Social Media and the ‘Spiral of Silence’
pewinternet.org
pewinternet.org
I do have a real world example too. I used to work with a manager over me who was really cool and worked with me well. Felt he was looking out for me and my career advancement. We shared common interests on more than a few things too.
And then one day I said something that rubbed him the wrong way (still don't know what exactly) and just like that, he pretty much stopped talking to me. And that led to the point where I was left out of projects, out of discussions, and eventually to the point where the upper management felt I was not needed. I had to leave the company. I still feel he was a great guy and smart dude.
Btw, I read somewhere that on US Navy ships' officers' dining rooms, 2 topics are not discussed at all: politics and religion. I understand why.
I am sure they let their views known in other arenas.
This is not good for a healthy democracy.
Can't have the cogs discussing things outside their design, after all.
Those who wanted to talk about the NSA, especially critically on social media, may have refrained or at least paused to reflect on whether that was a sensible thing to do precisely because of the NSA dragnet. I personally initially paused and considered my action moreso than usual before I began retweeting and writing tweets of my own that are critical of the NSA's behavior and the laws that provide cover for its behavior.
Irrational or rational as fears of later repercussions for communicating opinions may be, when the subject matter is a principal organization that will ensure that very communication is never forgotten, I believe there is a chilling effect. It would be like hesitating to criticize Twitter on Twitter—you can imagine less savvy users would wonder, "Will this get me into some kind of trouble with Twitter?" Even now having long since put aside my worry about being critical of the NSA's behavior in public (yes, based on the tired axiom: "why would they care about me?"), I still suspect that I have squelched at least 10% of what I would have otherwise said.
Even as I write this now, it's impossible to not have a concern that in some (very unlikely) future, the NSA will put anyone who had been critical of their actions onto a "definitely will aid with all parallel construction requests" list. Irrational, sure. But difficult to put aside nonetheless.
Hmmm... I probably should just delete this post....
And to say I edit my thoughts here on HN would be an understatement. People don't want true diversity. That would mean hearing something they dislike. Which would invalidate their life apparently.
It seems like the great lie of social media was that it would open up and democratize communication, encouraging people to speak up and speak out on issues important to them. Instead what we ended up with is big companies getting even more of a megaphone than before, giving people the illusion of having a voice (only to find that when everyone has a megaphone, only the loudest and most attacking voices or the most hive-minded comments get perpetuated). And everyone has to constantly preen and groom their "social media presence" because it's all about cultivating a personal brand.
The execution of G+ was bungled disastrously, and ass-backwards policies like Real Names ran directly contrary to the original notion of having multiple identities/profiles to present to different people.
But I do wish someone would run with this idea again.
... But maybe we don't need to. Social networks with segmented audiences/identities have existed since forever, they're called BBSes and Forums.
They can only downvote you once per post (though the admins and mods may hellban/slowban you if you are enough of a gadfly).
HN is a sort of social network for coders. Anytime I post something about the evils of advertising, I attract enough downvotes to usually cancel out if not override those who see my points. I can see this as I watch the vote tally constantly go up and down. The sad thing is that the downvotes represent not that my comments are low quality and unworthy of HN, but that they are threatening to a culture that is sadly, for the present at least, beholden to advertising for its very survival.
It was only quite recently in the grand scheme of things that, particularly in school computer labs, one of the major things that we ingrained in children's heads was basic web safety etiquette: never reveal your real name, street address, phone number, etc.
With the advent of popular social media, holy shit has that completely turned around in the opposite direction. Now such things have been completely normalized, and we've started to talk about the "nymwars". There's also a reasonably influential segment that thinks all online communications should be done using personally identifiable information, lest someone gets trolled and has their sensibilities hurt.
"Because of its sample size (1,801 people) and choice of topic, Pew’s study might not be a fully accurate example of social media’s silencing effects, but it’s definitely fodder for discussion – if you dare! – as well as further research."
