Social Media
The Anti-Social side of Social Media
On the surface social media seems to be an extension of how we socialized pre-internet. Even the name itself leads us to think in that direction. We used to get together on birthdays, holidays etc. and take each other’s temperature on various issues. Going on-line seems just an extrapolation of those get-togethers with the added benefit of being able to reach across both space -you can connect with a long-lost friend from across the world – as well as time because there is no need to both be online at the same time in order to communicate. The history of how, for example, Facebook got started in a way foreshadows the direction social media has taken – Facebook started as a rating system of women – guys would rate them “hot or not” – hardly social.[i]
We humans (and not just humans btw) are tribal by nature. Humans evolved in a world of (resource) competition and being with others who are pulling in the same direction increases our chance of success, at whatever it is we are trying to accomplish[ii]
Tribalism gives us a stronger sense of belonging – like when you are all rooting together with a bunch of strangers for the same team (also comprised of strangers) – to win. Traditionally we identified ourselves by our language, gender, nationality, or region and certain, tribe specific, habits and routines. Being tribal is not the same as being social – you’re rooting for people that you don’t know anything about.
At the same time however it increases the “Us vs Them” mentality that is the flipside of that comfortable homogeneity.
Tribalism tends to go off the rails quite easily and become extreme, and frequently violent if not carefully and continuously checked – and that almost always must happen from outside of the tribe. Traditionally it has been kept under control by statements from religious institutions like “love thy neighbor” (but not too much please) and legal guardrails like anti-discrimination and equal opportunities laws.
Community vs Tribe
That label of “community” for a group of people that coalesce around one particular issue is incorrect. By definition, communities are heterogeneous, and tribes are homogeneous[iii]. Communities seek to unite people with different viewpoints and backgrounds. This is the polar opposite of tribes, which only chose to recognize other tribal member’s similarities and ignore the rest. Non-members are deemed inferior and should either be just ignored and mistrusted. Tribes are the opposite of inclusive and have no interest in reconciling conflicting viewpoints in order to come to a common ground.
Social guardrails
If you are in a café with a couple of friends telling inappropriate jokes that only your table – your “Stammtisch” – can see and hear, your behavior will likely be very different than it would be if the bartender put a microphone on your table so the whole café could listen in. Having your identity tied to your statements changes your behavior – often in ways that are better for society at large. Self-censorship is often a good thing.
Your friendship can also be an effective social guardrail.
In the real world you may refer to a friend as “Big Mike” but you very well know that Michael Johnson is an MBA/CPA who runs a large division of an international company. He also has some pretty extreme ideas about [2nd amendment] issues. But because you actually know him as a complete person you can talk to him about everything – including is extreme ideas – and talk enough sense into him to not become even more extreme or to start taking action based on his ideas.
However, when BigMike_1964 is in an online debate with GunsForTots on [2nd amendment issues] things are likely to be quite different. They don’t know the other party outside of their 2nd amendment viewpoints (which are almost certainly virtually identical because tribes don’t tolerate conflicting viewpoints) and very likely don’t even know each other’s real names or anything about their lives aside from the issue they like to discuss – the 2nd amendment. It is much easier for things to become more extreme because there are no social guardrails. The social guardrails have been completely removed by the anonymity afforded by the platform. And over time some people will turn some of those extreme viewpoints into action. The format of the platform itself shapes and enables discussions and thoughts, and not necessarily in a constructive or positive way. Anonymity precludes the need for self-censorship.
Transmission
The nature of the transmission channel matters. Mediums of transmission that are one-directional – where there is one source of information but many people in the audience, to the devotees are relatively simple to follow and control. There is not much need for a dialogue because one party speaks and the other listens. It is essentially impossible to have bi-directional communications through media like newspapers and such publications. Other traditional ways of transmitting the message like the phone are limited in their ability to widely propagate new angles to the main message – mail and phone are point-to-point communication methods. Even email is not particularly efficient for collaborative purposes. When somebody sends a mass-email, and 50 people respond it just turns into noise. Whatever signal there was gets pretty much lost in the noise.
Social media MAY seem to be just another channel to transmit the tribal messages, but it is fundamentally different. Social media like twitter, facebook and reddit however enable multiple, self-organizing channels with full transparency in one group / subject matter. It provides a platform where multiple threads within a group/thread can be developed by the users themselves, not the platform owners. There is no consensus based central viewpoints that most if not all of the participants can agree with if not just tolerate, which is something you need if you want to be a community.
