Social media is one of the greatest tools for connection and collaboration that we've ever had, providing every individual with a voice, a means to make themselves heard and to take part in the global conversation. Used right, social media has the power to connect the world and enrich our understandings of cultures and lifestyles beyond those we're physically able to experience. But along with that connectivity comes a down side - social media has also increased people's ability to broadcast abuse, bullying and other anti-social behaviour. Studies have shown links between Facebook use and depression and anxiety is now the number one mental health concern among college students, with 'compulsive social media interaction' identified as a significant factor behind that stat. Social media abuse is a major issue, and one which all social platforms need to be taking seriously. As such, it's heartening to see the major platforms are now doing just that.
Twitter Announces Ability to Share Blocked Lists
Earlier this year, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo made headlines when, in a leaked internal e-mail, he lamented the platform's poor handling of trolls and abuse. At the same time, Costolo committed to ensuring his team would work 'night and day' to do what they could to resolve the issue. Since then, Twitter has announced a range of measures to make it easier to report on-platform issues, adding options to download Twitter interactions for use in police reports and re-writing their own guidelines on what constitutes a threat and how they can respond. Twitter's shown that it's taking this issue seriously, and yesterday they announced another step - enabling users to share their block lists to help reduce the reach of trolls within communities.
From Twitter's announcement:
"You can now export and share your block lists with people in your community facing similar issues or import another user's list into your own account and block multiple accounts all at once, instead of blocking them individually."
So rather than having to individually locate and block users, you can now export the block lists of others to better safeguard your Twitter experience.
In itself, this is a small change, but again, it's another step forward in limiting the impact of on-platform trolls and abuse, an issue that's incredibly difficult to police and eradicate. Every step forward is a major one, particularly when you consider the stakes involved.
Reddit Bans Five Subreddits to Prevent Harassment
Reddit, which touts itself as 'The Front Page of the Internet', has long held a reputation as the source of much of the more controversial, offensive and dangerous content being posted online. It was Reddit that was used as the main sharing site for last year's massive leak of celebrity nude photos, Reddit that's come under fire for hosting communities to discuss underage girls and share sexualized images of women, taken without their knowledge. Reddit had long prided itself on standing for free speech, but recently, the platform updated it's harassment policy - instead of letting moderators decide what constitutes harassment, Reddit put forth new rules on what is and is not acceptable. And now it's taken its first actions based on that update.
Yesterday, Reddit announced that it is removing five subreddits which were found to be in violation of its new anti-harassment policies. Those subreddits, with homophobic and racist titles too offensive to repeat, have been shut down effective immediately.
It's great to see Reddit taking a stand on this type of behaviour, to see the platform which has long been a haven for anti-social activity making the move to improve the safety and experience for their users. Really, if Reddit's doing it then that should prompt all platforms should be take notice and look into what actions they can take to do the same. Largely, they are, which is great to see.
An Impossibly Big Issue
In a recent report, the Chief of Psychology at Yale University, Dr. Rajita Sinha, reported that she, in her notes and interactions with students, is definitely seeing a "greater amount of worry about what's happening on social media". Sinha noted that the high amount of anxiety related to social media generally tends to stem from inappropriate content, such as bullying and harassment, along with people making comparisons of their lives to others - or, at least, their lives as displayed via social platforms. When you consider that suicide trails only cancer and heart disease in terms of years of life lost in the U.S., it's impossible to understate the importance of this issue, and the importance of all platforms and users doing all they can to tackle online harassment and abuse where they can.
In this context, it's great to see social networks moving and taking action. The strength of social media is in diversity of voices, in its capacity to facilitate the sharing of many viewpoints and perspectives. Bullying and anti-social behaviour is an impediment to that, and something that we, as a social media community, need to work together with the platforms to stamp out. Every user should feel safe, empowered and free to express their point of view. Hopefully we'll continue to see platforms moving forward in the battle against online abuse.