Social Media
Confessions of a Social-Justice Meme Maker
I made pretty pictures that helped keep people enraged and mobilized. Then I asked myself: ‘Why am I doing this?‘
Building a Better Twitter
Twitter’s current policy on content isn’t one dimensional: It serves up both false positives and false negatives—wrongly banning certain accounts for thoughtcrimes while permitting others to continue on the platform despite engaging in grotesquely abusive behavior.
Musk and Moderation
Reports that Twitter has accepted Elon Musk’s offer to buy the company for $54.20 a share have provoked much handwringing about his attitudes to free speech, especially with respect to possible changes in the social media platform’s moderation policies. So far, the discussion has been a largely
How Much Real-World Extremism Does Online Hate Actually Cause?
While calls to censor hate speech and violent extremist content on social media platforms are common, there’s little evidence that online incitement leads to real-world radicalization. Ironically, such calls may actually galvanize extremists, who interpret hostile media coverage, commentary, and censorship policies as confirmation of their victimhood narratives and
Troll Exposure
Hell hath no fury like a trolled daughter’s father: When multiple media houses and friends of friends from far overseas approach me and my family over a devastating, soul-destroying, career-ending lie, then the time of any person to act has arrived. It’s time to protect your daughter and
The Exhibitionist Economy
When former Facebook product manager Frances Haugen leaked thousands of internal company documents to the Wall Street Journal in September, it led to another cycle of acrimonious allegations of corporate irresponsibility. “I’ve seen a bunch of social networks,” Haugen told 60 Minutes in an interview, “and it was substantially
Podcast #168: Jonathan Haidt on Instagram’s Mental Health Emergency
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with NYU professor and Coddling of the American Mind Co-Author Jonathan Haidt about the emotionally destructive effect of social media on many young users.
Children Are Lonelier Than Ever. Can Anything Be Done?
In East of Eden, John Steinbeck writes “all great and precious things are lonely.” Increasingly, our children fit that description. Loneliness among teens has reached troubling levels. For the decades encompassing the late 20th and early 21st centuries, teen mental health outcomes had been reliably stable or were even improving.
