Don't use Instagram or TikTok ✅👍
Enragebait is a well known consequence of using a profit-driven Algorithm, i.e. enshittification.
15-year-olds are not being specifically targeted so much as caught up in the phenomena occuring overall.
The thing is this isn't a phenomena that's recent. This type of shitty misogynism has been going on for decades/centuries. The only difference between then and now is that we have social apps that make it easier to spread.
I'm coming up on 70 yrs old and misogynism has always been the bane of my existence.
The extent of apps promoting and amplifying this hate posting is a recent phenomenon, through the so-called algorithmic feeds. It all needs attacking.
Yep.
The primary problem is that 'the algorithm' amplifies all of our worst traits, to the extent that someone is not critical of what it is showing them.
Oh, and its also addictive.
Oh, and its also hugely profitable.
Its a giant ratking of feedback loops, and we really should just use Alexander's solution to knots.
The underlying biases and bigotry in humanity has ways of addressing and alleviating it.
But apparently, nothing is strong enough to defeat convenient, targeted, personalized reinforcement of basically, your Jungian shadow.
And its very much relevant that all of this is done to sell advertisements and establish brands, which themselves basically just are also selling you validation, a personality, opinions, 'facts'.
Its the fanciest Skinner Box that's ever been designed.
I'm not quite 70 years old, but I've been around for long enough to laugh at this line from the article: "Sexual equality has ceased to exist online"
Only a 15 year old could think that sexual equality ever existed online. It may be hard to believe, but it's probably better now than it ever has been. Back in the early days online spaces were so male dominated that people had trouble believing that women were even online at all.
Maybe we shouldn't laugh at it because we still have young women having to go through this kind of revelation after thousands of years of civilization.
I'm not actually laughing at it.
If misogyny were somehow magically solved tomorrow, then Xhitter would still remain a misogynistic hellhole, featuring a cesspit of whatever traits of humanity triggered clicking or views or whatever generates the highest profits (maybe in the future, trying to gain the attention of bots will vastly outweigh what happens to us here humans, in the same manner as corporations replaced individual businesses in the economic sphere?).
The specific situation described in the article is misogy, but it points to deeper roots of enshittification. The 15 year old girl will still feel put upon, even unsafe, even if it has nothing to do with her femininity anymore.
good thing these men don’t exist outside of social media! whew, we dodged a big one there…
and i sure hope this school girl doesn’t go to any place regularly where she sees these teenage boys, oh wouldn’t that be unfortunate???
School is mandatory, Xhitter is not.
If she walked home and along the way stopped off at a particular cafe, and always got side-eyed by people there... then yeah, I would say hang out somewhere else?
Be the change that you want to see in the world, and all of that.
Don’t use Instagram or TikTok
Yeah, in general, my answer to "I don't like using Internet site X" is "well, don't use that site."
There are a vast number of sites out there. Use one that you like. I don't have a very high opinion of lemmygrad.ml, but I deal with that by not going there.
"But TikTok is a big site!"
Okay. I don't use Instagram or TikTok. I can assure you that it's very possible to not use them.
"But my friends use Website X!"
Well, making the probably-reasonable assumption that the relationship is symmetric and they also use it because you do, that situation isn't going to change unless someone decides to use something else.
I think this type of argument is relatively flawed. Obviously I'm very happy to leave one platform for another, but most people dont like change and want to be where thier friends are. I think it's reasonable to expect them to get over the former, but because of the former they would probably have to leave their friends behind. Thats obviously not viable for teenagers and it's a rare few that are willing to do that into thier 20s as well.
Seeing as getting people to make a move is so hard I think forcing these platforms not to be so vile would be a good move. We should put the onus on the platforms, not the users.
If i avoided every place I ever encountered misogyny, my life would shrink considerably. Forget work. Never a church. Goodbye school, the grocery store, movie theaters, almost all spaces online, my local park.
Woman: I keep getting catcalled on the street and it’s disturbing my sense of safety.
OpenStars: stop going outside, easy.
Knowing that these sites are bad and the algorithm is part of that doesn’t make “just don’t use those sites” a viable option when most or all of someone’s peers are also using them. That is part of the social media companies’ strategy, to make switching costs so high no one leaves.
Woman: I keep getting catcalled on the street and it’s disturbing my sense of safety.
OpenStars: stop going outside, easy.
False equivalency. Going outside is not similar to using Instagram.
Looks like you've mistakenly replied to the wrong comment. Which is ironic because... try reading? With your eyes?
Yep. Apologies.
I agree with your sentiment here. Obviously, it's possible to avoid using Instagram and TikTok, and it's basically impossible to avoid using the street.
On the other hand, if you're a teenage girl, it may be nearly impossible to not use these big corporate social media sites. A big part of being a teen is socializing with other teens. A big part of being an adolescent is learning to fit in with other adolescents without constant adult supervision. It's one of the reason that home schooled kids have a rough time once they hit college, university or work. Many remain deeply strange for a long while after that.
If all the other teens in your social group are using Instagram and TikTok and you're the one person who isn't, you're probably going to be ostracized. Liking and commenting on each-other's social media posts is an important ritual of friendship at that age.
Sometimes parents ban or restrict social media usage by their kids. To a certain extent that can shield the kid, because it's no longer their fault, and their friends might accept that. But, still, if the kid isn't on social media, they're probably not getting invited to in-person events, they don't know what the important topics of conversation are, and so-on.
I mean, the nerve of saying "don't use social media" on a social media site is pretty rich. And, don't think a 15-year old is going to switch from TikTok to PeerTube or something. You might be able to get them to try it out, but you're not easily going to migrate her entire friend group. The content is also not there. Plus, fediverse sites are inhabited by deeply strange people. I love you all, but I wouldn't want you interacting with a 15 year old girl.
I love you all, but I wouldn’t want you interacting with a 15 year old girl.
Such a strange thing to say. A lot of the people here probably have daughters around that age. A lot of the people here are perfectly normal people.
Such a strange thing to say.
Wait, you include yourself?! 🤣
Well someone has to be first to switch platforms.
If you always get catcalled between Fourth Street and Sixth Street, and you never get catcalled on First through Third Street or Seventh and above, then yeah, maybe just know that going onto Fifth Street you might get catcalled?
You could try expressing your explicit disapproval to Elon Musk directly, maybe that will help?
Actually no, it's not just "Fifth Street", it's Fifth Street in an entirely different country. Tiktok is based on China, Insta and Twitter are in the USA. Normally the rules governing a platform are a combination of the origination point and whatever interrelations exist - although obviously Donald Trump is rewriting those at will to suit him. And yet the UK could do the same... or make an alternative, if it wanted to?
This isn't realistic to tell a kid who uses social media
Sure it is, you just don't like the answer. Which is strange coming from someone who is presumably on Lemmy because they didn't like the way reddit was conducting business and decided to leave. You moved to a competing service, it's also an option to just not use those types of social media at all.
This thread has real orphan-crushing-machine vibes to it. Many just take for granted that of course kids have to use social media. They don't and neither do you. It's not the path of least resistance but why would you expect taking care of yourself to be easy in a society designed to do everything possible to beat you into submission and extract value from the lifeless husk that remains?
"But but Lemmy is social media and you participate here. Curious."
No, not in the same way that Instagram and the rest are. Pseudo-anonymous forums are fundamentally different both in the way people interact with one another and in the types of content they tend to generate.
If you just say "stop using this thing you like" without an actual motivation behind it, you won't have any more success than if you put a pack of cigarettes on the kitchen counter of a smoker and say "Don't you smoke these! It's bad for you!"
First of all, it doesn't sound like these people actually like these platforms. The article in the OP is about a girl describing the pervasive abuse she experiences while using them. I don't think it's unreasonable to say in response "you're clearly not enjoying this so just stop doing it". Second, that is fundamentally sound advice to both this girl and the person smoking in your analogy. The fact that both might be hard habits to break doesn't make the solution any less simple. Simple != easy.
you're ignoring the massive wall of incentive pushed on people by capital forces to use the largest, most commercially active platforms
No I'm not. I specifically called that out in my response. As I said, avoiding them as the solution may not be easy but it is simple in concept. Maintaining your health in all forms is hard to do but the steps to follow are not complex.
I can't really follow what your imagined argument is about
I have seen people in this thread and others use that argument as a way to sidestep the conversation at hand and pivot to something more juvenile and uninteresting. I added it to head off that line of thinking and prevent this from trending in a pointless direction. If you weren't about to say something like that then feel free to ignore it but I wanted to make it clear I'm not interested in going down that path with you or anyone else reading the thread and considering replying.
You're presenting additional nuance as if it disproves what I'm saying and it doesn't. I understand that overcomimg any addiction is more difficult than saying "I'm going to stop this behavior". However, any approach you decide to take is fundamentally just breaking down that ultimate goal into practical steps. I've repeatedly said I agree that there are usually more steps involved but you seem categorically opposed to agreeing that changing your behavior is the goal of any addiction treatment and that seems like a you problem more than a problem with anything that I'm saying.
If you just bothered reading instead of vomiting words, you'd learn the problem is persistent to real life, too. Asshole.
Of course it is. Do you think "misogyny exists in real life" is a novel idea to anyone old enough to know what that word means? You can't opt out of being exposed to it in real life though so unless you're proposing suicide as a solution I'm not sure how that's related to what we're discussing. Dumbass.
This isn't a specific platform problem, it's a social problem and needs social solutions.
The erosion of free (or mostly free), teen-friendly physical third spaces is a big part of this problem, imo. As is the culture of clamping down on kids’ free movement irl. Young people need to have safe spots to hang out together without being pressured to spend money or have a ton of adults breathing down their necks.
Not saying that misogyny or bigotry would disappear, but bringing these back in an accessible way could allow kids to grow again without dealing with corporate surveillance apparatuses as their only social lifeline.
