Our generation doesn't really understand the power of social networking. We simply use the social networks to drone on about out boring little lives and then the older generations report about the impact that we have on marketing trends, etc.
Then we, in turn, ignore what was just reported and flip on the TV to watch The Hills.
I admit, I used facebook for a while because a high school friend who I had not spoken to for ages suddenly contacted me via FB. Before long, I had dozens of "friends" who I wasn't really friends with back in the high school days on my Friend's list. But now that I know what happened to these people, I don't need to use it any more, especially their boring daily updates :)
Jamieson's statement ""Language is evolving because of the Internet, and people have no sense of what's appropriate or not." is not a cope out but pure nonsense and BS. This is part of the attitude of not holding people accountable for their actions and statements irrespective of how despicable and harmful they may be. This is not funny or responsible to post that kind of polls against a sitting president and this has never existed against any previous president. Those responsible should be investigated and the full force of the law applied against them! They will learn to keep their hateful and dangerous inner desires for themselves while in jail.
I advised a friend of mine not to use facebook because people abuse it. she ignored be because "all her friends were doing it". some of her clients found out she was jewish and decided not to use her services anymore.
I am disgusted that our country is so proto-fascist it accepts using facebook as an employment filter. its ok to not hire someone based on what is on their facebook. we have laws protecting you from all kinds of things but if a friend of a friend goes to keggers outside of the correct fraternity or wears all black clothes you aren't hired and could in fact be fired for not acting in the company's best interest.
this country does not focus on the common good -- everyone is constantly looking for excuses for exclusion of certain people be it by ethnicity, religion, political affiliation, and even if you have a stray mcdonalds bag in your back seat. This is primitive tribalism -- we were supposed to be better than that.
What confuses me is why people are so willing to expose all of their personal business, feelings, etc to any site on the internet in any event.
There is nothing that is too personal anymore.
Keeping things private has gone the same way as having manners has gone.
I'm translating a book written by a police officer about Identity Theft and how can you protect against it. He told me stories about criminals increasingly searching sites like Twitter for happy tweets like "I'm in Virginia, visiting my folks". They google it, find the user actually lives in LA, so... he's not home. Be careful. Reflect a bit on that compulsive need to trumpet your every movement online.
So true... I'm shocked at how folks dont mind posting how drunk they were the last night. Or what happy hour joint they are going to. But I find that its just like High School. Everyone says Hi but then the cliques form. I'm an adult, I have a life and things to do -- I don't feel the need to update my page with every philosophical thought that pops into my head and Tweet when use the restroom. Is FB/Tweeter a cry for attention? A need to reveal feelings and emotions to a World Wide Shrink?
Make that "this ISN' T a matter of free speech.
So how do we curb some of this ? This is a matter of freedom of speech anymore. It is a matter of the crazzies run amok. Tell us what we must do with the internet to make it less prone to violent people spewing hate .
Don't be a bystander. FIght that urge to 'not get involved' or whatever it is. See something, say something. The fact that people can't even make their opinions heard online makes me worry about what might have to happen in the real world for people to shake of their lethargy.
I don't know, in the case of the internet, I have to disagree with you here. I've had plenty of incidents where I got involved and nearly wanted to smash my laptop because of people's blatant stupidity. Sometimes, it's better to just let them run free on the internet, because in essence, many of them are just trolling... feeding the flames won't really change much, especially in environments like the Facebooks Poll pages. I've witnessed the discussions that go on there, and its a very, scary place to be.
Time is better spent in places like this, where [for the most part] mature debates are happening, versus the immaturity that runs amok in facebook.
Enact an e-police state, "Papers, please!"
All this fascination about something that's been around a long time. Ten years ago anonymous people were posting all kinds of crazy weirdness, and offensive online polls on groups all over the place and nobody even bothered to care.
Also, there appears to be a disconnect in peoples' logic. The question "should Obama be killed?", while offensive, is not inferring that Obama should be killed, it's only asking what people think about the subject.
