The Importance Of Trolling In Social Media

The internet and the people on it can be very crucial. Social media allows people to express themselves in ways they feel can’t in the actual world. They express their feelings, their open to their own opinions, and so forth. However, the internet also consists of people who give unnecessary, mean, and hateful opinions to other people for reasons that no one truly understands. The podcast “Act One. Ask Not For Whom The Bell Trolls; It Trolls for Thee” by Lindsey West, is about a female who was constantly getting backlashed over the internet by whom she referred to as “trolls.” The internet is usually where people go to voice their opinions over what they feel is right or wrong; with Lindsey West, she had voiced her opinion and what she felt was wrong about male comedians using the rape term too often and using carelessly. A result of West voicing her opinion

Today, people seem blinded by their outsized enthusiasm for social media. According to them, a few clicks can change the whole world and accomplish wonders such as curing cancer. Good intentions become sufficient on their own, as if there were no need for medicine and scientific researches anymore. Well, this is pure nonsense. Facebook’s likes cannot save African children from starvation, the same way Twitter’s 140 characters will not put an end to acts of terrorism. This notion is not even remotely debatable. For instance, the project Kony2012 had a perfect starting point; inspiring video, moving story and most importantly worldwide spread. Unfortunately, the terrorist is still at liberty, and the lack of thorough investigations is to blame. Instead of focusing on the real problems of war and kidnapping of children, the so-called activist related to the obvious and spent all of his money and energy on his movie. Ultimately, due to the predominance of weak-ties, the project was not successful. More importantly, certain tools of social networks, especially “likes” and “retweets”, encourage people to feel good about themselves, when actually they should incite them to put their efforts and means in the cause they supposedly defend. As Gladwell wrote, “[current] activism succeeds not by motivating people to make a real sacrifice but by motivating them to do the things that

In Mark Pfeifle’s article “Changing the Face(book) of Social Activism,” the definition of the term slacktivism is introduced with the words of the Urban Dictionary which defines it as an idea that belong to people who want to look like they are taking action to support a cause when they mostly do nothing. Despite the dictionary’s meaning of the term, Pfeifle concludes that slacktivism has completely changed social activism because people all over the world now have the ability to create impacting and beneficial reforms on society. He argues that social media is more powerful than ever, and the way people play a role in politics has changed because of it. Pfeifle gives an example of the power that social media has when he points out that the Democrats regained power through the use of social media during Obama’s run for presidency. He states that social media can form political groups with greater masses of people while reducing the expenses as well as the difficulty of organizing one anywhere in the world from Cairo to Zuccotti Park. He also supported his conclusion with the example of Kony, a cruel guerilla leader whose brutality was exposed to the world with the help of slacktivists. Keeping all these events in mind with the contribution of social media, Pfeifle sees the totality in the positive change of social activism from slacktivism. Pfeifle is right about slacktivism having successfully transformed social activism since it causes vast social changes, increases the

Daniel D’Addario wrote an article called “Everything is ‘Trolling’ Now,” which is about internet trolling. Trolling is generally regarded as an intentionally offensive remark or action against a person or group of people who hold a certain ideology in order to get a reaction (421). However, D’Addario takes note in the article of an apparent oversaturation of the word ‘troll.’ Individuals will call many different things a form of trolling, to the point that it seems as though just holding an opinion is enough to be considered as a personal attack against other people. D’Addario even mocks this by occasionally placing quotation marks around the word ‘troll,’ to call into question a particular instance of its usage. Through sourcing, comparisons,

In his essay, “Changing the Face(book) of Social Activism”, Mark Pfeifle writes about the role social media has played socially and politically in our world. In his time, Mark Pfeife has served as a top national security advisor, communicator and deputy assistant for George W. Bush. Pfeife has come to the conclusion that social media has redefined social activism - in place, calling it “social slacktivism”. The word “slacktivism” is a conjuring of his views and biases. Pfeife believes this describes the populace as taking action over the internet without doing anything physically to change things. An example that Pfeife brings up is during the presidential election of 2008, Barack Obama’s campaign was promoted all over online, sources like

Malcolm Gladwell argues through social media “the traditional relationship between political authority and popular will has been upended, making it easier for the powerless to collaborate, coordinate and give voice to their concerns,” but ultimately concedes this collaboration doesn’t provide enough social motivation to act (Gladwell,

Anonymous posting provides an opportunity for social media users to reveal “honest expression, unencumbered by identity” (Poole). The ability to remain anonymous directly affects users’ online behavior to inevitably portray an extension of their offline persona, yet it also enables the choice to make claims on an identity that differs from reality. When individuals hide behind the mask of electronic anonymity, they can take the role of a cyberbully with the intention to aggravate and distress victims, which demonstrates their moral disengagement toward the feelings of other individuals. Despite the fact that anonymity fosters a “unique sense of community . . . that embraces and encourages freedom of thought [, social media sites such as 4chan have] completely raw and unfiltered discourse” (Poole). The social media site, 4chan, is an online messaging board where anonymous users do not have to submit personal information to be involved in it (Russon). Because it does not replicate real-world social norms by emphasizing the human qualities of conversation such as people’s faces, real names, as well as brief biographies, there is not a baseline of responsibility and thus users are willing to post without inhibition to castigation. The

Protesting has become the newest way to get attention and stand together, because of social media that provide inside to every internet users. In the following of recent protests against police violence and blame in the United States judicial system social media has show beyond doubt to be an important practical tool for activists aiming to a amass support and raise awareness on police brutality. Clearly, social media has the capacity to make, advocate and apprise mass crowd about protests. Social media platforms such as Facebook or Twitter have the capability to connect us with millions of others internet users in order to acquire support and share awareness. These social media platforms permit us to reach an immensely large audience and allow people to participate and help a cause without having to be there in person.