I quite enjoyed hanging out with my friends without having a flood of antisocial adults hurl venom at us on repeat. They deserve that chance too.
What would make YOU excited to go out and hang out around other people? I feel that the entire premise is dying, and adults are equally crippled by this problem as kids
That’s a completely fair question and point.
My being an adult skews my answer, so idk if it’s a fair one but I recently went to a local concert and had a blast with the other people there. What makes me, as an individual, excited overall is knowing other people will be there and the place will feel alive.
Unstructured but available activity seems to be the unifying theme for the location attractions of our own pasts. I don’t have a perfect solution but identifying the issues seems to be a step, at least.
This isn’t a platform problem
It is though. You think the spreading of this content is an accident? They could change the algorithm tomorrow and it would disappear, but they won't because this division is useful to them.
There's some truth to that but the lack of algorithmic manipulation will make it easier to deal with. Plus you just have more options here on Lemmy to deal with it. Most instance operators have shown a willingness to restrict or even defederate from other instances when they are consistently shit to deal with.
This isn’t realistic to tell a kid who uses social media, it’s like saying “Don’t play Xbox” or “Don’t watch new releases, only watch stuff that’s out on video already”
Do these kids just not have parents or adult guardians?
The vast majority probably do. For a parent or guardian to be useful in this sort of situation they need to take an active interest and forge a bond with their ward, and this day and age I don't think that all who wish to do that have the ability to, and there'll be a decent chunk of people who simply don't care.
I've a parent who didn't really give a fuck. I ended up hitting up lots of random dudes, making a bid for some kind of emotional connection, and no one in my personal vicinity knew, cared, or cared to know. It was a terrible idea, but my story is hardly unique, I know a handful of people with very similar stories.
I've seen plenty of misogyny here on the threadiverse. It's not solved just by not using Instagram or TikTok.
Edit: it's in this very comment section, in fact.
It is everywhere, including irl.
However, I would guess it is more prevalent on Xhitter than here.
Better yet, make a UK-based Mastodon instance "for the children", keeping it safe from such?
Teens are too stupid to not use it. Most people are too stupid to not use it. I actually see very little wrong with no one under 16 being allowed on any forms of social media. Among all the stuff like this (that I doubt was really written by a 15 year old, and was more likely made by a person or organization trying to get the law to pass) It fucks up how you regulate dopamine and gives you the attention span of a goldfish.
Not true. It actually makes your attention span WORSE than a goldfish! 😞
Read the article instead of the headline ✅👍
Indeed. Not saying that adult women don't face sexist harassment and that that isn't a problem to solve, but kids shouldn't be on social media in the first place. Not to mention that social media is 90% bots anyway. The majority of the blame here falls on the parents.
Why should we police the victims instead of the perps???
Because it's easier to monitor your children's use of the internet than to remove dumb men, hateful men, and bots from the internet?
Just because one thing is more difficult to do than another doesn't mean it shouldn't be done.
Ban those men and their IP addresses off every social media possible.
It isn't really that easy to monitor or control one's children's use of the internet. They're smart and can be good at figuring out ways to get what they want; more so as they get older. It's better to stay aware of what they're likely exposed to, and talk to them and prepare them to recognize harmful things and avoid them.
Now that you say that... I do agree. But at the same time, I wouldn't want my daughter to be exposed to gross misoginy in the first place. That kind of thing affects someone deeply, especially teenagers, I think. I wouldn't want my son to be exposed to it either. Not sure what to do. I'm relieved they are far from reaching that age, yet I'm aware that time will come.
Yea, fully agree with that.
But until then, don't leave your children on their own.
Thanks, I appreciate the tips.
Because it’s easier to monitor your children’s use of the internet than to remove dumb men, hateful men, and bots from the internet?
Is it? One of those groups famously struggles to program video recorders and it ain't the kids. Teenagers can probably defeat any firewall you set up, including by gaining access to someone else's wifi or device. So let's at least try to police the perps instead of their victims.
NO ONE should be on social media in its current state.
Lemmy is social media, too.
The problem isn't social media. The problem is profit-driven monopolies incentivized to promote high-emotion content. The problem, more generally, is monopolies that no one has hindered since 1974.
"Social media" generally implies an algorithm delivering monotized content, so Lemmy is not true social media.
It is media that is social, but it's nonetheless very very very different.
We here are not:-).
Well, I'm self aware enough to acknowledge the irony here, but I will say that I'd rather be on Lemmy than reddit.
Plus capitalism is currently being run by a global pedophilia cabal who owns the media, so there's that as well.
Oh come on, it's not like the Trump-Epstein files describe meetings with Musk, oh wait... Zuck, oh no, he's there too... hmmmm.
The majority of the blame here falls on the parents.
The majority? Seriously?
The age verification debate misses the real point. These commercial algorithms are harmful for everybody.
The identity verification debate is the point and it is the only reason this article exists in the first place.
These commercial algorithms are harmful for everybody.
Also true.
It's a business of outrage. Just say the most vile things you can think of, wait for some people to react to it, no matter how, and watch the algorithm do it's work. Congratulation you are now an influencer.
From what I'm seeing, the messaging is "we want to protect children, thus age verification".
To your point, it is identity verification they're doing.
My point is, age verification isn't even the right solution to the problem.
It's not about age verification, it's just an excuse for more censorship.
They're addiction creating and brainwashing. I have believed for the last ten years that they should be illegal, and all feeds should be sorted chronologically or by popularity
Using social media has ruined my self-esteem and my relation to being a girl in this world, and nearly every day I feel hatred towards my gender, my appearance, or even teenage boys as a category. The misogyny I see from boys my age online, which is echoed in real life too, has made me grow resentful and bitter towards them, as much as I try to avoid it. As wrong as it is, I persistently find myself considering if there are truly any boys out there who are not misogynistic to some extent, and have even questioned whether I can find love in the future because of this. I understand that boys are victims of harmful content, as well as perpetrators of online misogyny – they’re growing up learning how to do this from the adults who post misogynistic videos first. But even so, I feel such a strong divide now between girls and boys in my generation, especially when the way they talk about us in real life mirrors the way they do on the internet.
That’s fucked up.
That level of misogyny is definitely learned, but it’s not just her age group. I’m floored by (for example) some comments my Dad makes, a “quiet, respectful, classy” type guy who’s never had a Facebook or Insta, who’d you’d never expect to hear insults from. And it’s definitely worse after he watches Fox News… that shit is like a drug.
My school “friends” dropped my jaw, sometimes. They got a lot from their parents, but social media (Faceboook back then) absolutely made it worse.
Even here on Lemmy, the disrespect or casual sexism from commenters sometimes makes me want to throw up. Not that I’m a particularly standup guy or anything, but the longer I live, the more I wonder “the fuck happened to my sex?” I certainly can’t critique this girl for wondering the same thing.
Yeah, I feel like a lot of the people here going "just don't use social media then" are missing part of the point. Like, as she specifically mentioned, the misogynistic discourse happening online is also happening offline. Even if you yourself manage to avoid most online misogyny by not using social media, you'll still be exposed to it through everyone else who is and all the people watching and reading stuff like Fox. It's just kind of everywhere.
Exactly! Precisely. It’s affecting her real life, too.
That “just don’t use social media then” response in itself feels… misogynistic? This isn’t her choice; she can’t ignore the catastrophic effects.
It feels very reminiscent of "well don't dress like that then"
Yup. And that's bullshit. It's way past the time we should be teaching boys how to NOT be misogynistic asswipes.
The thing is, teenage boys learn this behavior from social media. If we had told boys not to use it, they might have not turned out like that.
If misogyny has been around for centuries (and it has) who taught boys back in the 1600's to be sexist assholes?
It didn't originate from social media. It started with fathers teaching their sons that they were more important and special than girls were.
Obviously, but it gets reinforced there.
"Stop using social media" is probably good advice for everyone, but as you say, its not the solution to the this problem unless literally everyone follows it and even then there is more to do since its not like the internet invented misogyny.
Yeah, it is great advice. But I'm under no illusion that's happening anytime soon, not for most people.
The context matters. And in this instance “stop using social media” feels more like blaming the abused teenager while the rest of the world carries on, like its totally dismissive of what she's saying.
the issue isn't just that she's reading and hearing these comments online, the issue is that teenage boys are doing so. social media has normalised this kind of behaviour to them, and they bring those views with them to the real world where girls will interact with them: school, sports clubs etc.
Gestures at Lemmy comments in this post. See what I mean?
We gotta stop this Lemmy from forcing her to do all that
I'm reporting you for still not even bothering to read the fucking article. The is un-fucking-real. Just open the fucking link and absorb the words written in it. Then come back and apologize for being an asshole.
Yeah I've already read it. Feel free to use the report button however you choose, though. That's what it is there for!
Oh ok, great, so you've now learned the problem extends to real life, and the boys around her talk this way in person as well as online. So just quitting the entire Internet wouldn't help in the slightest. What's your apology gonna be like?
So just quitting the entire Internet wouldn’t help in the slightest.
help
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/help
slightest
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/slightest
So not voluntarily subjecting herself to internet abuse would ...not... improve the situation in at least the smallest way? Are you sure?
Just wanted to chime in and say that you're part of the problem. That is all.
No, actually I've provided the solution to the problem. You just didn't like it.
Part of the problem is that it's a feedback loop. People use social media and somebody makes some misogynistic content which angers people which then gets the algorithm to promote it heavily. Then somebody else who's inspired by that content makes their own misogynistic content and the cycle repeats. Once enough of that content is circulating it becomes the norm and a bunch of people start dogpiling on it to be part of the in crowd. It's particularly pernicious when it's being used to blame people's problems on others which is how the incel and red pill groups got their start.
