UKC

I've started using Twitter to follow cyclists and find it quite interesting that it gives you some kind of access to people who are a bit more interesting than the average person, but even after just a couple of weeks of using it I wonder how people in the public eye using it stay sane. I watched Chris Boardman (a well-respected, decent chap who has just lost his mother in horrific circumstances) get ripped to shreds by some feminazis over some perceived slight to womankind last night, and this morning I saw that Laura Trott's sister had been savaged by some dullards who chose to interpret her sibling joshing of her little sister as jealousy, forcing Laura to spend her time in her post-gold medal winning glow being upset by it and having to defend her sister. It can't be good for your mental health to be so accessible to these loons. My experience is limited to sports people; I imagine if you're a reality TV star with some self-esteem issues and yo-yoing weight it could drive you suicidal.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:

Agreed, moreover it is treated by the media as reflective of public opinion. So the media is full of stories saying the the public was outraged by Emma Trott's comments about her sister , when actually only a few nutjobs were outraged.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Yeah, and half the news stories you read are just reports on Twitter exchanges with screenshots. It normalises what shouldn't be normal.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:
A mate of mine's niece is a pretty successful athlete, she's only young and didn't quite make the Olympic squad but did really well in the commonwealth games. Her Facebook page (as a 16year old kid) was terribly abused as was any social media she had, it was really appalling some of the stuff my mate showed me. There are some nasty bas**rds around who have a place for their bile whilst hiding behind anonymity.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:

It's the same with newspaper comments pages. I keep telling myself to never read them, but I lapse sometimes and get exposed to the vile ravings of morons.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:

I see that Ellen Degeners has been accused of racism, for posting a funny image of her getting a piggy back off Usain Bolt.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cp7nxqRUkAAUzwy.jpg

In reply to Postmanpat:


Totally agree. Reading about any opinion "trending" on Twitter or facebook is usually a good indicator that one can safely disregard that opinion. All this virtual community garbage, let£s change our background snap to Je suis Charlie just distracts from actually doing something in your real environment. Posting something on twitter has done nothing to combat climate change or help reufgees from Aleppo.




edit: And add to that that newspapers regard the opinion of any celebrity as newsworthy. This is the post expert age. Why ask someone who has studied a subject in depth if we can simply check online what some actor or TV presenter thinks about pressing political issues. The medieval attitude was much healthier: Let the travelling actors sleep outside the city gates, their job is to pretend being someone they are not, so they cannot, by definition, be trusted....

In reply to cb294:

Posting something on twitter has done nothing to combat climate change or help reufgees from Aleppo.

Ok, so tell us what YOU have done?

In reply to subtle:

Join a political party, join lobbying groups, discuss with representatives and ministers, help refugees arriving in my town, donate money to various causes, ...

CB

In reply to cb294:


So, you like to talk

help refugees arriving in my town, donate money to various causes, ...

good, at least that is doing something

In reply to Yanis Nayu:

I find Twitter really useful as a news source for stuff like cycling, non-league football, mountain biking conditions etc. But the 140 character limit means it's no place for any sort of debate. I rarely see the nasty stuff because I don't go looking for it, just as I don't tend to look at the comments on news reports because I realised the sort of malicious person that dwells there.

Unfortunately this is the price we pay for the internet generally. The irony is that in your OP you used a term - "feminazi" which is pretty inflammatory and offensive on so many levels.

In reply to cb294:


Which is a totally different topic from trolling on social media.
I guess that's another symptom of social media - illogical argument and tangents.

In reply to Chris the Tall:


I didn't expect to find that sort of stuff following Chris Boardman and Laura Trott.


It rolls off the keyboard rather more easily than "aggressive, bullying, offence-seeking, so-called feminist", not to be confused with people raising actual issues about gender disparity.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:


I really hate that word. I hope it goes the way of mong or retard.

In reply to planetmarshall:

As if they're comparable! Are you for real?!

In reply to Yanis Nayu:


That's a pretty fine distinction you're making, and not one made by the majority of twitter users in my experience.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:


You've just compared people who challenge gender discrimination (accurately or otherwise, it makes no difference) with perpretrators of genocide. Are you for real?

In reply to planetmarshall:


Fair point, although it's used similarly to grammar nazis. Is there a more acceptable term for people who use the feminist cause to bully people, absolutely certain in their own rightness, with no consideration of context, humour, the track record of the person they're attacking or the proportionality of it?

