Redefining the Comments …

… by actually listening

Allen Arthur
May 14, 2016 · 4 min read

This is a cowritten piece by Anna-Michelle Lavandier and Allen Arthur

The landscape of online discourse has changed drastically through the years, leading many to question the value of the dreaded comments section.

Despite the warnings to avoid looking at the comments section (lest people be scarred and insulted), guest speaker Pedro Burgos invited us to take another look into the comments section for the hidden gems that can inspire future articles or identify trends.

According to Burgos, a number of media sites, including The Daily Dot, have disabled the comments section due to abuse of the rules, harassment, sexism and racism running rampant in the comments, among other issues. Some media organizations, such as Huffington Post, make people aware that what people post on social media would be read by the general public and moderated to avoid abuse and harassment.

The comments section could be a place of healthy discussion, even on sensitive topics, just as easily as it can be invaded by trolls or led in a troubling direction by a particular individual. However, moderating the comments section and being aware of individuals who make it a hostile space could help to bring trolling and insults to a heel. Through this act, readers and participants can feel like they are an important part of the bigger conversation, which in turn could lead to future stories.

“You may not be able to change people’s mind, but you can empathize with them. If you understand what their biases are, what their arguments are, and what is important to them, you can find better arguments for your ideas. You can find ways to get things done, but with a new perspective.” — Pedro Burgos

Here are a few of the tips he discussed to have a healthy comments section:

· Invite: Invite people to participate in the discussion. As Pedro pointed out, “Asking what people think doesn’t count.”

· Build a healthy space: It’s important to keep your place of discussion organized. It doesn’t have to be an organization. It could be a Facebook feed or other kind of thread on social media.

· Participate: When journalists participate, it makes the conversation better

· Foster disagreements: Disagreement can happen in a healthy way.

· Listen: Look for genuine concerns, common ground, and what people are actually talking about.

· Internalize: How can the comments guide follow-ups or future coverage?

We get excited about weird stuff.

But how can comment sections actually help us? Well, we’ve talked a ton this semester about objectivity. With contributions from all corners of the class (but with special guidance from Sabrina), we’ve started concerning ourselves less with traditional notions of “telling the story” and realizing there is rarely only one story to tell. Instead, we are looking questions like:

Whose story are we helping to tell, and why?

Why do I want to tell it? Why should I be the one?

How can we let those most affected and/or frequently ignored become participants? How might we serve them?

Through this, we have focused more on “fairness” — telling (or helping to tell) the story in a way that is genuine and with a clear point of view, while staying intellectually honest and transparent. Despite not explicitly focusing on fairness as such, Pedro’s discussion contributed a lot to that conversation. Like many ideas in this program, fairness is one thing to theorize about and another to implement.

Pedro spoke a lot about hearing the other side out. Even in some of their most unpleasant comments, we can over time learn about their hopes, fears, and concerns. So far I (Allen) have been positioning the work I’m doing as a counter-narrative. The only problem is . . . I didn’t look into what narrative I’m actually countering. Sure, I saw laws that work against the formerly incarcerated or offensive comments online, but I never thought about trying to understand just what is behind those attitudes. I want my work to be a response, but I haven’t learned yet what I’m responding to. This is a huge blindspot.

It seems like the next phase of my work will be deeply understanding the other side: why “tough-on-crime” laws are so effective at galvanizing support, or why people feel that a prison stay suddenly makes one human less than another. While the sentiments expressed are often repugnant, I would guess they come from places everyone has: fear, perhaps, or the desire to grow a family in safety.

This is how fairness can unfold. While we don’t have to agree with the other side, we can perform a service by using our work to push back against misconceptions and misinformation. The only way to do that is by experiencing some things we’d rather not. Not only does this make our work more relevant (and more persuasive) to more people, but it can also allow us to take some of those negative comments on ourselves instead of our communities and turn them into something productive. Sounds pretty fair.

Questions for discussion:

Engagement Journalism

MA students building new ways to engage communities at the Newmark School of Journalism at CUNY

Engagement Journalism

MA students building new ways to engage communities at the Newmark School of Journalism at CUNY

Allen Arthur

Written by

Online Engagement Manager at Solutions Journalism Network. Plus: freelance engagement reporter working with currently/formerly incarcerated people.

Engagement Journalism

MA students building new ways to engage communities at the Newmark School of Journalism at CUNY