Because of public humiliation, Raza lived every day in shame and fear. Furthermore, Facebook is online social media which we can share our pictures, or news with our friends. On the other side, Facebook is considered as a device to attract people. For instance, someone made a fake new to blame a student at Lewis and Clark University in Portland, Ore for being sexual offense. Due to the protection of privacy, they don’t use his real name; however, all over Facebook called him “rapist”. Further, we are all human races, if we don’t like to get hurt, why we hurt other with our words. In case we hadn’t posted the video of a South Korean student online who was named “Dog poop girl”, she wouldn’t have dropped out of college. Because of our joke,we can cause irrevocable harm to someone else’s life Likewise, Bennett also noticed, “ For people who use blogs and social-networking sites like diaries, putting their personal imformation out there for the world to see, this presents a serious risk.” (92). Most people agree with her argument because social media is virtual world, and we can’t identify good or bad people. In some case, identity thief steals our personal information and used for different

The use of social media from the left and right are noticeably different. Brooker and Barnett (2017) observed that those who were drawn to social justice politics tended to use insults as opposed to engaging in a serious debate. This itself has created a stigma for socialists who don’t support and even oppose identity politics, but are associated with those using identity politics, similar to how the new and alt-right are often stated to be one of the same. And it is identity politics that’s arguably drawing the forgotten people to these alternative sources of information and humour. The ideology of political correctness is identified by young people as censorship and suppression, comparable to totalitarianism. It is for this reason why the new and alt-right have made significant inroads in the social media space. Traditional media repressed what those on the right call freedom of speech, thus forcing individuals to search other places, predominantly online where their voices, concerns and opinions can be

Community media is often depicted as idyllic representing the quant small-town newspaper. In many ways it represents classic Americana similar to the images in a Norman Rockwell painting. These representations, however, do not necessarily include digital communities that form using social media. Instead of communities of place, online communities will often revolve around interests; and some of those interests are far outside the mainstream. This paper seeks to study one specific group that has formed digital communities. It will use agenda melding, selective exposure, and the spiral of silence as its theoretical basis. Specifically the study examines Podblanc, a video site created by Craig Cobb a well-known white supremacist (Southern Poverty Law Center, 2016), designed as Youtube for extremists.

In this paper, I argue that social media may be an outlet for freedom of expression but it has been widely misused since there is little control over social media. The aim is to convince the reader that social media is a ground for insults, threats and bullying, given the freedom of expression and lack of governance that

For the past decade or so there has been a considerable shift in the way we communicate with each other; instead of speaking face-to-face, we prefer to stay in touch by way of a Facebook post or Tweet. Social media dominates our life whether we’re using it, or not. However, not all online dissonance has been healthy and civil. The internet has seen a rise in the number of trolls and predators that lurk the dark corners of the Internet. Threats, and heinous insults flood media networks like Reddit and Snapchat. Online predators who fling insults are enamored by the internet’s alluring anonymity and can’t give it up. Like Christine Rosen says in her article called, “In the Beginning Was the Word,” “technology has introduced new words, changed the meaning of others, and has even introduced new forms of language and communication” (230). The evolutionary trend and prevalence of people intentionally offending others online has led to a

One of the hottest topics over the past few years has been that of platforming and free speech. Are all people entitled to a platform with which they can express their views and free speech? Should platforms be taken away from those whose views are deemed ‘hateful’ or ‘dangerous’? Is the notion of preventing people from having a platform a legitimate form of activism? In a recent discussion panel at Oxford University, two sides debated these issues. One side argued that no-platforming is a legitimate activist tool. The other side (pro-platforming), argues that no-platforming is not a legitimist activist tool. In my view, the pro-platforming side provides a more convincing argument. I will summarize each argument, then I will be looking at two main points that each side uses to make their argument. We will be looking at the ‘harm principle’ and power dynamics for the no-platforming side, and we will be looking at the platform as an extension of free speech, as well as the importance of exposing bad ideas for the pro-platforming side.

Social media. We have all heard of it. We have all raved about it at some point in our lives. There is no doubt; it plays an imperative part of people’s lives today – users are reliant on social media. It is great that Mark Zuckerberg reminds us to say, “Happy Birthday” to our friends. Yet, we have all seen the dangers it can cause. From identity fraud to cyberbullying - we become exposed to the dangers of the internet. Not only is it hackers and frauds that cause destruction, but social networking posts. Every day, you scroll through Facebook, or Instagram - liking, sharing and commenting on posts. What people don’t see is how words on a ‘status’ or ‘tweet’ can hurt someone. They can’t see that a person’s feelings behind the screens on a computer have been destroyed, because they can’t see what they don’t want to see.