How to conduct yourself on Social Media?
With so much hate and so much negativity that is going around on social media platforms like Twitter, I felt like writing an article on this. This is not some advisory article but rather a question that I’m putting to myself as much to others.
So lately I have been appalled by the level of hate that one human being can have for another and certain posts on popular social media sites like Twitter made my insides twists in knots and my face burn with anger.
How else can you feel when you have people openly giving open death threats and rape threats just because?
And what’s most terrifying is the blood-curdling details these people go on to describe. One of them had sent a death threat to the popular Indian journalist telling her that “ her organs be taken out of her and put in acid while her parents watch her die. Wow! This is just a very high level of evil. One cannot possibly associate this with humanity. But this is the truth. The tweets on Twitter will scare you more than any Stephen King, novel. One cannot even imagine what the people who these attacks are directed to feel. Just reading them and writing about them is giving me the chills and making my hair stand up.
It was with great self-control that I steered myself away from the mess of humanity that is there on social media where people have taken the liberty to let all hell loose.
If that doesn’t wake you up then perhaps it would be shocking for you to know that a woman was gang-raped in the metaverse moments after she had entered it.
Is it because people feel there are no repercussions in virtual worlds? Is there no fear of God and has the conscience died in these people?
So is the fear of punishment the only thing that keeps people civil?
I cannot seem to explain the actions of so many of these hateful people out there who are like this against people who they have never ever met. Were these people already like this and now they have a platform to express themselves under the cloak of anonymity? Or has hate slowly sowed a seed in the minds of these people over time and now they have lost in touch with their humane side?
I don’t know the answers but for my sanity, I’m obliged to say and believe that all these people are just mentally unstable and are mad. The surprising thing is that these people can be anybody. They are homemakers, they are vice-chancellors of universities or retired senior officials or college students or high officeholders who would otherwise be called normal if you saw them on the streets. Do platforms like Twitter give them so much power that they feel they can say or do anything and can get away with it?
I was talking about the country of my birth, India but this phenomenon is visible in all the other countries of the world. There is no tolerance for opposing points of view in most people. And people have taken their right to be aggressive. Even just writing about such things has caused uneasy sensations in me, and I apologize to the reader if you too are feeling discomfort reading this article. But It’s important to raise such questions and high time to take a call on what should be permissible online and what shouldn’t be.
And what if the machinery that is supposed to hold people accountable promotes violence?
Political parties all over the world have weaponized social media if it was already not earlier, now it has become a weapon that can be used by many to target one.
In India itself, the ruling party BJP has its ‘hate factory’ that gets activated and attacks in hordes on anybody who they wish to target. Most often than not it’s the minority who are being attacked. They have targeted all the reporters who report against their ideology. Many of these were the blue tick accounts. They attacked the reporter
@RanaAyyub Twitter account, for reporting on the death of Yemen children at the hand of Saudi drones. The Saudi authority was an equal party to this coordinated attack which had 25000 tweets in one day targeted at this lady journalist for reporting on this.
Social media has indeed become the choice weapon of evil. But I also see the good side. Many contribute by posting positive content and inspiring and motivational content which does help people become better. But seems to me, that’s at this moment it’s not enough to counter the bad elements. I feel a more proactive movement is required by the netizens to remove the scourge of hate from social media.
It’s high time people who misuse the internet by spreading hate and attack, be disbarred from using the internet itself. I don’t know if such a thing can be implemented but with so much power available on the internet, there has to be a way to control the conduct of people. There are AI systems that can be put up which allow what can be said and posted.
There is a slight problem with that, the agencies that are put in charge of these things are prone to be corrupt and use their power in ways favorable to them.
So What’s The Solution?
Hence it is time that the netizens come forward and take charge of situations rather than give this to some government agency. The only problem is that there are very few people who want to take the effort to do these things as most of them are too distracted by their pursuits.
Perhaps one day they will rise together and take it upon themselves in this decentralized way of Web3.0 to challenge the evildoers.
And in the meantime, Social media giants like Twitter should conduct a test before letting people become a part of their site. They have to take responsibility and it cannot be always that they take action after the damage has been done. Many people go through so much cyberbullying that they carry deep traumas for a long time.
We have so many psychological tests in place that are often used to select people for various jobs and even there is a test for driving a vehicle.
Why can’t we have something similar for people to go on these sites? Being on these sites is giving a lot of power to the hands of people. I’m sure a certain test can be devised that allows people with a particular level of Emotional Quotient or some other parameter the ability to operate on them and post. While others can only have read-only rights.
Revolutions take a long time to happen. It’s not until the majority have been exploited and suffered do people rise.
But the seeds of revolution are sown much before. Hence I will sign off on a note that somewhere out there, are more people like me thinking of ways to cleanse the system to create a more positive space.
How To Be On Social Media -
just like the way you want people to be with you.