It's not just the girls/women that need to get off these platforms, it's the boys/men as well. Algorithms that reward anger and controversy are a significant part of the problem and really should be looked at to be regulated the same way gambling and addictive drugs are.
should be looked at to be regulated the same way gambling and addictive drugs are.
Yet here we are, still in the War on Drugs. Betting apps are exploding in popularity and being straight up paraded by politicians and business leaders.
I agree with the sentiment, but I don’t think the engagement feedback issue will be addressed directly. It’s too profitable. We’re cooked, for a while. So maybe we should reach for every half measure with a chance of passing, like restricting kids?
holy shit these comments
lemmy users stop being individualist-brained, victim-blaming misogynists challenge: IMPOSSIBLE
you don’t stop misogyny by just ignoring it you twats, and hot take, mainstream social media being filled with nothing but privileged assholes being bigots (because all the good people were told to just go somewhere else 😇) is not good, actually!
I mean this is why I stopped using social media 10 years ago. Bunch of nonsense drivel, everyday.
I'm not victim blaming, this shit shouldn't happen, but if you are on a platform and that platform has shit moderation and you keep seeing content you don't like, well, maybe you should leave that platform? I mean this is why we all left reddit, right?
If I walk into a wall once, then it's an accident. If I keep walking into it, then I'm just stupid.
Genuine question: What do you categorise this comment as, other than you using social media?
I keep falling into the same trap as well, when telling people I quit using "social media" but am very much active on social media platforms - just not the ones controlled by big tech.
Maybe we need a shorthand for "profit-driven algorithm-controlled influencer cesspools" so we can separate it from "non-profit decentralized social media platforms" like Lemmy and Mastodon?
It's called the Social Graph. Platforms that implement a social graph are social media.
The fact that people don't know this basic, fundamental mechanism is the problem. Even the technologically inclined haven't been able to make this simple distinction.
People think "social media" means a place for people to be social. That's not it. Social media is specifically platforms that implement the social graph and/or similar types of algorithms that are designed to manipulate sociological relationships.
Traditional message boards are not social media because there is no algorithm. In the past reddit wasn't social media because it technically did not have a social graph. It was a simple aggregrator with comment sections. That alone does not make social media. reddit does have a social graph now. That's when it became social media.
Lemmy doesn't have social graph algorithms.
The social graph is quite possibly one of the most dangerous inventions the 21st century and nobody talks about it. Yet it rules your entire life. It's what makes the world turn. It's what is dictating cultures and societies. It's what is determining what goes viral. It determines the daily headlines.
You have a very restricted definition that doesn't seem to be common. "Social graph" is not mentioned once on the Wikipedia page of "social media", nor the Britannica, nor the Cambridge dictionary, nor Merriam Webster. While they are not specialized sources, I think they reflect the common usage of words. By those definitions Lemmy seems to be a social media.
Hey thank you for the term drop! I haven't heard of "social graph" and it falls into my "feelings" of what social media has been for me(or what I hate about it(algorithms)). I am definitely a "one in ten thousand" today for this.
This definition of social media is new to me as well, thanks for sharing it. This sort of clarifies a term I really dislike, and which you've used: "the algorithm". It's always seemed a little murky to me which algorithms it refers to. It's like saying "don't eat food with chemicals in it".
Lemmy does have "an algorithm", it's just a relatively simple one based on communities one is subscribed to plus some vote/comment data for the various sort orderings.
Lemmy also absolutely implements a social graph -- the data about who has interacted with whom is all stored by the system. It's not explicitly stored as a graph structure, but then we're arguing database schemas.
As I understand it, however, you're saying "social media" arises when the "social graph" data structure is used as an input to "the algorithm". That seems like a pretty robust definition to me.
One bit of pedantry: user blocks on Lemmy are, by a general definition, a form of social graph, and they do affect what content people see. So Lemmy could technically qualify as social media by the definition I've written here. I'm not sure what a more precise definition could be that avoids this technicality.
A stronger distinction could be made for the use of graphs on a widespread scale. That's what I meant when I said lemmy doesn't have a graph. The data structure itself is benign. When it becomes dangerous is when you're playing god mode by dictating what individuals see. When that is applied that across the entire platform then you're controlling entire societies. This is "the algorithm" that people speak of in common parlance even though they don't know the underpinnings of it. It's such a simple concept but extremely dangerous to humanity.
You can block on individual if they annoy you. This is a basic feature that existed on old forums and chat software. A single edge on a graph millions or even billions is insignificant. It's a silly retort anyways that trolls use, thinking it makes them sound smart. Ignoring one or even a few idiots isn't going to alter your algorithm. Not relative to the system as a whole which is orders of magnitude greater.
If anything the block feature is an antidote to algorithms that decide what we see. For some reason people don't see anything wrong with having to be forced to confront your polar social/political opposites all the time. I can't remember where I heard or read about this but studies shown that this does not work. It's not productive.
The thing that people have to get over is that "the algorithm" isn't correct by default. You're not losing anything by blocking users or breaking from it entirely. There's been more than enough evidence over the years that they do much harm. I have yet to see much strong evidence that they are beneficial. What has society gained from it? There's nothing but sales pitches for adtech firms telling us that they have mastered how give us the best social experiences. Where's the proof of that.
While I completely agree with you on all arguments about the dangers of algorithm-based platforms where eyeball count and time spent in apps (ad revenue) are the primary reasons behind their very existence, I disagree on your definition for the term social media.
I tried to find some sources for your definition, but for example the Wikipedia article on social graphs define Facebook as an online social network (although it also calls it a social media platform).
Judging by the list of social networking services, the definition (at least on Wikipedia) seems to lean towards "any site where you can add people as friends" (thus building the social graph you refer to).
Personally, I think that term fits better with your description (platforms based entirely on a social graph), while online social media is a broader term describing any online medium on which we socialize with other people - graph-based or not. Old-school forums and chat rooms included, even if we didn't call them that back then.
Maybe, but I've definitely seen people disagree about what constitutes social media - e.g. some thing youtube is or isn't, other people lemmy/reddit are or aren't, it seems pretty inconsistent. Maybe it's a generational thing?
In this sense, yes to Reddit and YouTube. YouTube may not be very social but it clearly has an algorithm that pushes toxic content/stereotypes.
And im going to say no on Lemmy. Lemmy may be social but there’s no algorithm pushing toxic content. Maybe I’m missing it but there’s seems to be very little toxic content.
You're saying the criteria for being called "social media" include, "must be toxic" and "must be algorithmically-driven"?
Maybe this is an age thing and language has changed (I'm old in Internet years) but to me, "social" implies the opposite of those things - friendly interaction and organic connection.
I’m saying the term is somewhat nebulous, with lots of gray area but also an objective definition would not answer the question.
People do disagree on what constitutes social media, and even apply it inconsistently to themselves. So let’s not pretend there is a clear definition. Language isn’t always cleanly defined so we can understand what “social media” is based on context
I don't consider Lemmy or other message style boards as social media.
We aren't posting pictures of ourselves or posting updates of our lives on here. We don't use our real names(or I hope we don't).
Please define social media for me, because it seems like everyone's take on it is "a website where you interact with others", which is way too broad and I would say that applies to the entire internet then, which is a slippery slope.
*Edit, another post linked the "Social Graph" which I think encapsulates what social media is vs. what it is not.
Please define social media for me, because it seems like everyone’s take on it is “a website where you interact with others”, which is way too broad and I would say that applies to the entire internet then, which is a slippery slope.
That is effectively the definition from my understanding. Lemmy, Reddit, and similar boards are social media because the content is primarily user-generated.
It probably feels like the entire internet because it's where many of us are spending most of our time.
Yeah and I don't accept that definition. Is GitHub social media then? Is the LTT forums social media? Is Wikipedia? Nexus mods? All of these sites contain "user generated content".
Because I would say none of those sites are social media sites. But all of these loose definitions are being thrown around and next thing you know you'll need to verify your ID to look at any Wikipedia article.
Please define social media for me
I guess my take is anywhere people interact with others in a conversational way, yes. You can see a timeline of posts, you can comment and reply, etc. You can't do that on 99% of websites or apps. You can't do it on your banking app or your weather app or your insurance website, etc. The lines blur around things like Wikis where you can chat with people on talk pages.
Limiting "social media" to places you post pictures of yourself rules out most earlier forms of social media before that became a thing, but looking back you wouldn't say twitter wasn't. The Wiki link you gave also links to "list of social media websites", which includes Reddit, as a directly opposing point.
I don't think it's clear-cut, and I know different people have different opinions.
Personally I didn't consider Reddit as social media 10+ years ago, but in the last few years it has definitely become social media, and I would attribute that to the Social Graph concept.
Right now, I don't consider Lemmy or other link aggregators(Piefed) as social media, same for PeerTube as that is more of an entertainment/video sharing platform that isn't focused on a social aspect. And I guess Matrix wouldn't be social media for me either because I see it as a chat platform where you can be social, but the focus isn't on sharing personal details of yourself. But I would consider Mastodon and PixelFed as social media and their focus is on pure social interactions. Which I guess I don't know if I consider YouTube to be social media either at that point.
Maybe I'm hyper-fixating on the "media" part of "social media". But again, I think clear and concise definitions of these types of sites need to be created BEFORE laws are in-place, because it seems that everyone is focusing on whether or not a website or service has "social" functions, which again, is a slippery slope.
No. All walls should be padded because we assume everyone is going to walk into them...
Depends if an algorithm is going to pop that wall in front of everyone repeatedly. Ideally, pad the wall, fix the stupid algorithm, and prosecute the creators of both.
So suicide, then? That's your suggestion?
That's not what they said at all.
Keep walking into that wall bud.
a large share of “incel adjacent” shut-ins, as they are the segment most likely to keep a forum or website active
"But not me, I'm different even though I'm here too!"
This user:
Lol proves my point.
