Showing posts with label online abuse. Show all posts
Showing posts with label online abuse. Show all posts

Saturday, December 17, 2022

Teens and Cyberbullying 2022; Pew Research Center, December 15, 2022

EMILY A. VOGELS, Pew Research Center; Teens and Cyberbullying 2022

"Nearly half of U.S. teens have been bullied or harassed online, with physical appearance being seen as a relatively common reason why. Older teen girls are especially likely to report being targeted by online abuse overall and because of their appearance."

Tuesday, May 2, 2017

Sandy Hook father Lenny Pozner on death threats: ‘I never imagined I’d have to fight for my child’s legacy’; Guardian, May 2, 2017

Hadley Freeman, Guardian; 

Sandy Hook father Lenny Pozner on death threats: ‘I never imagined I’d have to fight for my child’s legacy’


"Pozner realised quickly that there was no point in arguing with these hoaxers, so instead he attacks through copyright law. Every day, he Googles Noah’s name to see if anyone has put up a photo or video of his son without his permission and, if so, he files copyright claims. Thanks to Pozner’s dedication and experience as an IT consultant, he has scrubbed Noah’s search results of toxic-hoaxer content. He has sued other hoaxers for invasion of privacy, and successfully petitioned a Florida university to fire a professor, James Tracy, for hoaxing. (Tracy has sued for wrongful termination.) He also founded the HONR Network, which helps grieving families deal with online abuse, and it lobbies YouTube, Google and Facebook to stop hosting such abuse. "

Tuesday, September 6, 2016

A Republican Candidate Said He Hoped I Got Raped; Daily Beast, 9/6/16

[Graphic Language] Olivia Nuzzi, Daily Beast; A Republican Candidate Said He Hoped I Got Raped:
"In an additional statement to The Daily Beast, the West Deptford Executive Board said, “We have been informed he is resigning.” But the fate of political discourse in America is less certain.
News publications (including this one) have made a big show of eliminating comments sections in recent years, arguing, correctly, that they are little more than safe spaces for bullies. But increasingly every other public forum is becoming like that, too.
And in the age of Trump, bullying has been rebranded as telling it like it is.
Using obscene or threatening language is a point of pride, proof that you’re beholden to nothing but the truth. And anyone who can’t handle that? Well, they’re just a politically correct loser."

Thursday, August 11, 2016

Toxic white male nerd avengers: What’s really behind the “Suicide Squad” super-fan freak-out; Salon, 8/9/16

Matthew Rozsa, Salon; Toxic white male nerd avengers: What’s really behind the “Suicide Squad” super-fan freak-out:
"Beyond simply calling for diversity, though, we also must infuse our debate with an awareness that being a fanboy doesn’t entitle you to anything. The common thread linking the “Suicide Squad” petition to other nerd-based racist and misogynist incidents this decade is that, at their core, all of them betray an assumption that producers of popular entertainment are beholden to the nerd community. This misunderstands a basic principle of a free market society — while consumers have the right to invest or not invest their time and money as they see fit, they don’t have the right to demand that producers act as obedient servants to their will. It’s certainly nice when an author or actor or critic or film studio shows deference to the wishes of fans, but they are in no way ethically obligated to do so. Indeed, because many fans (like many people from all walks of life) harbor terrible social views, it is very often necessary for producers to disregard the will of the more vocal segments of their fanbases. Just because some gamers don’t want increased diversity doesn’t mean it shouldn’t happen; just because a lot of moviegoers liked “Suicide Squad” (myself included) doesn’t mean the film critics aggregated by Rotten Tomatoes should agree."

Wednesday, August 3, 2016

How to Crack Down on Social Media Threats; New York Times, 8/3/16

Room for Debate, New York Times; How to Crack Down on Social Media Threats:
"Last week, a prominent feminist writer abandoned social media after a rape and death threat was directed at her 5-year-old daughter. Online violent threats are not uncommon, especially for women and minorities, but when they are reported, police are often not responsive.
How can law enforcement crack down on threats of violence made on social media?"

Saturday, July 23, 2016

Turns Out, Fighting Fat Shaming And Racist Trolls Is Also A Ghostbuster's Job; NPR, 7/22/16

Tanya Ballard Brown, NPR; Turns Out, Fighting Fat Shaming And Racist Trolls Is Also A Ghostbuster's Job:
"I don't know what makes trolls attack so viciously on social media. Is it that they don't like it that some women — in this case a 6-ft.-tall, larger than size zero dark-skinned black woman — are confident and comfortable with themselves?
Who knows, but now that Leslie has returned and is once again engaging on social media with her fans, maybe she can reach out to help some of the women who aren't comedians or actors in summer blockbuster movies navigate troll attacks."

Monday, June 20, 2016

Mob Shaming: The Pillory at the Center of the Global Village; New York Times, 6/19/16

Clyde Haberman, New York Times; Mob Shaming: The Pillory at the Center of the Global Village:
"Once upon a time, miscreants subjected to public ridicule were pilloried for perhaps a few hours. In internet life, that can last forever. “You never escape it,” Danielle Keats Citron said. She is a law professor at the University of Maryland and author of “Hate Crimes in Cyberspace” (2014).
“When you post something really damaging, reputationally damaging, about someone online, it’s searchable and seeable,” she told Retro Report. “And you can’t erase it.”
Does shame have a legitimate place in our lives? Mark Twain seemed to think so. “Man is the only animal that blushes,” Twain wrote in 1897.
“Or needs to,” he added.
Jennifer Jacquet, an assistant professor of environmental studies at New York University, shares the sentiment. In her book “Is Shame Necessary?” (2015), the professor argues that shaming can be a strategy for beneficial change, notably if the targets are corporate polluters and others whose deeds harm the commonweal.
She is not opposed to chastising individuals publicly, as long as the tactics are not abusive, but her preference is to call out governments and large organizations that behave badly. “Shaming is better used for the collective well-being,” she said in an interview."