Sigh.
a. You are sighing because you believe the study to be meaningless due to its sample size.
b. You are sighing because the writer needlessly undermines the results of a completely legitimate poll (+/- 3.3% margin of error for the subgroups).
c. You are sighing about poor comedy ("if you dare!").
Weird I must say.
> Of course, it’s worth pointing out that the choice to use the Snowden situation as the basis for this particular study could be flawed – after all, social platforms, including Facebook, were implicated as being among the places the government tapped to listen in on citizens’ conversations. Perhaps citizens didn’t want to publicize an opinion on this particular matter, but would be more willing to do so on others.
LOL again. Have the Pew researchers never heard of the "priming" effect? As soon as you bring up Snowden as the topic, respondents may immediately think of the social network surveillance and of course, think that they may not want to talk about just anything -- Snowden related or not -- online.
Look at Brendan Eich, no matter what we think of Proposition 8, I think it's crazy that his support of a political position that was also supported by a very narrow majority of his fellow Californians could cause him to have to leave his job six years later.
It's entirely possible that Eich could become a verb, like Bork. Any one of us could support one side of a contentious political fight today and in six years get Eiched because the winning side chooses to be vindictive and petty.
I hesitated to bring this up because I thought about the last time I was moderated -4 for something I said here.
In the end we need to decide, how serious we are about the marketplace of ideas. We need to decide if we really believe in the ideals that we claim to.
If I disagree with you, I'll challenge your ideas. I'll challenge your thinking. I'll debate you. I will not attempt to silence you.
Will I get down votes for this?
Just curious.
So that is all it is: a comment that people might agree with but provides low value to the reader in that context.
With that freedom comes the concomitant responsibility for the consequences of that speech.
In fact, I think it's admirable that he didn't back down from his position or try and weasel-word his way out of a difficult situation. He stuck to his guns in the face of a firestorm of controversy.
And not only that, OTHERS were taught a lesson to be silent on that issue and other issues as well.
Nothing is more effective to silence someone or groups of people than threatening someone's livelihood.
Let's not get too hyperbolic here. A rich, white guy was forced out of a CEO position and he was "silenced"? He could have given interviews about his position at any tech magazine he could reach by phone. He could publish a blog post on his site. None of this suggests that he was silenced.
Let's save the powerful terms for bigger travesties is all I'm saying.
What happened to Eich should be considered at best an embarrassment to the otherwise progressive image of folks seeking sexual respect--at worst, it's a fine example of the same sort of bigotry they've fought against themselves, in some ways justifying many of the petty accusations made against their ilk.
It was not a good time to be an ally in tech.
The strict definition of bigotry is viewing other groups with suspicion, hatred, whatever. So, yes, I'm okay with being bigoted against people who kick puppies.
I think the more meaningful definition of bigotry within the context of social equality is an expression of power that flows from those with power to those without it. In this case, the one with power (rich white guy) trying to remove previously granted rights from marginalized folks (gays wanting to get married).
The fact that the rich white guy, in this case, was the newly minted CEO of a corporation that strives to bring "Internet equality" added a spice of irony to the whole thing.
To borrow your metaphor, you are not being bigoted against someone who kicks puppies. You are being bigoted against someone who isn't bigoted against people who kick puppies.
EDIT: His donation is actual discrimination based on someone's sexual identity.
Having an opinion and donating money to a cause is not remotely the same as refusing to hire LGBTQ individuals or refusing to sell/rent a house to them.
You asked if he'd engaged in actual discrimination -- by donating that money, he had. Having the opinion wasn't what people were mad about.
I was thinking more about those times that I've sat in work meetings and been asked if I objected to something and said nothing when I actually do object because I knew few others agreed with me.
Here are the main differences I see: the power dynamic at play, the scale of the effort, and the availability of concrete proof of action.
The Hollywood Blacklist was an attempt by studios and directors and some in the US government (those in power) to ban those underneath them based on, largely, unfounded allegations of Communist sympathies. It also had anti-union motivations, but I might be wrong? It took down dozens of actors, directors, and producers. No concrete "anti-American" actions were proven (that I know of).