I've been a social media moderator and it's an awful, thankless, volunteer job. And I think objectively we kept our community very tightly focused on our narrow topic and civil. But we'd have never gotten to that point without a ton of help from the community itself. We outlined our vision and had clear, reasonable guidelines, so it was very easy to determine if something was against the rules to report.
But this was a special interest subreddit, and it was a constant battle. I made sure that every ruling and interaction I made had thoughtful intent. I had to step down because it was making me legitimately depressed.
I could never fault a moderator for being overwhelmed, especially for a community as chaotic as instagram. For these large, general purpose communities, it's impossible to police directly. It truly takes the whole community to enforce and report bad behavior.
So no, you shouldn't blame the victims, but you have to understand it's a massive systemic problem with no easy solution. The best advice you can give really is "Take care of yourself, and avoid problematic communities."
Systematic issues aren't any one person's responsibility, and those who thing it is, tend to be violent assholes.
All we can do as individuals is be responsible for ourselves. We are not responsible for other people.
However, the parents are responsible for this 15 year old girl. She is not responsible for herself as she is not an adult.
The 2:1 ratio of course just degrades the platform further because there's too few to challenge the misogyny. Like public officials quitting under Trump, you can hardly blame them but it makes the problem worse not better.
You're not going to save Instagram. The owners do not want you to save it and you do not control it. It was a lost cause before you even knew there was a problem.
Some systemic problems cannot be solved from inside the system.
I am certainly not going to save Instagram, since I never joined. But if you mean it can't be saved, that might be true as well.
If every female person left Instagram today, what would happen to the misogyny? Would it be starved of fuel or would it escalate and spiral until it explodes in (increased) physical attacks?
And if the women and girls created their own female-positive space, how long before it was brigaded? Judging by everyTwoX post that ever hit R/All, I'm putting the over/under at 6 hours.
My solution? Oh I'm not saying the women should have stayed in Instagram! It's one reason I never joined in the first place. If anything I was wondering if women created a No Boys Allowed WomenSpace totally separate. And still I think it would be brigaded.
I think we agree on the basic evil of societal misogyny. Although as an old woman who has lived through changes, I have seen that having more women in a workplace or field, especially as we start to fill the upper echelons, can help fade certain parts of the misogyny or at least drive it underground.
Women simply prefer spaces where they can control the membership and replies to ensure validation of their beliefs. You'd be surprised by how censorious women spaces can be. Posting replies on their spaces is never egalitarian. And women have no problem brigading either.
or maybe dumbfucks like you just think you're a lot more egalitarian than you actually are.
The 2:1 ratio of course just degrades the platform
Men and women have different interest. It's mostly a fantasy to expect 50/50 participation.
How do you propose stopping it?
The people who propose "age gating" social media are essentially advocating the end of Internet anonymity and privacy for us all. After all, you can't effectively determine one users age or identity without collecting them all.
Is removing digital privacy really something we want to be flirting with? Especially in the era of Palantir, Flock, and the Trump Administration?
Democracy, freedom of speech, and privacy are all related.
Without privacy, one can't have freedom of speech because bad actors and authoritarians in power can and will silence critics. Without freedom of speech, one can't live in a democracy, because having the ability to organize and speak out against those in power without fear of persecution is the basis of democracy.
Maybe I'm just more cynical than most, but I don't see the elimination of all privacy on the Internet as a good solution for something that can otherwise be managed by basic parenting and personal agency.
We are fools if we willingly give the corporate oligarchs that control mainstream social media (and, by extension, Trump) our full real identities in a futile attempt to "think about the children".
educating men and boys, and actually moderating misogyny (and other bigotries) would be a good start, how many reports of horrific posts end up with "after careful examination by our moderation team, we have found that this post does not violate our community guidelines..."
Requiring large social media platforms to regulate and moderate hateful speech would be a start. Big tech has been largely dropping the ball in this regard.
Cases-in-point, Meta (Facebook, Instagram, Threads), X Corp (the App Formerly Known As Twitter) and Alphabet (YouTube.)
X's Grok AI has been used to generate millions of sexualised images. Sometimes women get objectified and undressed without their knowledge nor consent by people promoting Grok. Sometimes the victims are minors. The fact that X hasn't been shut down speaks volumes about how much billionaires have been able to get away with crap that would land anybody else behind bars for a long time.
YouTube... Have you also noticed more hateful content being posted to the platform. This isn't an example that I think I can link to here, but there is a far-right ragtime musician called Foundring who was previously banned from the platform years ago for hate speech. Either due to ban evasion or his ban being lifted, he came back two years ago and recently started posting piano covers of old vintage ragtime and folk music from the late 18th Century. One of his videos, which contained the word "N*****" in the title (yes, hard-R) got catapulted by the YouTube algorithm and is currently sitting at 1.2 million views. It's 37 days old and still up.
Is removing digital privacy really something we want to be flirting with?
Digital privacy and anonymous posting are two different things.
I would argue that they're closely related.
Imagine a circumstance in which you have to use your real ID to sign up for a social media site which happens to be owned by a billionaire oligarch with close ties to an out-of-control fascist authoritarian president with no reservations about pulling whatever string he can to maintain his grip on power, and I think you'll understand why.
You may know my user name, but really not too much else about me, because of the partial anonymity of having a username which is loosely coupled to my real life identity.
If we lived in a world where we could trust our government or the corporations that control mainstream social media, then maybe it wouldn't be an issue. We don't.
Imagine a circumstance in which you have to use your real ID to sign up for a social media site
You're setting up a false premise. It doesn't have to be done that way.
I don't think I am. How else do you verify a person's age?
So far the options seem to be:
- AI video facial recognition (privacy nightmare)
- Government ID verification (privacy nightmare)
I suppose you could use a credit card transaction, but so far nobody seems to be going that route.
Regardless, ALL of this shit is a poor substitute for decent parenting.
Way I see it there are two productive paths to take here:
- Start trying to convince women that privacy does in fact matter. Use examples like the menstruation tracking apps potentially being used to identify abortions to illustrate this point.
- Try to relate to the men here on Lemmy and find a way to cooperate. You've got a largely fresh population of men here who don't actually hate women, but have spent years in education being told they are dangerous rapists waiting to happen, or were treated as defective women by their teachers. They need good male role models and women who will treat them with respect, so that they can climb out of the pit without leaving the better parts of themselves behind.
An utterly unproductive use of your time would be trying to fight misogyny on oligarch-owned platforms. You will never win because they find this content useful, as it divides workers and wastes their time and social energy. Just get out, and help others do it too.
I'm constantly baffled by the amont of misogyny some Lemmy users through around if the topic is even slightly about women.
I don't have any skin in this fight but sexism is wrong from either side of the isle. I feel bad for kids who grow up with parents like this. I get that its hard for women but its also not easy for young men to navigate this madness.
but what about men????
Dude FUCK OFF!!! It's okay to bring up men's issues or whatever if you think they should be discussed more often, but if you're gonna do that, you should make your own post instead of bitching about it in the replies to a post about the insane shit we have to go through. It's genuinely fucking crazy, nine times out of ten whenever "muh wHat aBoUT mEn" comes up, it's in the response to conversations about misogyny, and I'm lowballing here. You're just derailing the conversation and it's fucking rude.
If you are going to lead with being rude I won't bother wasting energy on you more than this response.
Yeah. I have a feeling that stopping it is, somehow, not desirable to a portion of the commentors.
you don’t stop misogyny by just ignoring it you twats, and hot take, mainstream social media
Opinions aren't stopped. They also don't need to be. Trying to make individualism a put-down is pathetic.
We all have it in our power to ignore or use our voices to promote our messages with as much force as the messages we oppose. That provocative ragebait engages more effectively than constructive dialog reflects a human failing & a need to work on ourselves.
Social media doesn't need to be good, and we don't need to keep using it.
The beauty of social media is we can be totally irredeemable "twats", victim-blame up the wazoo, and put out the most infuriating shit conceived until we realize it's all expression lacking substance & none it matters.
It's only when people start caring too much that we should be concerned for humanity.
They need to get a life or something, stop putting so much of themselves on words, images, & sounds on a screen.
Yeah, "just stop using social media" is an insanely stupid take that misses the point so hard it makes you wonder how someone distorted their perception so hard that they can even react that way.
"Stop using social media" is literally the only real solution because oligarchs will never again risk letting us actually connect with each other. You stay on "social" media and you will just be getting run in circles by engagement algorithms and bots.
You cannot save Facebook, Instagram, X, or Reddit because their owners will not allow you to.
No, it's not. It might seem impossible for society to improve, but that is the solution, and talking about it without telling people to just avoid certain avenues is the only way to that end.
"Social media" is not society; it's a series of platforms built by billionaires for the purpose of control.
Filled with people expressing opinions. I don't understand how this could possibly be controversial or difficult to grasp.
You're literally pretending social media isn't real or doesn't matter as long as you just do the right thing and ignore it instead of addressing the horrible ideas spread on it.
I don't understand what you're failing to grasp. You see what you're allowed to see. They are signal boosting shit heads while suppressing everyone else. If your message begins to spread, they will just pull the platform out from under your feet.
How do you propose to win on billionaire-owned social media when they can just kick your legs out at will the moment you stand too tall for their good? Look at all the Reddit protests that amounted to nothing besides getting moderators booted from their subs, they're a perfect example of this.
Top three read article btw. Shilled by the same people who will soon have a track of you everywhere you do or go. You won't even have a permission to fart without paying the fine.
15- y old girl. Most likely written by a 40 y old who can't understand how parenting works. If you are a failure it doesn't mean the rest of population now needs to be enforced in id links and checks and give away their right to privacy. Fucking dumbasses
Subheading:
Objectification, hate, rape threats: the politicians debating online abuse mean well, but to truly understand, they need to see what I see
No, they don't.
Delete TikTok and Instagram for starters.
Let me guess the solution before reading the article - some form of weakening to digital privacy.