The point I was making more widely was about the effect on famous people of being on Twitter.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:


Alternatively you are saying that someone who objects to everyday sexism is comparable with the perpetrators of genocide. And you are aligning yourself with those who seek to bully women off social media. And they are far more numerous and effective than "aggressive, bullying, offence-seeking, so-called feminists".

Yep, Boardman's comments were innocent and completely misinterpreted, but suppose John Inverdale had said them ?

In reply to Chris the Tall:


No I'm not aligning myself with them whatsoever! You have made a leap of logic to suit your own agenda. I can, and do, quite legitimately have issue with people who bully women off social media as I do with feminists who bully decent people on social media. They're both wrong. And I wasn't saying anything about people objecting to sexism, I was saying something about somebody wilfully interpreting something as sexism and then using it to attack somebody who, in any rounded analysis, was innocent. They are entirely different things and I'm surprised you can't see the difference. And given that I'm sure there are loads of actually sexist issues to go at, you'd think the battles would be chosen more wisely.


That's why I mentioned track record and context in my previous post. Inverdale has clearly shown himself to be a sexist prick (prick in general to be honest) with his Bartoli comments, so in any discussion over anything he says, you would give him far less benefit of the doubt. CB is not JI and he shouldn't be treated as such.

In reply to Chris the Tall:


Clearly not. He's objecting to people who make spurious claims of sexism, for whatever reason, thus undermining efforts to remove genuine prejudice. The Nazi term is clearly being used metaphorically to imply domineering behaviour generally cf grammar nazi

In reply to Yanis Nayu:

You're missing my point. You want the internet to be a nicer, friendly place, but you yourself use a term that is inflammatory and sexist - it's a gender-specific term used in a derogatory manner.

And for more irony - I myself criticised this person on a different forum yesterday - but I used the description "female journo".

In reply to subtle:
The point is trying to convince people who have the power to change something!

CB

edit: also, solving problems by talking is the accepted way of our society, even though there are many people I would much rather hit with stick.

In reply to off-duty:
No, the issue is mistaking social media trends for the real world.

CB

edit: and confusing getting a topic to "trend" on twitter is the same as addressing the problem.

In reply to cb294:




Trolling and abuse, by whatever means, is a completely different subject to "cause" social media, it's motives and its effects.
Unless you are trying to suggest that abuse in social media is something that shouldn't have any effect, in a similar way that you believe "cause" social media didn't have any effect?

In reply to off-duty:
Not another edit, but here is another thing: You cannot separate the issue of trolling in some medium from the importance that you give that medium. Even though I do not tweet or follow, there is now twitter content which I cannot avoid being exposed to (as repeating someone£s twitter posts has apparently replaced journalistic research). Most of this primary content is irrelevant rubbish and can be ignored, and this is even more true of secondary comments!

CB


edit: just saw your reply. Of course I do not condone hateful posts on any social medium, but in general I find the importance of social media overrated. Quite a few of my friends are teachers, and those that do have a look in social media platforms will over time see lots of negative comments by their students, sometimes actually illegal. I prefer the approach of the others who do not look, do not have a own social media presence, and rather concentrate on real life.

In reply to cb294:



I'd emphasise "another thing" in that paragraph.

Although you might be happy not to use, or give any importance to, various forms of social media, this is the 21st century. Social media exists and is a normal part of life to most people growing up in industrialised societies.

To suggest abuse doesn't mmatter because the medium is unimportant is pretty close to saying - don't use a telephone if you get nuisance calls, or just go out of your back door if you get abuse going out of your front door.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:


No, it's absolutely nothing like the term 'grammar nazi'.


Who are these people? I have never seen any evidence that 'feminazis' actually exist. It's a term used by obnoxious, sexist men's rights groups who like to bully and victimise women online.

P.S. On the whole, Twitter is a far more positive and useful online community than UKC.

In reply to cb294:

It depends how you use social media. Something like 75% of work leads for my business come directly through Twitter and Facebook. My working life would be *dramatically* different (and more difficult) without social media.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:


The point is that you *have* aligned yourself with these groups by using the word 'feminazi', which is almost exclusively used by those groups in a derogatory manner. In a medium dominated by words, words are important.

In reply to Only a hill:


Yes, so please use them sparingly.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:

I also got that shudder from reading the word "feminazis" in your otherwise sensible post. Perhaps you aren't aware of the origins of the word - I remember it as being the loathsome Limbaugh's coinage although wikipedia says he credits a friend. I don't know what Boardman said or what the reaction to it was, perhaps some people misunderstood or over reacted, they might be trying to score cheap political points by misunderstanding him deliberately, but even with that I suspect they don't really deserve being called that - a word normally used by the type of angry man who really does seem to hate women.