Brendan Eich stepped down after his customers (and some of his employees) found proof that he'd donated to a cause supporting Prop 8, a piece of legislation that would have removed previously granted rights to homosexuals trying to marry. The donation was a specific action that Eich took that his customers disagreed with.
I think the power dynamic is the telling one. Oligarchic vs. grassroots, etc.
And, it's more so than bikeshedding over what terminology the government should use to talk about inheritance and visitation rights.
(Also, isn't having an elected government being viewed more and more as basic human rights these days?)
This also comes at the expense of other non-traditional relationships, by making the argument about making a narrow change to what's called "marriage" rather than about handling the associated legal rights more flexibly.
So yes, bikeshedding.
Also, your original argument that a debate about Communism is also about human rights is applicable to any political debate, because of course politics is all about deciding things that affect people.
If you can't understand the difference between a class of people being denied common rights, and standard political debate about rules that ostensibly apply to everyone then I have no additional argument to try to help you see the light.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic_partnership_in_Califor...
See under "Scope". By 2008 as amended, California afforded domestic partnerships the same rights and responsibilities as marriages under state law.
Federal law was of course different due to DOMA, which was overturned in 2013.
Prop 8 did not remove any legal privileges available under CA Domestic Partner law. It did not revoke any marriage licenses, either.
As for denying "common rights", you are begging the question. What common public good (not "right") is secured by marriage, defined based on that public good, that the state should regulate it in the first place?
Traditionally (in the US), legally regulated marriage had to do with family law, children, rearing as well as getting of children, forming legally recognized kinship based on procreation and adoption.
Along the way, baggage including visitation rights at hospitals and jails was thrown on board, but such regulations are not essential.
If people can't agree on the common good of marriage, then marriage should not be legally regulated at all.
It's stupefyingly clear from this case that people do not even use the same definitions for words including "marriage" and "rights". That this is true does not make anyone on any particular side of the multi-sided debate an outlaw for dissenting from whatever might be the dominant position, in 2008 or now.
Anyway, ignore the lack of consensus on a common good. You didn't even bother to be accurate about relevant California law. You just made up stuff about "material grievances" and "common rights" to try to dodge debate and cast others as beyond the pale.
Metaphorically, it's the difference between a guy with a big stick who makes stuff up so he can beat your face and a crowd of people voting on what court system to set up to give you a trial.
Afaik, he did not force others under him to agree. Nor force the idea onto Firefox. It was guilty by association.
The main method of protest was to boycott Firefox. Yet this was a stupid thing to do, because Firefox is the result of over a decade of wide-scale community effort, all done on a non-profit basis, and has been instrumental in advancing web standards. Firefox was also the initial spark that got us out of the stagnation caused by IE6.
By boycotting Firefox, people were punishing pretty much everyone except Eich. A much more blunt statement would have been to boycott JavaScript, something Eich was directly responsible for. Of course, that would actually require some effort in a major overhaul of one's browsing habits.
Then it was OKCupid just blatantly jumping on the bandwagon, encouraging Firefox users to leave their browser, all in an absolutely farcical attempt to assert their moral superiority.
Finally, most people don't seem to be aware that gay marriage is often a red herring in general, and the topic of marriage privatization is rarely discussed in public. But that's heading towards my personal views.
Causing indiscriminate collateral damage (and using various arguments to deflect blame onto your enemies) until people submit to your whims is a long and time-honored tradition (for example, terrorists).
Vicious attacks against those who (appear to be about to) "leave the fold" are also long and time-honored tradition (for example, apostasy in religious-ruled countries).
Given that They (the people doing the protesting) decided that Eich's political actions made him a "them", and that They considered Mozilla to be an "us", it was perfectly reasonable for Them to (1) attack Mozilla for associating with Eich, and (2) attack anyone associated with Eich until Eich was forced to submit to Them (in this case, to Go Away).
So no, the problem is that people decided to suddenly target one individual for protest over a years-old used-to-be-majority political opinion.