Yep: "A social media ban for under-16s might prevent young boys seeing endless content that treats women with contempt and hate. Boys at this age are very susceptible to the cool and funny framing of what is, in reality, relentless misogyny. A ban might not fix the problem, but it would help. If society can’t stop it, it can show it disapproves."
Essentially, this article is an argument to introduce online ID, and I disagree with that on a fundamental level.
The soil misogyny has dug it's roots into is the iniquity we created while seeking equity. It was done for the best of reasons, but now we see the price. That's not a problem we can solve easily, and certainly not via creating state spying infrastructure.
I was gonna say unpopular opinion, but maybe not...
disengage from social media. It is not reality. not only that, but it perpetuates itself, and the oligarchy that created it. Go out and meet people in the real world. This is comming from an autistic person with minimal patients for other people. Seriously, ditch social media; it's poison, and when it dies (which it will if people like you leave) these toxic peope you encounter will have to face the real world.
The answer is to disengage yourself, and to teach your children AND OTHERS to disengage from social media.
Social media is harmful, advertising is harmful, drugs are harmful, gambling is harmful. This is a question of societal level harm and is is a problem for individual counties, nations, and states to address by the creation and enforcement of law, and for individuals to address by collectively shaming participants.
And yet some politicians say the solution is to ban 15 year olds from social media, rather than police the platforms, algorithms and users. Please contact your representative and ask them to police the platforms, not bring in creepy ID checks.
Never understood how the solution to all platforms going to shit is making users upload their ID. This does neither fix the problem nor the symptom. I mean, I understand why it's done but not how people come to think this is a good idea.
ID laws are about control. If you can't post anonymously the govt can track people who don't agree with them. Or LGBTQ+ people, or whoever the govt doesn't like.
I mean, I understand why it's done but not how people come to think this is a good idea.
They are the same people who think "If you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to hide. Only bad people need/want anonymity." They are also either childless or don't care about their child's online access and activity.
people who think “If you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to hide."
I think these people should live in a world without bathroom doors.
A good nearly half of people use authoritarian thinking rather than have to put in effort to think for themselves even slightly.
Sheeple
The whole point of the algorithm is attention. Yeah, they could try to actually police it so coded versions of “kill yourself, ugly bitch” don’t spread, but that language works, and it makes the posters rich.
You can’t get around for “addiction for ad dollars” being the whole point. It’s always going to surface ragebait, trash talk or whatever because that’s what sells attention, no matter how hard it’s fought.
…So yeah. Policing isnt going to do anything. Don’t tell your representatives something that won’t work, and worse, has the “theatre” of helping.
I don’t know a good “solution” other than burning it all to the ground, but honestly, banning as many people as possible sounds like a good idea to me.
You can’t get around for “addiction for ad dollars” being the whole point. It’s always going to surface ragebait, trash talk or whatever because that’s what sells attention, no matter how hard it’s fought.
Yes you can.
Why do you think going after the haters, taking their riches away, booting them offline and possibly imprisoning some of the worst, plus going after the operators of platform that spread hate "isn't going to do anything"? We're at the point now where there's so much hate that it'll be like shooting fish in a barrel at first.
To a certain degree I agree with the assessment - children (under-16 would be my definition here) shouldn't have full access to what we consider social media today.
Things were different 10, 20 years ago when it wasn't so centralised. You'd have independent forums, all with reliable moderation, and so on, plus with little to no ads, and the ad networks themselves were more inclined to not have inappropriate things shown, especially to children - basically all the "make your dick grow 7 foot long" and "8 cock hungry MILFs waiting for you in your area" type of ads were all relegated to porn sites to begin with.
Today? We have centralised social media with little to no moderation beyond basic keyword filtering, ad networks not giving a fuck about the content they push, and every single malicious actor having access to these platforms to further their agendas... Not to mention unfettered access to children by any and all accounts.
What IMO would be the best solution is to force social media sites to have a cordoned off "children" section where kids can socialise with their peers without predatory adults having any form of access to them. But that's easier said than done, unfortunately.
I mean, old forums were pretty messed up.
Your point stands though. The old internet isn't what the average person experiences, anymore.
What IMO would be the best solution is to force social media sites to have a cordoned off “children” section where kids can socialise with their peers without predatory adults having any form of access to them. But that’s easier said than done, unfortunately.
In real life, we call this school!
It can definitely be done. It's not difficult, it's just that the world is not heading in that direction.
School is not about socialization. Socialization absolutely happens there, but it's not the primary purpose, and it does not exclude predatory adults. See: the rampant rates of bullying and violence that occur, and get further enabled by faculty who either ignore complaints or both-sides it into victim-blaming.
Kids are not just naturally nice to one-another.Lord of the Flies is still taught in schools for a reason.
No, but it’s still a more isolated environment. There aren’t bunch of ads or grifters or whatever on campus because it at least tries to insulate kids from the outside world profiting off them, and to curate what they experience.
That’s what they need on their phones, too. Lord of the Flies is better than Big Brother.
I guess the difficult part would be to blunt the outside from flooding in, like kids mass reposting Andrew Tate. But at least there would be some control/fairness with exposure, instead of an engagement algorithm ruling their feed.
Lord of the Flies is fiction. It is taught for its artistic merit, not its applicability to the real world.
Screenshot of this Mastodon toot, because I can't get newlines to work in quoted-text.
How much do you think it'd cost to 'police the platforms'?
lemmy is only took off because reddit policed it and kicked most of the users here off.
the problem with policing speech and bullying is it's totally subjective. i used to be told I was a bully for offering people writing suggestions.
lemmy is only took off because reddit policed it and kicked most of the users here off.
Other waves arrived here because reddit kicked all the independent apps off, and started feeding all community discussions to AI.
Less than it's costing us in lives and damage not to police them!
police the platforms
No thanks. The beauty of social media is the unrestrained assholery. People just need to learn to cope & quit being fragile: skill issue. Education & civic campaigns to promote social good are better approaches respecting our inherent liberties to piss people off.
How do you police someone you can't identify?
By closing the accounts? Facebook doesn't need to know who you are in real life to ban you.
Why would Facebook want to have less users?
It wouldn't. That's why have to ask politicians to make laws that forces Facebook to do it anyway.
Facebook has a certain level of moderation, as is required by a lot of countries.
But they're never going to, for example, screen every comment before it gets posted. And politicians basically banning Facebook don't get many votes
Also, I don't personally use it but isn't Facebook one where you'll only get comments from people you've first connected with?
Facebook has a certain level of moderation, as is required by a lot of countries.
Where that level of moderation is negligible and ineffective. It's a sham.
And politicians basically banning Facebook don’t get many votes
How do we know? Who's tried it? They're all scared that facebook will start working against them, as it allegedly has in some referendums and elections.
Also, I don’t personally use it but isn’t Facebook one where you’ll only get comments from people you’ve first connected with?
🤣🤣🤣 No. There's loads of "promoted" posts in your feed for years now.
I very highly doubt the majority of dudes posting shit like that even use a vpn. Therefore they can be ifentified by IP.
Hell the worst shit you see on Facebook is by people posting under their actual name.
They think it's now acceptable.
As the others have stated, you don't need to know them to ban them, but i would also add that a majority post from their real accounts, with their face as a profile picture, with little to no shame.
Outside of this, there needs to be a targeted effort to label and/or ban bots, but those bot accounts drive up user engagement numbers, which drive ad revenue, which makes line go up, so it's never going to happen. But doing so would limit how far these messages get and reduce foreign (or domestic) influence.
Sexual equality has ceased to exist online. It’s absolutely fine for boys to have sex, but when girls do, they are called worthless and referred to as objects.
This isn't new. I'm a man in my mid 40s and the disparity between how promiscuous men are viewed as compared to promiscuous women has existed for as long as I've been sexually aware, and well before.
Obviously that doesn't make it okay. I also have no idea what the solution might be. There have been a few cultural efforts to normalize the idea of women enjoying and seeking out sex but none of them seem to really reach the people that need to hear it.
I do find it oddly paradoxical that men who make it very clear that they are actively seeking sexual partners would disparage women for being sexually active.
I'm a whole cisgendered 30 year old male who games a bit too much, so I try to discourage misogynistic comments when they're made by people in games.
I think there's another layer to the misogyny where any form of "defending" women is seen as white-knighting or simping. You don't even have to be directly referring to comments about a specific person, but you'll still be labeled as a loser who likes women, for some reason.
It's not only misogyny.
Social media absolutely removes the inhibitions of just about all kinds of assholes, builds pat-each-other-on-the-back support groups for them by putting them together with like minded assholes and then algorithmically shovels all that shit on everybody else because anything that elicits strong emotions means more clicks and anger from being offended is one such emotion.
By the way, this also applies to unhealthy gender expectations on males (including misandry), though this being The Guardian I expect this is about the UK, which IMHO (having lived there and also elsewhere in Europe) is a country with serious problems when it comes to gender expectations around women and insidious "benevolent" sexism ("benevolent" not because it's good but because it follows the whole "women are fragile creatures" and subsequent subtle disemplowering of women "to protect them" or because "they're emotional creatures") which far too often taints the articles in The Guardian because they're very much from the British upper-middle class Acceptable Feminism, which tends to underestimate the strength of women and favor "protection" "solutions" over empowerment and agency.
So whilst I absolutely believe in all of this and in misogyny online being very bad, especially in certain countries, the choice of focusing on misogyny rather than as a whole in the problem of social media's Profit Driven amplification of societal dysfunctions in general, is very much a typical privileged British Upper Middle Class "Third Wave Feminist" perspective and choice.