In reply to Only a hill:


Really? Interesting... I used to use Twitter a lot, and started for work reasons so I can see your point - but I always felt there were quite different circles that didn't overlap much, so I had 'climbing twitter', 'backpacking/general outdoors twitter' (often surprisingly little overlap), then stuff to do with work - EU analysts, counter-terrorism analysts etc. But because I was researching populist/far-right/anti muslim movements I saw a lot more dark stuff as well which perhaps soured it. Not that horrible stuff isn't on facebook too, but if your FB friends are all pretty normal people you tend to not come across the hate so much! UKC remains on the most part to feel like four geeky engineering students in pub arguing animatedly over something that no one else really cares about.

In reply to TobyA:

>
What about angry woman who really do seem to hate men? Is it wrong to be rude about them just because they are women?

In reply to TobyA:

Maybe I just haven't come across the bad stuff yet, but I spend a lot more time on Twitter than Facebook (and was put off by the relentless negativity on here years ago, which is why I only visit a few times a month these days). I agree that there's little overlap between different groups on Twitter, but I've found it an almost entirely positive place.

In reply to Only a hill:
Don't go looking for the "alt-right" types then as they now seem to call themselves!

In reply to Postmanpat:


I'm sure there are some but I've never come across them. I have a number of friends who are, I would say, on the very serious academic-theorist side of the feminist movement. Their writing can - like most influenced by French post-structuralism - be VERY heavy going but it's not about hating men even if they have no time for some men whining about losing some aspects of their male-privilege.

In reply to Only a hill:

Yes, I see the point of social media as business tools, but then you are using a social media community to establish real life contacts (I assume....)

CB

In reply to TobyA:
>
You mean actually met them or have read their stuff?

I've never met Julie Bindel, thank God, but judging by the crap she writes, she hates men.

In reply to cb294:

Not necessarily. I work with many people I've never physically met in real life. In some cases these professional relationships go back years, yet I've never met them and have no immediate plans to do so. Are these 'real-life contacts'? Not sure where you draw the line, but I don't think there's any valid distinction between online and offline contacts these days.

In reply to Postmanpat:

French post structuralist philosophers? I recommend "Intellectual Impostures" by Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont. No further comment required!

CB

In reply to Only a hill:

Possibly you don´t meet your customers, but you will draw up contracts and be paid in real money.

CB

In reply to cb294:



Sounds like a bundle of laughs.

In reply to cb294:

Yes, but that's my point – I virtually never meet colleagues either, such as the other editors I work with. Contracts are electronic and I usually get paid on Paypal. It's all virtual and I think it's pointless to split hairs in terms of what is 'real' and what isn't.

My opinion is that we're way beyond the point of claiming that stuff happening on the web somehow isn't 'real'. It's all part of real life.

In reply to Only a hill:


Rubbish. I've made myself perfectly clear.

Do you defend people who act as I've described btw?

In reply to Only a hill:
You sure?

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=feminazi

In reply to Postmanpat:

It is, just read the wikipedia page on "Fashionable nonsense", which was the US title of the book.

Just as an appetizer,

"... For example, Luce Irigaray is criticised for asserting that E=mc2 is a "sexed equation" because "it privileges the speed of light over other speeds that are vitally necessary to us"; and for asserting that fluid mechanics is unfairly neglected because it deals with "feminine" fluids in contrast to "masculine" rigid mechanics.[8]...."

Sokal of course was also famous/notorious (pick your standpoint) for the hoax article he got published in a postmodernist philosophical journal that was just a pile of BS.

CB

In reply to TobyA:


I thought my use of it was quite appropriate in the context, but if, as you suggest (and I don't know if you're right or not) it's a term used generally by misogynists to describe decent feminists, then I'll avoid it's use again.

It's quite illuminating though that people have pounced on my use of that word, without actually engaging in the overall point I was making.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:

I'd say this whole thread has been a pretty good example of the point you were making...

In reply to Yanis Nayu:


Can I suggest you employ "barking mad misandrists" in its place?

In reply to Yanis Nayu:


You seem not to have noticed that I was agreeing with your overall point - that too many people use the internet to be vile and nasty. But you undermined yourself by using inflammatory and offensive language. And whether it's racist, sexist, homophobic or whatever, if we don't want these forums to descend into cesspits like the daily mail comments, then you can expect to be picked up on it.