Suddenly everyone's in an uproar over something that doesn't indicate what they seem to think it indicates, and over internet anonymity, as if it's this terrible new development, when in fact it's been around since the internet found its way into everyone's livingroom. Nothing has changed. I recall all kinds of anti-Bush vitriol, suggestions about various heinous things that should be done to him, etc. etc.
It's all talk, just a bunch of blah blah blah, and people getting out their anger in a nonviolent manner. There's no violence in posting something to the internet. It's just people getting all worked up and getting out their frustrations, or being smart-allecks and trying to offend people.
What's the big deal?
It isn't fascination, it is like watching a slow motion accident about to happen. Before that day in Dallas that ended JFK's life there was this kind of thing going on -- it is the rumblings of a beast that should have been shown the door at its first teabag meeting -- instead it was encouraged by "leaders" like Michele Bachmann and all the others like her who fueling it all and giving it legitimacy.
In the 70s there was a lot of political discord. It started as political rumblings and angry words turned to angry actions. Words can be very dangerous. Words turn into actions. Angry words at the right time is tinder to the fuel of latent hatred. Germany is a good place to see how words turned into a horror. The book burnings here, in our time, done by the religious right wing during the GWB era were scary. And now we take another step down the same path that this country followed with MLK and RFK.
People think this is a game and it isn't. When Nancy Pelosi shed a tear for all the hate happening now it was because she had seen what happened to San Francisco in the 70s and that was a small scale armageddon next to what this country will see if something happens to our president.
If anyone said a word against GWB they were called "traitor" and now we have our leaders of Congress acting like classless bigots cheerleading the
Well I can see your point on learning from the past. We hear the enflamed talk that propelled some people to commit heinous action, and we fear it may happen again. I can totally accept that.
I can also accept "investigating" things. I think what happened to Milk, MLK, RFK, etc. was terrible, and it's disheartening to hear the kinds of things we're hearing. We have a lot of people in this country who never grew up, and don't have compassionate thoughts, and have very bad intentions.
What I am really finding hard to stomach is all the talk on the forums about arresting people and throwing them in jail. You can't arrest someone for posting a poll on the internet. Sure, investigate, ask questions, it's the secret service's job, but when it crosses the line and becomes a witch-hunt, then there is a problem.
I was called a traitor numerous times for my ranting, anti-Bush tirades. I considered myself a patriot. I would never commit an act of violence - I am a pacifist. But should I have been arrested for making some crazy suggestions about what we should do with the fascist neo-con that was destroying our country?
People say a lot of things, and very few of them would ever commit those words to action. People blow off steam, they provoke, they push the boundaries of acceptable language. We can't control everything everyone says. It makes more sense to prosecute actors, not speakers.
Your post is a big deal! This is not just a bunch of blah, blah, blah! If you ask an insane question about killing the President, don't you think that could push some fool over the edge? You can't be that blind! Words have consequences and if someone harms the President, will you say "what's the big deal, then?"
Sorry, but words are not actions. If someone allows someone else's words to compel them to do something terrible, then they should suffer the consequences.
I think the guy who brought the gun to Obama's rally should have been arrested, right there on the spot, for threatening the president. THAT is a REAL threat, and what do we do? Nothing. We talk about it.
Meanwhile, a silly, innocuous little poll on facebook, made by some childish fool who just wants to offend people, gets all the attention? And everyone wants this person ferretted out, tarred, feathered and thrown in jail?
Meanwhile meanwhile, there are actual groups of people out there who have very bad intentions, hiding in basements, collecting weaponry. THOSE are the people we should be worried about.
I do understand the power of words over people who lack the capacity to think for themselves. But words are still words, not actions.
What about the KKK rallies? How come we never arrest the KKK for hate-speech directed at blacks, for burning effigies and crosses, and basically doing their best to foment hatred and cause bloody action? Because until there is action that breaks the law, their free speech is protected.
If someone harms the president, or attempts to harm the president, or meets clandestinely with a group who are armed and intend to harm the president, then you have actual action. Those people should be arrested, not some dumb kid who posted a poll on facebook.