I was an early Facebook user. I had an account from 2007-2018. The early years it seemed fun and Fairly innocent. I kept up with friends and saw funny posts. I could curate my feed to be things I wanted to see. When I left Facebook in 2018 it seems like the app was targeting me. Showing me things to rile me up. First I quit the mobile app. I deleted it and used a browser. Then I left Facebook altogether. A year ago I did a similar thing with Instagram. It was no longer a place curated to my interests. It’s horrible. I barely touch it anymore. Even Reddit is not my usual collection of posts that interests me. It’s why I’m on here! Everything is just so polarizing now. I have been able to cut way back and do my own thing. But at 15 friends are your world. Everyone is using the app. Everyone is speaking the speak. It’s so hard for them to disconnect.
feeling disheartened and unhappy about being a girl. When nearly every comments section on a video of a girl my age is filled with disgusting and objectifying comments about her body from boys, it causes me to feel deeply uncomfortable in my own body, and compare myself to her
this hits home for me. I have a near 14 year old daughter and this is the struggle I see with her constantly.
It's not that she's particularly non-binary/trans/androgynous, it's that she's ashamed/embarrassed to be a girl or be perceived as one. She still likes many traditional feminine things, (ie hair/nails/makeup, romance novels, cutesy characters, etc), and she has no real desire for any kind of masculine interests...
It's as though being a woman is inferior. It's "girly". And that's what is being internalized. And part of that, I think, is also the culture's post-ironic loathing for authenticity. Ala, being passionate or earnestly enjoying something is seen as being "cringe". So, being a girl, who likes girly things, is cringe.
I think both of these things ratchet the internalized misogyny. With the former being what turns the ratchet.
I just don't believe all of this is real anymore. It's a fucking psyop! Men and women have different kinds of comments under posts. If a woman looks at the comments of Reel where a woman promotes the most depraved, objectifying a degrading things to do to guys with the sole purpose of making them suffer, they will only see comments of other women (rightfully) blasting OP in the comments. But when a guy opens the same comment section he will 99% see only comments of women encouraging other women to be the most evil things humanly possible.
It is not a conspiracy, it's a really effective way to farm engagement for basically free. We are letting them take control over society with the most obvious divide-et-impera tactics ever applied in human history
Have you ever considered not spending time on social media? Especially the types where randos can send you stuff? Ive tried to limit my kids on this as much as possible. They obviously would prefer I don't but I feel like it's the right thing to do.
Telling somebody to simply not participate in society is not the solution. Creating a better society is.
But it's easier to just tell women to go away or to stop wearing sexy clothing.
Yes - it is. To a teenager if that's where your friends are then it's part of your world. You're just telling girls to either "suck it up" or "don't participate". Odd it's not the guys who should be removed for being assholes to girls though. It's always "well just don't use that hugely popular app" to the girls being harassed.
Odd it's not the guys who should be removed for being assholes to girls though.
Can you quote where I made this claim, please?
Kind of yes.
The fact that almost all tech CEOs don't even give their kids smartphones or tablets should tell you everything you need to know.
Can't you limit your posts to just people that you know somehow?
Opening everything up to the whole world is bound to attract the worst. And, apparently, you have to read all the replies
I don't think telling women and girls to stay off social media is going to fix the issue. She also talks about this kind of language and views being parroted in real life. You can tell your kids to stay off social media but that doesn't mean they're going to be immune from this if other people don't do the same. The bigger problem is boys are being radicalised online, and no one is coming down on social media platforms that profit off of this happening.
"If you can't change the world, then change yourself". I agree the boys/men who harrass women online are the problem. If you have a fix I'm happy to try helping. But in the absence of one there is only one other alternative
But the alternative mentioned doesn't exactly work. Even if your intention is to save your own children they will still be exposed, whether you k Like it or not.
There are a lot of different things people can do, locally or otherwise:
- Demand accountability from platforms by way of pressure on your representatives. And no I don't mean age verification, I mean using some of their profits to better moderate content online.
- Support politicians who push for responsible social media.
- Get involved in your school's PTA or equivalent, and raise the issue, form a group with parents and teachers to learn about the issue and work on ways to tackle it.
- Reach out to organisations that are fighting against this problem and ask how you can support/get more involved.
- If appropriate, empower your kids, especially boys, to speak up and stand up for those who can't stand up for themselves. Teach your kids what behaviours are not ok and if they see those behaviours to act (whether that means speaking up or reaching out to adults to intervene).
- Stop giving money to irresponsible organisations who perpetuate the problem and instead start supporting companies that use ethical practices (though I acknowledge that's usually not simple nor cheap).
- If you're a man, support and/or get involved men's groups that are working to address the problem, especially through outreach programmes to young and vulnerable boys and men. If there isn't one, look to start one in your community.
Those are just some I could think of off the top of my head. Change doesn't happen overnight, it takes action from multiple people. But throwing our arms up and putting the responsibility on the victims alone (which doesn't even work) is not it.
I specifically limit my kid's socials to get friend groups, etc. I can't prevent everything, but I don't need that constant drone beating them down daily.
Same where possible. But then they make new accounts, etc..
I can only redirect misbehavior at this point. We have had lots of discussion in the past on how this affects them mentally and emotionally.
Imagine if TikTok automatically tagged all content with #misogyny, #racism, #sexism and so on. And then published monthly reports on society trends. Like "In Feb 2026 racism went down 12%, misogyny went up 5%". I think it would be incredibly insightful and helpful.
While article tries to promote social media ban for under 16s, I strongly believe its just a way to sweep the problem under the rug. I think much more reasonable approach is to recognize those trends and deal with them through education and better parenting.
It baffles me to whine about the disgusting shit on short form video pop app for kids and then say this is what I use for Social media. How about not doing that? did you try to not do that? perhaps your problem is the doing of that and the Solution is to not do that?
If anyone uses the word "female" to refer to women/girls, they instantly disqualify themselves from any right to be taken serious. Those people need a psychotherapist.
Obviously this is true and it sucks, but I don't really view it as a man vs woman issue. I think it's a social media issue where these companies purposefully push outrage content to drive up engagement. It's an unethical practice with little to no legislation protecting users exposed to it.
Many of these platforms don't even have a way to opt out, forcing users to view it via "suggestions" in their main feed.
Abhorrent to hear such a young person having to deal with this. It gets easier as you grow older, but it never stops being a vile state of things. Nobody should have to grow 'thick skin' to just participate, as wonderful aspects of their personality can die with it.
The gut reaction is to point to the easy and straightforward option, to just leave. But in the end this doesn't solve anything. This is exactly how many safe spaces die, on top of it blaming victims. Once abusers are let in and tolerated, the victims will start leaving if they can. And eventually, the space is no longer that of the victims, but that of the abusers. This happens with nazis at a bar, smokers at restaurants, assholes on the road, unruly people in the train. It leads to a society where everyone nice just sits at home because that's ultimately the last safe place left.
The hard truth is that the group that doesn't take a stand and accepts in the abusers, is the only place we can look at for a solution. But there's no easy way to get to them often. If they let it get this far, it's essentially pointless. (The big social media platforms for sure). I think the only real alternative is to build alternative safe places. Reach out to friends and other victims. Let them know there is another place where they can actually feel safe. But it will be hard and grueling. At first it might seem like you are alone, that nobody shares your grievances. But it takes time. Years even. You might get assholes trying to get in anyways, that have to be harshly rejected to keep the spirit alive. You might get sabotaged from outside. It's tough - but as far as solutions go, it's a real one.
I consider Lemmy one of these places. And I think it's very important for anyone to realize they're in a community built on those grounds. It must always be protected with full force. From the smallest friend group, to the biggest of governments. Even when that's hard to do.
If you’re anything like my parents, you probably wouldn’t even understand most of the content that floods my social media
Aren't her parents like 35 or 40? She thinks people who are 40 don't understand social media? LMAO
This community should be renamed to anything goes community.
Moderation team never actually moderate.
This is an opinion peace. Why is it posted here?
This isn't social media, it's social acid, dissolving and corroding everything.
Getting glad I never tried out Instagram. I can see where these 'ban social media' people are coming from if these are the platforms they're looking at, I've never seen anything nearly as bad on the platforms I use (and a most of the bad stuff I see is heavily downvoted and argued against anyways). I guess if I went to r/conservative or started watching Asmongold videos on Youtube or something I would probably see some pretty terrible stuff, but Reddit and Youtube both keep me pretty separated from their bad sides.
- Article violates Rule #1 §1. Why is it still here?
- This article looks like it's has a sublimal message to justify ID uploading (just read the last paragraph).
As a father of two girls this makes me sad. However, I am a little bid sad to see so many, treading social media as this is the real life view to a lot of young people. Of cause there is plenty of people that gets sucked in, and their view of the world becomes whatever algorithm they follow online. But to most people this is just "shock effect content" not something they would ever follow. I certainly hope, that in your school, most people actually have a since of human left, and are still nice to eachother. As nice as teenagers can be ofc. That the people who actually has this kind of view of other people (especially girls) are the ones who get left out. What I am trying to say is, that I hope young people today leaves all the shit online, ONLINE, and gathers around the good friends IRL. Those are what matters most. Turn off social media ffs. It is meant to fucking poisen your brains. I did. And it feels phenominal. What real value does the swiping really give you, if all it does, is showing how bad you should feel, by being born a Woman? What do you and your friends use social media for today?
When I was teenager, we used social media to socialize online back in the day. Stayed in contact after school hours. Thats all it did for us. Today, I feel like it's sole purpose has become intertainment/pure distraction rather than connectivity to real human beings. It's all about scrolling and leaving bred crums to the big tech, that can be used to fill your "feed" with even more crap to keep your distracted every waking hour. It is the dog chasing it's tail, and what you see won't stop there.please tell me if I am wrong. But this is how I've seen social media develope over the past 2 decades of my life. It went from being the cool place, like a social place to interact with the people you like/love to a swipehell with no valuable interactions what so ever.