To me, this is enabled by social media. This uproar against Eich wouldn't have been viral if it weren't for Twitter, Reddit, and others.
The people who complained used tactics akin to bullying: "do what I want (fire Brendan Eich), or else I'll make much noise as I can, and drag your brand through the mud".
The backlash was driven by self-righteousness ("my beliefs are superior to Eich's") and contempt ("his beliefs hurt people, so he isn't entitled to them"). These feelings are timeless and have been common throughout history. The problem is that it's easy for them to quickly spread on Twitter, and then get blown even further out of proportion, either by being mentioned on 24/7 TV channels, or, here, because of OKCupid pulling a marketing move by supporting the backlash.
And overall, the effect is that some opinions and subjects are sadly becoming taboo, and people have to be politically correct or risk having their lives ruined. This happened to Eich, it happened with Donglegate [1], and it will happen again. The common theme in these stories is social media.
[1]: http://arstechnica.com/staff/2013/03/donglegate-is-classic-o...
This would seem not to be the case, based on the things that happened.
The fact that fewer and fewer people online think this way is what makes me think twice about saying anything. Once you say anything slightly outside the accepted progressive viewpoint on Touchy Subject X, here comes the downvote and "you're a horrible human being" brigade. Online debate is effectively dead, and it's a shame.
Debate in pretty much any form has been dead for a long time. Few people know how to debate properly, and simply introduce fallacy after fallacy into the discussion. For instance, you cited appeal to emotion, maybe more specifically appeal to pity depending on why "you're a horrible human being."
Alternatively, they just constantly move the target. As soon as you address one point, they just move on to another without even acknowledging the previous point. Any attempt to pin them on that point will be addressed that you have "misunderstood" them, and what they are stating now is what they meant the entire time.
The worst part is that this is all done, as best as I can tell, not even maliciously but almost subconsciously. Most likely, they have learned over their life that these methods produce results and so they continue to use them. (And by "results", I generally mean reinforcing their mental status quo, bonus points if they can vilify their opponent.)
The problem is his support was for an anti-human rights issue, not just another "either side has valid points" political argument.
And yet, applying 21st century moral values to the 18th century is completely meaningless, as every historian who studied these time periods will tell you.
Except Prop 8 was five years ago and not 200 years ago? I know I'm sure not absolved of my mistakes (or even debt) from five years ago. Public activism during one's lifetime is on the table as a factor for judging that someone.
Now, you can try to argue whether the decisions of the person are actually what the person believes or if they were just following to feel like they belong or feel important or be around their _other_ bigoted friends. Either way, it doesn't show great capacity for independent thought.
There were more than two sides to the Proposition 8 fight.
I happen to be neutral on the issue of whether or not same sex unions should be recognized by the government but I too supported Proposition 8. Not because I want to deny anyone anything but because the way to go about doing it should be legislative and not by having a judicial activist issue a fiat.
Some other states moved to legally recognize same sex unions via the legislative process and in those states, once the law passed, the fight was over.
Why is this distinction important? Because once we set the precedent that it's a "human rights issue" to be able to marry whomever you wish, what is to stop the FLDS church from suing because we don't recognize their polygamous marriages?
Once you accept the premise that marrying whomever you wish is a "human rights issue", there's no argument in favor of same sex marriage that doesn't equally apply to three or five person marriage.
In 2004, Karl Rove maneuvered "anti-marriage" amendments to voted on in many states during the presidential election season. So, the republican establishment riled up all the religious nutters to vote both for bush and, while they were there, why not vote your bible faith to restrict rights for actual humans too?
That's our legislative process—easily manipulatable, corruptible by riled up motivated voters who don't actually represent the majority.
So, we fix wrong decisions of the people with checks and balances. We dissolve the tyranny of the many and restore balance to the force.
suing because we don't recognize their polygamous marriages? there's no argument in favor of same sex marriage that doesn't equally apply to three or five person marriage.
Doesn't seem unreasonable to me.
Is there any downside to multi-marriage besides it just making you feel squicky?
