Why You Should Curate Social Media

Social Media is, if you'll forgive the expression, like sticking your head inside an angry wasp hive and hoping you don't get stung. It sounds like it shouldn't be, but at this point in the proceedings I think we can probably all agree that though its useful (in a way that sticking your head in a wasp hive isn't), the Internet, and especially sites like Facebook, Twitter, and even LinkedIn, has enabled the worst aspects of our species. That's not to say that we're all unpleasant when we interact online, or that we aren't sometimes nasty in real life (though I do tend to err on the side of that being less likely than it being online). It's just that from Twitter mobs to cyber stalking to the growth of "red pill" culture, it feels like social media has enabled unpleasant views, and often disgusting behaviour.

Now, I'm not actually going to say that we should wave a magic wand and get rid of this stuff: the genie's out of the bottle and its far, far, too later for that. I do think there needs to be more of a concrete idea of online etiquette, and that sites need to take more steps to reinforce that sort of standard, if only to protect themselves legally. At the end of the day though, its impossible, and some would say immoral, to censor speech online. Like a perverse game of whack a mole, you'll find that hitting it on the head may be very satisfying, but it won't actually solve the problem.

This is why I believe you should curate social media, and have an idea of what you want it to do. Not in the sense of "durh, I want to talk to peeple", but what are you getting out of it? Are you using it to promote a business, or to keep in touch with family? Are you agitating for some sort of social change, or just in it for the cat videos? Each of these uses requires a different approach to the platforms you use (yes, use, these things are, or should be tools, and if you find they're more than that there may be a problem). In the past I've maintained quite open policies for my social media use, because I wanted to meet people, and make friends. That meant keeping an "open door" policy. Now, I'm not so interested in that, I'm more choosy about what I'm looking for and not so convinced that accepting every friend request that rolls my way is a good thing to do. Even if I do, then I don't always keep following, especially when it seems like the new friend doesn't share any common ground with me.

In addition, though, the walls of our social media bubbles are often painfully porous. It's far too easy to encounter other people online who are, frankly, tossers. On this platform especially so, as there's no sitewide blocking, while on Twitter you have the bizarre phenomenon of hate following, where users follow famous people just to have a go at them.

No, I don't understand that either. All I can say is that having that much time on your hands must feel great, but don't these people have anything else to do? Imagine what heights the human race could reach if we stopped farting about with things like that and actually tried to make stuff or to learn philosophy, or whatever would make us better human beings.

The porous nature of social media is one reason why we should curate our bubbles. Block, mute, unfriend, whatever it takes, because even if you think you're being the better person by not shutting out people, you really aren't. You're just making it more difficult for yourself, and you may be playing to ego. Are you really needed on the barricades every time someone says something stupid? And if you answered, why? What cost are you willing to pay for that conviction? Given that social media now accounts for a major source of mental health issues, are you willing to risk that just because you feel, without evidence, that your expression of opprobrium means a damn thing?

You're far better to protect yourself by blocking and reporting the offending person than you are trying to persuade them they've got the wrong side of the stick. Add to that a claim I heard on the Personality Hacker podcast that social media is making us less intelligent and the wrinkles on our brains are actually getting shallower*, and I wonder if online debate does anything but waste our time. I already have a personal black list of debates that includes topics like whether there's a deity, Israel and Palestine, Feminism, and whether or not Captain America could defeat Batman in a fight**... Simply because, unlike those hate followers, I have shit to do.

The other reason is that most of these people don't exist inside your tribe, and they don't actually give two tugs of a dead dog's dick about what you think. While ignoring bullies won't stop them bullying you, ignoring, blocking, and reporting trolls online is absolutely the right thing to do.

It is possible to build strong networks on social media, but you can't do that without a strong hand and a willingness to slam the door shut on people you just don't want to know.

We have stuff to do, and in the spirit of that I'm going to shut up now.

* I haven't followed this up because I get queasy just thinking about brains... which is a shame because I'm getting more interested in cognition and neuro stuff as I get older.

** No, really... and no I don't get why comic nerds get so hung up on it, either.