Sunday, June 12, 2016

Why I Quit Twitter — and Left Behind 35,000 Followers; New York Times, 6/10/16

Jonathan Weisman, New York Times; Why I Quit Twitter — and Left Behind 35,000 Followers:
"I have been encouraged to return to Twitter, and told that I should continue to fight, that my exit was cowardly, that I let the haters win. And I might. I miss the quick rush of a scan through my time line.
But the fact is, giving up one social media space wasn’t exactly martyrdom. It wasn’t much of a loss at all. I have found myself reading whole articles through The New York Times and Washington Post apps on my phone — imagine that. I can actually look at the profiles of people requesting to be my friend on Facebook to see if they are, in fact, trolls. If one slips through, I not only can “unfriend” him but can delete his posts. It feels liberating.
And I am awaiting some sign from Twitter that it cares whether its platform is becoming a cesspit of hate. Until then, sayonara."

Tuesday, April 26, 2016

Revenge porn: the industry profiting from online abuse; Guardian, 4/26/16

Dan Tynan, Guardian; Revenge porn: the industry profiting from online abuse:
"Perversely, while the internet has given a voice to vast numbers of people who might not otherwise be heard, unfettered free speech can have a chilling effect, whether it’s Gamergaters ganging up on female writers or Donald Trump using Twitter to attack his enemies, notes Stephen Balkam, CEO and founder of the Family Online Safety Institute.
“I think the people who profit most from online harassment are those who use it to suppress other people’s thoughts, suggestions, comments, and criticisms,” he says. “We are often so focused on making sure governments don’t chill speech, and here are anonymous stalkers and harassers doing just that.”"

Saturday, April 23, 2016

How do we make the Guardian a better place for conversation?; Guardian, 4/22/16

Katharine Viner, Guardian; How do we make the Guardian a better place for conversation? :
"Last year, a few weeks before I started as the new editor-in-chief of the Guardian, I read a review in the New York Times of Jon Ronson’s So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed. The book looks at the emergence of public humiliations on social media, and the review ended by saying that “the actual problem is that none of the men running those bazillion-dollar internet companies can think of one single thing to do about all the men who send women death threats”. Since I was about to become the first woman to run the Guardian (not, sad to say, a bazillion-dollar internet company), I decided that I had a responsibility to try to do something about it.
That’s why, over the past two weeks, the Guardian has published a series of articles looking at online abuse, with more to follow in the coming months. You might have read our interview with Monica Lewinsky in which she described the trauma of being subjected to what could be called the first great internet shaming, and how she still has to think of the consequences of talking about her past – whether by misspeaking, she could trigger a whole new round of abuse.
Lewinsky’s experience has prompted her to tackle online harassment head on: she is now a respected anti-bullying advocate. But as we’ve considered online abuse in all its forms – the rape and death threats, the sexist, racist and ad hominem attacks, the widespread lack of empathy – it has become clear that some of the institutions that most need to follow Lewinsky’s lead are not; that police and tech companies are failing to keep on top of the problem, and victims are being abandoned to their abusers.
We’ve called our series the Web We Want. It’s an attempt to imagine what the digital world could and should be: a public space that reflects our humanity, our civility and who we want to be. It asks big questions of all of us: as platform providers, as users and readers, as people who write things online that they would never say in real life."

Monday, April 18, 2016

Have Comment Sections on News Media Websites Failed?; New York Times, 4/18/16

[1000th post since blog started in 2010]
Room for Debate, New York Times; Have Comment Sections on News Media Websites Failed? :
"Many newspapers and online media companies have begun disabling comment sections because of widespread abuse and obscenity. Of course, that vitriol is not meted out equally: The Guardian analyzed its comments and found the 10 most abused writers of the past decade were female and/or black. (The Times moderates comments in an effort to keep them on-topic and not abusive.)
Have comment sections — once thought to be a democratizing force in the media — failed?"

Sunday, April 10, 2016

Reddit Steps Up Anti-Harassment Measures With New Blocking Tool; New York Times, 4/6/16

Mike Isaac, New York Times; Reddit Steps Up Anti-Harassment Measures With New Blocking Tool:
"Reddit has in recent months started to address online abuse, and on Wednesday it took one of its bigger steps toward helping individuals gain some control over tormentors: The company said it would give people a blocking feature to shield themselves against harassment on the site, moving to prohibit abusive users from sending messages to others.
The blocking feature will build on the concept that the less exposed to negative speech users are on Reddit, the more they will want to engage with the community. That is important for the company, based in San Francisco, which aims to spread far beyond the 243 million unique monthly visitors it currently serves and break into the mainstream consciousness, much like a Facebook or a Twitter — with a similar ability to command online advertising.
The blocking tool could also serve to curtail the spread of online abuse beyond Reddit’s walls. Vitriol on the site can sometimes erupt into larger memes, spilling over into social media and other avenues and creating further repercussions. That behavior is also stoked by other digital haunts that are the favorite of trolls, including sites like 4chan and 8chan."