I got out of the facebook game a while ago. IMO, it's boring, it takes too much time to do what?...NOTHING!! Yes, I had plenty of 'friends' but most worked and never had the time (or forgot) to update or post or whatever it is pple do on facebook so it would be days, weeks even months before comments or whatever were even posted!! A big waste of time. But that's my opinion. Apparently, there are scores of pple who live by this and having trouble getting away from it. That's sad! (and scary, too! )
I used FB to get in touch with a lot of people I hadn't seen in years, and then I got their e-mail addresses and other contact info. so that I could rekindle friendships with those I wanted to. Now, I am back in touch with them outside of FB, but I have no desire or need to tell everyone I know on Facebook that I've just clipped my toenails or that I crave a peanut butter sandwich.
Facebook is post f#ckedcompany.com, and that was a cesspool of nasty way before FB. There are two things to remember, key-board courage (that faint whiff of anonymity) and downright stupid.
After a while, you realize the only reason the right likes Palin is because she manages to get under the skin of so many people who can actually -think-, that 'they' love her edge. If we ignored her, so would they. And there really is an us-v-them, you just have to go on the internet.
Also, there is a vile hypocrisy and rationalization factor that I'm not personally pleased with on any site where comments are allowed. Even here, because of the mere fact that even after posting stupid or dumb remarks, people can change their minds. Or lose their minds. (haha)
I agree with the vile hypocrisy and rationalization in any comments section. I have had to wean myself off of reading comments on most websites... I was shocked to see racist rants posted for just about ANY subject matter. The site could be about cute little bunny rabbits but I can almost guarantee you there will be a racist post about black people mixed in. I let it get under my skin and that was the wrong thing to do. But now, I recognize that there are people who believe that they are "safe" saying racist things online because 1) they think they have anonymity and 2) I think a few honestly believe black people dont use the internet. I no longer let it get under my skin, I now feel sorry for ignorant people.
What I've wondered for a while, is why all the political polls on FB seem to swing to the Right. Do progressives just ignore these apps? Does the Right order their lackeys to create these polls and vote in droves on them? Why do they all seem so skewed?
Guess us Lefties have better things to do
wrong thread. sorry!
the right wing forward machine can't be underestimated. they are funded by social security and spend 16 hrs a day working because that is what retirement in America is all about (outrage!). A happy old person is a work of art. We abandoned the arts under Reagan.
I'm not diminishing the impact of these hate blogs but 700 out of 300 million users is not really a huge percentage of FB users. And FB responded quickly and responsibly. I'm a recent user and I like the convenience of being able to look at pictures of family events that I have not been able to attend. My friends and family members are located (literally!) all over the world and I'm now able to keep in touch via FB. AND the majority of my family members on FB are libs - including the younger generation and they are able to alert us to important and interesting events ie YouTube, etc. that we should either support or watch out for. So I'm not an FB basher. And no, I don't get a kick out of posting any inane or banal info about myself. and only one lousy picture to boot!
There's a world of difference between asking "Will Sarah Palin kill us all?" and "Should the current president of the united states be killed?" One is a question about their intent towards us, the other is a question about our intent towards them. They arent comparable at all, especially since Palin (thank God) isnt president (and never will be). If someone starts a group called "Will Obama kill us all?", there shouldnt be anything wrong with that either. I certainly wondered if Bush was going to "kill us all" when he was in office. Fortunately, most of us survived his term (give or take a few thousand US soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi citizens).
I'd argue that there's no difference at all in asking a stupid question on the internet. There are hundreds of millions of stupid questions floating around all over the web. What's so special about this one? If it had said "George Bush" instead of "Obama", it would still exist, and would have gotten no press at all. Why? Because it would be just another lame, idiotic online poll that some smart-arse posted to try to offend people.
I think the joke's really on all the people who are up-in-arms getting offended. If that was the intent of the poll (and it invariably is with things like this,) then I guess it did what the author wanted it to do. Offend people. Okay, now can we move on to something actually a little bit relevant and important please?
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