There are also very few limits on how far (off the reservation) conversations can go, only fanning the flames of our need for extremes. Add to this that users can be completely anonymous, and one can be part of a “community” without even being a member of it simply by observing, or lurking.
Profit
A big difference between traditional communication channels like phone and email is that these have no profit motive with respect to the content of the communication, only the delivery mechanism itself.
The owners of the various social media platforms are profit-seeking. They have no incentive to have balanced discussions or viewpoints on their platform because they are boring and don’t get many eyeballs. The more extreme the content is, the more views there will be and therefore the more profitable it is for the platform owner. Their income doesn’t come from an access fee (like your monthly payment for your calling plan, or stamps) but from ads sold which are related to the content which generally has been contributed by the users. The ads are specifically tailored to the user, not generic to the expected demographic like you have in a magazine. You may see ads in a magazine that are outside of your scope of interest and they may actually broaden your perspective somewhat. That is not the case when ads are custom selected based on your browsing history. This approach only makes the echo chamber even smaller.
Social media is providing the infrastructure – seemingly gratis – for various tribes to both congregate and to lash out at other tribes at the same time. When you add our genetic respect/desire for extremes to tribalism, facilitated by social media, you end up with a toxic brew.
The more intense (and extreme) the anonymous participants and their viewers are, the more likely they are to keep using the platform. Dopamine, oxytocin and endorphins are powerful drugs so catering to tribes is more profitable than catering to communities. The platform owners then stand to financially benefit from extremism in a very direct way, the same extremism that puts strains on the fabric of society.
There is no profit incentive for the platform owners to demand accountability, or at least to reveal user’s true identity to the platform owners. It is a competitive marketplace and users can easily switch to a platform that does not have such requirements. The quest for money creates anonymous users in a de-facto consequence-free environment. What could go wrong? Posts are only words after all…
26 Words
Regulation is also much more difficult on a many-to-many platform. Traditionally, if a newspaper/single source crosses a line, authorities can step in and take the appropriate action. On an anonymous many-to-many platform oversight is infinitely more difficult. The platforms themselves may try to put in controls and limits but enforcement, especially between platforms, will be uneven. The most extreme action a platform can do is to remove a message and to remove a user. But, because users are allowed to be anonymous, the same user can set up a new account in 30 seconds and be back on-line posting divisive garbage.
The 26 words which are the essence of the Communications Decency Act are:
“No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.”
This statement is the root of section 230[iv]. This law significantly reduces liability for social media platforms with respect to liability of content on those platforms. Section 230 gets the platforms largely off the hook, but it doesn’t point to who, if anyone, should be regulating the content on social media platforms.
Freedom of speech is running squarely into Oliver Holms, Jr’s “Shouting fire in a crowded theater” observation that curtailing free speech is ok in certain cases because it presents a clear and present danger.”
Using social media to organize the events of January 6th in DC for example seems to fit this concept of “clear and present danger”, yet no substantive steps appear to have been taken by lawmakers to address this.
One of the practical issues surrounding regulating social media is its anonymous and amorphous nature. Globally, current regulation is a patchwork. In certain countries there are some laws on the books that for example mandate that terrorist related posts be taken down within a certain timeframe but which content is not allowed and which is, is not particularly clear. The rules and laws also don’t address the people who are posting or the divisiveness that social media enables.
The problem with the 26 words is not what they say, but what they do not say. Section 230 leaves a gigantic hole. It talks about who is not held responsible for social media content, but it leaves blank the obvious next question: who is to be held responsible for regulating content on the various social media platforms.
Conflict of interest
One of the problematic issues is that the very people who oversee regulating social media are prolific customers and users and beneficiaries of them. Most politicians use the various platforms to get people to donate to them and to get voters to vote for them – often by placing paid ads. This inherent conflict makes regulation a particularly conflict-ridden issue and so far it seems that no politician is willing to grab the bull by the horns.
The longer these channels of communication don’t have clear, consistent rules (with consequences) the longer extremism can continue and become normalized.
The unwillingness of governments to deal with the very thorny issue of how to manage the balance between free speech and fact-free, false or misleading speech enables the various, often extremely negative and destructive consequences of such speech.
Managing content on a many authors to many (recipients) platform may be challenging but needs to be dealt with sooner rather than later because social media is an increasing part of everybody’s life. This virtually unregulated sandbox may grow so large and unruly that social media creates and dictates reality and no longer reflects it.
[i] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Facebook
[ii] https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/social-empathy/201903/when-tribalism-goes-bad