I recently read Jon Ronson's new book So You've Been Publicly Shamed where he charts his journey from proud twitter shamer to reformed internet user and abashed shamer. He begins by discussing how he found his power against people who were using his name and celebrity identity to forward their own agenda by taping an interview with them and posting it online. The "support" he received, in the form of hatred toward those people made him feel proud. And who wouldn't? The public outcry even results in the impersonators relenting. He then goes on to talk about various other "shaming" incidents of varying infamy, including what was perhaps the most famous twitter shaming at the time, the Justine Sacco debacle. Ronson admits to thinking that the outrage against her was overblown and I agree. I remember thinking that it was a really stupid thing to tweet, especially for someone who works in PR, but didn't think that it made her a "racist."
This book was particularly interesting to me because of an episode of This American Life that deals with internet trolls and their often overly aggressive and sexual treatment toward women. Ronson acknowledges this hateful aspect of internet shaming as well, pointing out that one woman was embroiled in a scandal with dozens of men and she was the only one who ended up being shamed at all. What both of these texts suggest is that the anonymity of the internet creates a "safe space" for people to vent their aggression on others in an age where aggression isn't acceptable in the real world. This is particularly true for aggression against women - threats of rape, murder, slut-shaming and attacks on physical appearance are a dominant form of internet hatred. Perhaps most shockingly, these attackers are not limited to the male of the species. And in every instance, these attacks are the purest form of ad hominem logical fallacy there is. In other words, these people are always attacking the person, not what she did, said, didn't do, or represents.
Most recently this type of ad hominem hatred has been leveled at a woman named Kim Davis, a court clerk in Kentucky who refused to issue marriage licenses to gay couples. This has even led to one particularly harsh internet meme:
And certainly, there has been a great deal of backlash for this trolling, but those articles tend to invite even more hatred. One blog that really took issue with this issue is filled with internet commenters who justify these trolls by claiming "She's ugly on the inside" as if that makes these posts somehow legitimate.
For me, Jon Ronson's book was more eye-opening than I expected. While I've never been an internet troll, personally, or spewed hatred over twitter (mostly because I don't really "get" twitter and just don't use it), I have certainly supported some of these tactics internally. One of the major instances that comes to mind is Ricky Gervais' shaming of a woman who tweeted a picture of herself posed with a rifle and a dead giraffe:
There's still a part of me that relishes the treatment she received because of how grotesque I find this image, but where do you draw the line? In Gervais' defense, he pretty much sticks to attacks that are directly related to what she has done. Still...
After reading Ronson's book, I was pleased that he had decided to stop participating in internet shaming and considered myself immune from having to take any such action because, as stated earlier, I've never really done so. In a way, though, I felt a certain urgency to hate the haters - shame the shamers. But his book had an unexpected influence on me. Most people chalk up internet trolling to the anonymity of the internet by saying that people have an outlet to say something they would never say in person, and I think that's very true. However, I found myself in an interesting situation recently on the Denver light rail.
There was an average-sized man on the train who was taking up two seats and had his enormous bag on the floor in the aisle instead of on the seat next to him, where it would have easily fit. There was also a girl sitting across from a girl who she clearly did not know with her feet on the seat across from her, essentially blocking the other girl from being able to even get up and exit the seat. In both instances, I was very perturbed and sat there fuming and planning what I wanted to say to them. You see, I am completely the type of person who might go up to someone who is violating social rules in what I consider an inconsiderate way and verbally shame them, depending on my mood. This day, I was spoiling for a fight. As I prepared what I was going to say to each of them, I remembered an episode of Invisibilia about just this type of frustration and a twitter account that was created specifically to ridicule such rudeness. And then I realized that what I was sitting there contemplating doing was worse than internet trolling. I may have said something to their faces, but I would have been doing it publicly to shame them in front of real live people. We convince ourselves, I think, that when we shame someone we are doing a service because they will think twice before they take any such action again, and maybe they will. But the truth is, they probably won't. I know that if I were the recipient of such a confrontation, I wouldn't feel shame, but deeply insulted and I would look around for others to share a "can you believe how crazy?" eye roll with and then possibly brood over the incident for days as an example of how rude people can be. I know this is the likeliest outcome, and so do most "shamers," so, deep down, I also know that "correction" is not my real goal. No, if I had acted on my instincts and said something to either of those fellow train travelers, my motives would have been clear to everyone there, including myself, however much I wouldn't want to admit it. I would have simply been trying to exert my superiority over those who I felt were somehow lesser-than, and therefore make myself feel better.