Where will the money come from to pay for Elder Smith's four wives and their fifteen children? Everyone else's premiums, of course!
But then, that only strengthens the case for "Single Payer", right?
A polyamorous relationship means three or more people have managed to form a happy, loving partnership with each other. If they've managed that, why shouldn't they get married?
Obviously, this doesn't validate marriages to children or pets, since one or more parties are incapable of informed consent.
My friends are generally liberal, so I don't know many people who would vote for Prop 8 for religious reasons. That said, of the people who did support Prop 8, all of them had the same reason as you, and without fail, all of them wanted to see same-sex marriage become the law of the land.
Which ended for me the notion that supporting Prop 8 meant you hated gays and deserved to be silenced, run out of a job, and alienated by all right thinking people.
Thanks for sharing.
Freedom of speech has nothing to do with private parties exacting revenge on you for saying, doing, or promoting objective wrongness.
Freedom of speech is not freedom of equality of validness of opinion.
"Freedom of speech" is a concept that is bigger and more far reaching than the government. If someone threatens to punch you in the face for saying something that he doesn't want you to say, he has violated your freedom of speech.
If your employer fires you for something that you said outside of work and separate from your duties as an employee, that employer has also violated your freedom of speech. The notable difference being that in most circumstances, there's nothing illegal about that.
The point that I'm making here is that it's absolutely possible to suppress suppress freedom of speech without violating the law.
In contrast being shouted down at a meeting or losing your job is common and not protected. If your employer doesn't want to support your opinions, they are free to stop paying you. That is a freedom too.
I think it is very important that bosses embrace this view too, because otherwise you just get a lot of sycophantic yes-men, an echo chamber. The correct approach is to let everyone be free to voice their opinion before the decision is made: if you don't want their opinions, then what are you paying them for? Once a decision is made it is necessary for everybody to work towards that, but making a good decision requires lots of input, and those who disagreed with the final choice shouldn't be punished in any way, otherwise there quickly won't be any disagreement.
I think it's entirely correct that Eich was deposed and shamed for what he did. I wish that we had the Internet in the 60s so that we could have done the same to George Wallace.
Be on the right side of history or you'll inevitably end up on the wrong side of it.
You literally didn't use 'literally' properly.
> effective genocide Reagan committed against queer people in the 80s by turning a blind eye to the AIDS crisis.
You literally are wrong about history, c.f. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2014/06/01/ronald_... et al.
In those days, the LGBT community fought against attempts to close the bath houses where the disease was spreading because they didn't know what was going on either.
The sentiment that you're expressing here is precisely why discussion is dying.
There is nothing shameful about Eich's activity, he chose a side, his side won and the side that lost were so outraged that they began to threaten the business of his employer.
With the entitlement of those who attack marginalized people's love lives, he wanted ultimate executive power. Knowing that if he failed, he can trivially drown himself in wealth.
No need to shed fake tears over elite white male perverts who care overmuch about other people's sexuality, and bribe the government to police it. He can live the high life on Alan Turing's back. Instead, there's many people with little money who work all day in places with zero free speech. Who have real fears of losing their jobs.
Donating to a campaign that uses hateful, bigoted language and false information (Prop 8) is different from just sharing an opinion. I'll think less of a person who thinks I'm less of a person for being gay, but I'll still be civil toward them. That'll change real quick if they support a hateful campaign to take rights away from me.
There are so many better examples, like that mindless, misguided rage against Penny Arcade over a comic that was objectively not about condoning sexual assault.
I understand that plenty of people don't think that Eich should have been ousted from his position as a result of his political beliefs, but your post is not just not on-topic, it is actually the opposite of the topic. It looks like you're using this post to grandstand.
The more involved you are, the more aware you are of just how quickly the crowd can turn on you if you say something wrong.
No, that's not noted in the study at all. The study only notes that people who don't want to discuss it in person certainly don't want to discuss it on social media. It didn't say anything about whether a person's use of social media made them less likely to discuss the topic in person.