Misogyny sells, apparently. Sex also sells. That is precisely why we allow everyone on the Internet and social media to post pornography. Oh, wait: we don't. If there is as much as half a nipple on display, takedowns start buzzing about, bans come down faster than lightning bolts, and you are out of an account faster than you can say Freedom of Spee...
If you can appease Moms for Jesus, you can create an environment where misogyny is not allowed. In general, we allow these algorithms to do all sorts of evil in the name of engagement, and maybe it's time to put a stop to it. Maybe, for a change, we make the corporations liable for all consequences of their algorithmic posting. They'd pay more attention to what they push.
boys are never refered to as males?
that's your takeaway from this?
The term "female" has been used to subtly degrade women in misogynistic circles and conversations for a long time. I'm struggling to believe this is a new concept for most people, but in case you're being sincere, you can read more about this here..
It's not that it's a new concept. It's that boys definitely are referred to as "males". In years past it was probably more common than hearing "females", though recent trends (incels) have likely changed that. It's a nitpick that stuck out to me also, but it's a small point from a more important larger point being made by a 15 year old. Maybe someone should have caught that in editing, but it shouldn't be a big deal. And we can afford to give the kid that much leeway.
The study you linked doesn't include the text of the study?
Sure, that's off.
She's 15. Take the value out of the article.
maybe. the fact the first sentence has to be translated is just part of it and im definately one who needs the translation. when I see odd things I get skeptical about the whole thing.
I have been online since the 90s in mostly gaming spaces. Misogyny and racism feels like the default state.
Spaces that are able to rise out of that are exceptional.
god i fucking hate gamers so much its unreal (i am a lowercase-g gamer)
I am really sorry that you have to live through this. I (middle-aged, white, cishet, more or less wealthy male) know that I'm super priviledged - yet reading posts like that show me that I will never be able to fully feel what you girls/women have to live through. I promise that I will fight against misogyny whereever I can.
And thank you for your post, there are really phrases that I wouldn't have understood.
The algorithms in these social media services don't care about you actually wanting to watch the video or see the content in general, instead they hyperfixate on if you took 0.02 seconds longer before scrolling to the next one compared to the previous scrolls, to determine what should be shown.
For example, if your interests are exclusively in random gadgets and trinkets for example, but then it shows you a video of an onlyfans promotion, you may accidentally pause in confusion, then scroll, unknowingly triggering the algorithm to keep showing you onlyfans promotions despite you not wanting that.
And it’s the same if it’s offensive or triggering, the algorithm decides to keep showing you such content so it can stun you into staying in the app longer.
This is why I've decided to outsource my social media use to lemmy and geminispace BBS boards, because sure instagram can be enjoyable a lot of the time, but if you use it excessively, it’s damaging.
Also, pro tip: if you don’t use Insta for a month or so, it decides to show you the best content possible to try getting you hooked again, but once you get to a video which isn’t awfully enjoyable, close it and forget about it for another month. Mileage may vary but it works for me somehow, even if I’m likely to be AuDHD
Too easy saying not to use social media, when cutting off the fucking things -- as in a total ban -- completely might as well be more fair for everyone.
Because their billionaire creators can't help themselves but expect PROFIT through engagement and validation.
I was then pulled so late into social media because playing an MMORPG required me to socialize off the game, and this includes having contacts on Facebook, which was then hosting funny little games.
I read the article and found it poignant and interesting.
That said, why am I seeing this on world@lemmy.world ? It is not about anywhere else in the world specifically and it is not even news.
I know that in the rules it says only opinion pieces are potentially removed, but the fact that this "needs" to be published here makes the problem two-fold:
- it creates noise in the community where I would like to see news from anywhere else in the world than the US.
- it means that who posted it here thinks there is no other community where this actually would fit? Looking at the crossposts the other 2 communities (Technology and WomensStuff) seem way more fitting.
Putting everything everywhere doesn't help communities grow. It just generates noise.
Shit is infuriating.
Hi, I'm the guy who's on here waiting for Lemmy to become something more interesting than a Communist Linux forum that, as a guy, isn't that un-misogynistic itself, and that I think skews old. It's been two years and nothing, maybe it's even gotten worse.
I don't know how to solve the problem, but there's a reason the Fediverse isn't appealing to teenagers.
Seriously, even the presence of pornography here feels tertiary to politics and FOSS.
If you think that the fediverse isn't rife with misogyny then you haven't been paying attention.
I think this is some intergenerational religious byproduct. Agree, women/men can fuck about as much as they want and it shouldn't be degrading. Enjoy your body/life. Yolo
Social media is run by rich snobs. Time to organize.
Unpopular opinion: just leave.
You're not going to make social media any less disgusting by staying there. Just leave it to incels and fascists.
I think the worst place I've seen recently was Spanish forocoche. Absolutely brain dead opinions, disgusting comments, depressing levels of stupidity. So I left. I took a look twice, saw how toxic it is and never went back. If you see Instagram is just toxic swamp why still visit it? Look for smaller, less stupid communities.
Just leave Earth?
There's world outside of social media.
Some thoughts:
- Social media encourages a herd mentality.
- Social media can distract you from learning and focusing.
- Social media can feed you disinformation or subject you to bullying.
- This applies doubly for algorithmically steered social media (where information gets pushed at you without your request).
- Algorithmic social media is good at getting engagement (conflict: just another form of engagement).
This is being done to earn someone profit, not to inform people but maybe entertain them a bit - but foremost, because someone buys advertisements on these platforms.
Courses of action:
- deal with the users? (carrot or stick?)
- deal with the companies?
Viability of different courses:
-
Users are diverse and numerous. Dealing with them is a lot of work.
-
The actions of malicious users may be an offense in some place, but not in another, and being rude is not an offense. Dealing with malicious users individually is feasible only in an environment where the general public is interested in peace of mind and orderly discussion. I have seen and still participate in such places. They are mostly non-profit forums wich a few clear administrators. Lemmy is an experiment in a similar direction. An algorithmically steered social media site run by a for-profit company... no, it does not fit this profile.
-
Education of non-malicious users - how to choose a good environment and defend oneself and others in this environment - may be more effective. Users should be informed about what benefits them. They should know that "environment A has effective moderation, while environment B is a troll cave". They should know that "environemnt A sends you information that you asked, while B pelts you with rage bait". Who should educate people about the environments they can choose? Obviously, schools.
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Very large companies have to comply with EU DSA rules. They must show how they have effective moderation, prevent hateful content from propagating, are not harming minors, etc. I would prefer if all large companies were pressed towards effective moderation. It hurts their profit margin, but they must accept this is the price to pay for operating in a civilized society.
-
A particularly blunt instrument, recently touted in several countries, is outright banning of all underage people from social media. This is highly controversial. To the companies it sends a message: "if you cannot create a safe environment, we will take your future customers away, full stop". To others, it causes great inconvenience due to age verification, which is problematic. If age verification is in place, using social media for publishing something pseudonymously or anonymously becomes near impossible. I would not like that to happen.
Pedophiles run the republicans in the US who actively protect people like the owner of these platforms…
This problem has become so big and deep rooted, that we need multiple approaches over a prolonged period to rectify the exposure and impressions kids (below 16, maybe even 18) are subject to.
First and foremost, education in every layer: Adults, teachers and parents need to not only be aware of what the kids are (potentially) exposed to online, but be educational about how to perceive it. Blocking is not effective enough long-term (check out the failure of COSA).
Secondly, it's not the government's responsibility to surveil kids online, it's primarily the parents' responsibility! If you as a parent are unaware of your kid being hateful and a bigot online, you're part of the problem.
Thirdly, if we are to put any responsibility on the government, it is to mandate requirements for adults to become/remain parents. Just like we have a driver's license to protect the public from accidents impacting innocent lives, we should have something that protects society from having unworthy parents raising assholes and potentially also ruining innocents' lives (read suicide).
I'm tired of this, sorry for the rant. We need to step up. I'm painfully aware of what this 15 y/o girl has been exposed to, and I know of so much worse things easily available on the clear web, if not on social media.
Be the safety net your kid needs you to be, dear parents...
mandate requirements for adults to become/remain parents.
What world that look like? Are you saying the state should intervene to prevent some people becoming parents? Because that never goes well.
We already have some measurements in place like the CPS. One can also lose the rights of custody after certain convictions. This is all reactive, however, and in many cases CPS comes under fire for "not doing enough".
This is all speculative on top of my head, and I expect a proper governmental implementation to be much more thought through and extensive than what I write here, but the gist of it I imagine is something like the following:
Before parenthood, one would need to take mandatory courses and a governmental theory test (like the test for driving) in order to be eligible to keep your child when it is born at a hospital. This is not meant to be particularly difficult, but to root out the worst, and to educate a bit through the courses.
All human births are to be registered, and when doing so, one can easily check the parents' records for things like violent behavior, neglect, conspiracies, etc.. This is where I assume most enforcements of this law. (A result of this would be even more children in children's homes, which is another discussion as a direct result of this. (Which the government also has the power to do something about, like creating subsidiaries for foster parents.))
After the child is born, there should be a wellness checkup at something like the age of 1, 3, 5, 10, and 15, to ensure physical and mental health is good. Both the parents and the child have to answer a questionnaire separately, and if there's reason for concern, queue CPS.
CPS is also underfunded in several countries already, from what I've heard around.
This is an example of where a death should never have been necessary to take action:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=JBRHS5vErpg
Because that never goes well.
Could you refer me to some specific cases? I'm curious to learn. I have a feeling it's most likely due to improper implementation, being either too narrow or too fast. This is a potentially big societal change, and needs time - years - for a proper adaptation.
Secondly, it’s not the government’s responsibility to surveil kids online, it’s primarily the parents’ responsibility! If you as a parent are unaware of your kid being hateful and a bigot online, you’re part of the problem.