I didn't say anything, of course. I followed Ronson's lead and made a vow never to do anything like that again.
But if you're out there, oh-so-rude light rail seat and aisle hogs, could you maybe, possibly, try to be a bit more considerate, not to avoid being publicly shamed, but simply as a courtesy to those of us who may be having a bad day and feel frustrated at the world already. Thanks!
This book was particularly interesting to me because of an episode of This American Life that deals with internet trolls and their often overly aggressive and sexual treatment toward women. Ronson acknowledges this hateful aspect of internet shaming as well, pointing out that one woman was embroiled in a scandal with dozens of men and she was the only one who ended up being shamed at all. What both of these texts suggest is that the anonymity of the internet creates a "safe space" for people to vent their aggression on others in an age where aggression isn't acceptable in the real world. This is particularly true for aggression against women - threats of rape, murder, slut-shaming and attacks on physical appearance are a dominant form of internet hatred. Perhaps most shockingly, these attackers are not limited to the male of the species. And in every instance, these attacks are the purest form of ad hominem logical fallacy there is. In other words, these people are always attacking the person, not what she did, said, didn't do, or represents.
Most recently this type of ad hominem hatred has been leveled at a woman named Kim Davis, a court clerk in Kentucky who refused to issue marriage licenses to gay couples. This has even led to one particularly harsh internet meme:
For me, Jon Ronson's book was more eye-opening than I expected. While I've never been an internet troll, personally, or spewed hatred over twitter (mostly because I don't really "get" twitter and just don't use it), I have certainly supported some of these tactics internally. One of the major instances that comes to mind is Ricky Gervais' shaming of a woman who tweeted a picture of herself posed with a rifle and a dead giraffe:
After reading Ronson's book, I was pleased that he had decided to stop participating in internet shaming and considered myself immune from having to take any such action because, as stated earlier, I've never really done so. In a way, though, I felt a certain urgency to hate the haters - shame the shamers. But his book had an unexpected influence on me. Most people chalk up internet trolling to the anonymity of the internet by saying that people have an outlet to say something they would never say in person, and I think that's very true. However, I found myself in an interesting situation recently on the Denver light rail.
There was an average-sized man on the train who was taking up two seats and had his enormous bag on the floor in the aisle instead of on the seat next to him, where it would have easily fit. There was also a girl sitting across from a girl who she clearly did not know with her feet on the seat across from her, essentially blocking the other girl from being able to even get up and exit the seat. In both instances, I was very perturbed and sat there fuming and planning what I wanted to say to them. You see, I am completely the type of person who might go up to someone who is violating social rules in what I consider an inconsiderate way and verbally shame them, depending on my mood. This day, I was spoiling for a fight. As I prepared what I was going to say to each of them, I remembered an episode of Invisibilia about just this type of frustration and a twitter account that was created specifically to ridicule such rudeness. And then I realized that what I was sitting there contemplating doing was worse than internet trolling. I may have said something to their faces, but I would have been doing it publicly to shame them in front of real live people. We convince ourselves, I think, that when we shame someone we are doing a service because they will think twice before they take any such action again, and maybe they will. But the truth is, they probably won't. I know that if I were the recipient of such a confrontation, I wouldn't feel shame, but deeply insulted and I would look around for others to share a "can you believe how crazy?" eye roll with and then possibly brood over the incident for days as an example of how rude people can be. I know this is the likeliest outcome, and so do most "shamers," so, deep down, I also know that "correction" is not my real goal. No, if I had acted on my instincts and said something to either of those fellow train travelers, my motives would have been clear to everyone there, including myself, however much I wouldn't want to admit it. I would have simply been trying to exert my superiority over those who I felt were somehow lesser-than, and therefore make myself feel better.
I didn't say anything, of course. I followed Ronson's lead and made a vow never to do anything like that again.
But if you're out there, oh-so-rude light rail seat and aisle hogs, could you maybe, possibly, try to be a bit more considerate, not to avoid being publicly shamed, but simply as a courtesy to those of us who may be having a bad day and feel frustrated at the world already. Thanks!
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