Is there a good guide to what social apps actually let parents oversee their kids and how? I have some friends with children reaching the age where they'll be allowed onto these sites but are still legally children in their country.
I feel like there are incentives for the social sites to be seen as the private and anti-parent ones, rather than grasses/snitches.
There are plenty of apps that both provide restrictions upon the device as well as insight into how the device is used. But ultimately, IMHO, nothing beats open and transparent communication with your kid. Make sure they feel safe with you, and that they can share anything with you and you'd still be on their side. This way, they won't have any reason to hide things from you, in fear of undesirable consequences. With this, the parent also has to actively engage in these conversations, not expect the kid to bring up everything of possible concern.
There are also parental control built-in with several apps. And on iPhones and Androids there's already one available where you can do things like limit screen time, prevent app installs, and prevent opening selected apps.
When applying any restriction upon a kid, make sure to talk with them about it so they understand why you are doing what you're doing. It is not because you think they can't handle the freedom, but because with the freedom comes a massive responsibility to prevent harm upon both yourself and others. This is often more effective than any tech monitoring and restriction, IMHO.
If you're asking about how to prevent them from accessing certain sites, there are some options, but they are easily circumventable.
Ultimately though, the internet is an unsafe place, where even places considered safe and mundane can turn out harmful. Open communication is key.
Thanks, but that looks like a long way of saying that you don't know any socials that allow effective parental oversight. They know and use many of the things you mention, and have a good open communication with their children, as far as I can l tell, but I suspect you never quite know how a child will react if things go bad.
Yeah, there's no way to be completely sure or safe, for better or worse.
But even if it's not your own child, it takes a village. So if you are able to, as a safe and healthy individual yourself, you should hang out with the kid and talk about this stuff, and also converse with the parent about the child. I think with all this, there's not a particularly big need of technological intervention. Although some simple restrictions don't hurt.
Edit: Actually, I just recalled there being family-friendly DNS! This could be a good and simple measure for adventurous browsing. It doesn't do anything for the content already on social media however.
Not expecting complete, but something a bit more than Meta's new "you should panic now" emails.
Surely a truly family -friendly DNS would blackhole most corporate social media.
mandate requirements for adults to become/remain parents
This is commonly referred to as Eugenics.
Report & Block. Those are options 29yr old guy here When Andrew Tate started blowing up i blocked or reported every single account that was sharing his stuff Its kind of easy. Also maybe dont use Insta. Use only youtube and then update the settings so you are not getting recomended anythging. Only what u r subscribed to Thats what i do. It is called "dont store any of my data type full privacy settings in youtube"
Liberation is the way to go
I think this has always been a problem in many of the online social spaces.
Forums, xbox live, all the way back since the Internet became a common service.
The parents need to be more involved in regulating kids access to internet, socials and otherwise, and they can make choices based on what they see.
Absentee parenting, at least in the digital realm is the problem on both sides of this issue.
Any platform with algorithmically-elevated content needs to be age-gated or regulated into destruction.
Plain and simple.
Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose...
To a first approximation, all boys suck.
nykula@piefed.social you had this growing up?
This is the most persuasive argument for restricting social media to adult use only that I've ever heard. Can't even imagine how damaging this kind of shit is do a developing mind.
Edit: some places have restricted it to age 16, great- but honestly 18+ would be ideal
"girls and women are subjected to vile behaviour in these public spaces"
so? just ban them from those public spaces
Why don't you fuck off instead of telling little girls to???
You had one shot at a reply, and "no u" was the best you had? Sad!!!
Okay, so tell that to the parents. It is their responsibility.
You can't solve this problem by restricting access for teenagers. They find a way to circumvent the restrictions as they always found a way to do the things they want, as harmful as they might be. Also toxic behaviour on social media is not a teenager issue but a men issue and should be treated as such.
Paywalled :(
they want you to donate but they don't require it to view articles.
For me it's either pay with data or with money, no way to disable it (except of course with a little effort)
I always hear the "it's ok for boys to have sex" part and I guess I'm a pod person but me and my entire circle of friends would say neither sex should be promiscuous. So we'd say both the men and women in question are whores. Also, it's a proven fact that a small percentage of men get the majority of attention from women on dating apps. So I'd wager the average male's body count is lower than the average woman's.
And no I'm not saying the online vitriole is ok, good, or warranted. I'm specifically talking about the idea of celebrating high body counts of men. I'm just saying no one I know thinks a man having a high body count is a good thing. But that line is always said so confidently.
I went into a bar and there were people drinking alcohol. I went to Lemmy forums and had a nice time. No one told the author that the environment influences the behavior? Has someone convinced the author these platforms aren't predatory in LITERALLY every single way? Culture fail. Corporate win.
I don't understand. Is she posting with her real name and photo? If so, her parents should be in jail. That's mindless. There are billions of people online and millions of them are going to be unhinged assholes and lunatics. WTF!
I'm just gonna sit back and eat my popcorn.
Consider the use of the word “female” in these posts. It is not a neutral term here, it is a term of abuse. It’s used by teenage boys to degrade us and equate us to animals. Boys are never described as “males”, but girls are always “females” – the equivalent of sows or calves, creatures that are less than human.
Erm... Alpha male? Beta male? Sigma male? Lean six ligma male?
Wait, are you the 15 YO or is it someone else? I just woke up, maybe my brain isn't focused yet.
This is an article written by an anonymous 15 yr old girl.
Yeah I eventually got it. Anyway, that is one example of many terrible things brought on by misoginy that is preached by tapeworms like Tate. They're afraid to lose their delusional manly power in the world. Fucking pathetic.
No, this is a propaganda article designed to push the narrative that the internet requires identity verification in order to "protect the children" and was written by an adult. Don't be stupid.
While i agree the internet (i.e. most of the web and commercial social media) has gone to shit lately on account of surveillance capitalism and algorithmic monetization, i do still think kids these days would need life-long therapy if they grew up in 90s internet.
And i don't think it was better then.
Is it just me, or does it feel out of place that the author described herself as "a 15-year-old schoolgirl"? I don't think I've ever even heard that term outside of porn, and you wouldn't describe her counterparts as a "schoolboy".
Did you hallucinate the word "school" or what? Both the article and post title just say "girl."
4th paragraph:
I’m a 15-year-old schoolgirl and like most teenagers I spend a fair portion of my spare time on social media, often scrolling through short-form videos on apps such as Instagram or TikTok
She wanted to communicate her gender and her student status concisely, avoiding the word "female." What word or phrase would be better, taking all those considerations into account?
Boys avoid saying "schoolboy" because there is a weakness/insignificance connotation baked into the term, which would run counter to the machismo/boldness boys are encouraged to strive for.
Someone else suggested that it's a common regional term, and (apparently) not my region. I'll give her the benefit of the doubt that it's common and nonsexual in her area. However, around here I would've avoided terms and phrases associated with porn/fetish.
As for how it could've been written, she had already very clearly established her gender, so she could've just said student. But that can also be reasonably inferred from her age, and isn't really relevant to the rest of the point she was making. The entire clause could've been dropped. Start the sentence with "Like most teenagers".
I presume her goal was to highlight her age and lack of obligations. That would make sense given the following details of her and her peers spending so much time on these apps. The more natural flow (again, my local dialect) would be "15-year-old high-school student", or possibly "15-year-old girl in high school". But these are still unnecessary.
A 15-year-old is not going to anticipate readers thinking about porn/kink associations with terms that also have innocuous meanings.
I think it's not that unusual in Australian English and how are you so expert on what terms are in porn?
It's all random bullshit. Reality is just monkeys on typewriters. You can safely ignore it. Don't let it ruin your day.
Guys have always talked dirty about girls, between guys. It's nothing new. The difference now is that they do it online, in front of them and it's double wrong.
"I want to go out of my way to communicate with literally any random stranger from anywhere on the planet, sorted in a way that shows me the most controversial, sexual, and enraging content first, but also these random strangers should have to behave and talk the way I want that makes me feel comfortable"
??????
Like yeah, it would be great if everyone held hands and sang kumbaya and were nice to each other. But you're choosing to go to the public internet forum that is designed to maximize and amplify the shittiest opinions. Perhaps, stop making that choice?
I know this girl is just a child so this is really a parenting failure. Stop allowing your kids to communicate with literally any and every random stranger across the globe.
Of course, this article only exists as propaganda to push a narrative that the internet requires identity verification so that we can "protect kids" by not actually doing any parenting and instead monitor and track all other individuals on the internet.
Lol you get downv0t but you basically hit it on the dot here
These platforms are built on letting everyone interact with everyone because it drives usage and makes them so much fucking munn-ayh
Government can never ever justify the funds necessary to pay people to oversee all these conversations (and then what?)
The only solution is to choose for platforms that forego max profit
This isnwhere age verification and restrictions on social media for teens under 16 makes perfect sense to prevent this kind of thing.
I would argue that it isn’t necessarily social media, it’s the internalization of the male defined culture.
This topic is male centric.
The truth is that those boys(and most men) are insecure. I’m a 46 year old man I’ll tell you without a doubt that this stems completely from insecurity.
But so what? Women control the only thing that men want. I promise that women actually have all the power so long as violence and rape isn’t normalized. If women stopped engaging those boys would be on their knees.
All that matters to me, all that matters to the vast majority of men, is sex. Everything we do is a complication of getting sex and controlling women. I have a good job and a nice car and I cook and I work out and blah blah blah to display value to get women.
That’s all we are for, is to add some randomization to the gene pool.
Not trying to victim blame, but this is on you if you use Zuckerberg's (or Musk's) cancerous social media platform(s). Get the fuck off Instagram/Xwitter or suffer the consequences.
If this is happening on proper social media platforms, then I agree.
Just close the laptop little sis.
the internet is not a daycare for children.
if you don't have the skin to be online, don't be online.
it's like walking into a biker bar and complaining about the loud music, smoke and lack of healthy food.