PAX East 2014: Why Internet Jerks Aren’t Going to Win, And You Can Help

This was a great panel and I definitely agree that simply ignoring trolls and hateful comments is not the right answer; willing ignorance does not help to fix the Internet itself and unless someone completely avoids reading any comments at all (a terrible practice since it also means avoiding positive feedback and constructive criticism) a barrage of hatred will simply wear anyone down no matter how much they try to ignore it.

One of the questions asked at the panel was if simply trying to move away from the more caustic communities (specifically YouTube) was a valid solution and I think looking at YouTube itself provides a perfect example of exactly why ignoring hateful comments only makes the situation worse. YouTube actively encourages its users (both video creators and watchers alike) to simply ignore anything they 'don't like' with various features, such as the ability to remove comments, downvote comments (and hide ones with very low ratings), mark comments as spam (often this is abused), simply delete comments, ban users from posting on a channel, or to even just outright disable comments altogether. This practice of sweeping negativity under the rug only has caused YouTube to become more caustic over time and the comments section on videos tends to either be filled with fighting and vile remarks because such behavior is viewed as 'acceptable' if it is not removed (there is no middle ground) or the comments are meticulously curated so that anything which isn't outright praise is removed or attacked.

Of course, YouTube's community (and any site's community for that matter) does not exist in a bubble and if such terrible behavior is viewed as at least being 'tolerable' or even 'acceptable' there it will inevitably spread to other sites. Ignoring hatred and trolling anywhere on the Internet will inevitably only help such behavior to spread, but on the flip side of things the Internet can become a better place overall if we help to discourage such practices where they exist and to create communities where such behavior is unacceptable to begin with.

Bullies are everywhere...its the fact that the internet is anonymous that lets them behave this way.

In real life they mostly can't get away with it.

@white: Some people being jerks on the internet is obviously not an existential threat to the internet itself, but what’s so bad about trying to find way to make things better? Why just give up?

The two central suggestions for going about reducing the amount of harassment were also named in the video: Speak up about your own experiences and tell others (friends, people you know) that what they are doing is not cool if they engage in jerky behavior.

Also, I’m not sure how helpful anonymity is as a defense. First of all, many people just don’t have that option. For example, if you are an indie game developer you are doing business on the internet. You use Twitter, YouTube, Facebook or Steam to reach out to the public. You can’t really do that anonymously. Being out in the open on the internet is kind of central to being able to do your work and make it possible for people to see your work. It’s very similar for many other people who make or write stuff and publish or sell it on the internet.

However, even if you aren’t doing business on the internet being anonymous really only prevents stalking (and in many cases not even that because we aren’t all perfect at hiding our identities). Stalking is one of the more extreme forms of harassment and it’s always good to try and prevent that from happening, but if you are publicly communicating, anonymous or not, you are always at least open to people writing anything they want to you, including harassment. Sure, you could move from anonymous account to anonymous account but in the process you would lose many of the people you are communicating with perfectly fine and it would at very least be an enormous hassle and not really a realistic suggestion.

Please watch the video where many of these points were already made at length.

Fantastic talks Patrick and Zoe, well done. Patrick's talk was noticeably more fleshed out than the TEDx one. I, for one, definitely took some things away from it after watching. Again, bravo to those two. Public speaking, especially about a topic as volatile as this, is nothing to sneeze at.

Nobody sneeze.

That "you pussys dont even smoke heron" comment is a reference to one of the greatest songs of all time.

Also this panel was great.

We are all jerks.

After watching the video I felt compelled to practice what was preached during the presentation by posting this positive comment about it. As a writer myself I too get wound up about the tiny fraction of negative comments I receive yet rarely acknowledge the positive feedback I get on my work. When I do I actually check myself by muttering 'don't get cocky' and move on. It's a blight on any creator's character that we strive to entertain and enthral others with our works, yet at the same time become demoralised by negative comments that are thrown our way. Keep up the great work Patrick and Zoe, you're an inspiration to us all.

@rockyraccoon37:

I would but I'm watching Spiderman.

@patrickklepek Go die in a fucking fire, dude!

Jokes aside, this was pretty good! Way better than I expected it to be. Well prepared speech there, and it shows. Like normally on the podcast or on Bombing you sometimes try to properly nuance what you're saying while you've already started saying it, ending up saying the same thing 3 or 4 times until you get it right. (I do the same whenever a conversation rises above smalltalk levels). But this was really concise, well put together and a pretty convincing argument.

Zoe blew my mind when she said exactly what I was thinking about not calling someone out but redacting the culprit's name when exposing or retweeting harassment. Although I did not think about describing it as an asshole-oroboros... that's brilliant.

Everybody's gonna be a dick at some point or another, at least I know I've been and probably will again. Being a dick in return isn't gonna help and I think they're both right: the solution lies in counterbalancing the dickery with civil discourse so that, if nothing else, at least the harassment isn't áll there is to be found.

They're not booing, they're cheering "Scoops!" which sounds the same.

@patrickklepek - Amazing job with this. I really do love this message. Made me feel very positive, so I'm leaving some positive feedback. A+++++++++. Would like to feel positive again.

Also, I would really REALLY love it if you were to branch this out into a thesis, or long form paper.

@muh_sojiny: Well, one of you had to show up eventually. I guess I can at least be happy that it took this long.

@patrickklepek: Great panel you guys. I really enjoyed it.

You should probably watch the talk.

This was really great to watch! Great panel by both Patrick and Zoe.

So how would you go about fixing it Patrick?

What is it that you would do if you had the power to stop trolls?

@muh_sojiny: Great first post. Almost real.

Good stuff here. As far as why people are jerks on the internet, i agree with Jeff Gerstmann's theory that young people (or people who feel deprived of an identity) use it as a method of expressing an identity.

With that said, the trolls we deal with today will grow up and change in time but they will be replaced by new trolls and the cycle of life continues as it is a problem that is deeper than internet culture. Our place can only be an effort to provide that empathetic evolution for our generation and maybe even the generation that fallows but i think, until society becomes less complaisant with the ideals we have built, it will always be a problem.

My favorite take away from the panel was Zoe's quote, "'Should' is basically the worst word in the English language." As it is just a word that only shames people into fallowing your shallow ideal which is a problem regardless of what part of the political spectrum you lean towards.

My second favorite is the bit about how sarcasm and irony create static in discussion. Empathetic evolution requires information, information requires communication and when throwing ambiguous miss-information into the discussion i feel it does more damage than good.

@muh_sojiny: Did you just create a new account to complain about Patrick?

Great panel Patrick, good work

I don't know. Publicly affordable internet has been around for over 10 years. We got by 10 years just fine with dicks on the internet. We'll do just fine for another 10.

Know what I learned over the last 10 years using the internet? Have a thick skin. Oh, it also helps if you leverage the anonymity of the internet by avoiding social media and not use your real name in any context.

This is pretty inspiring -- thank you Patrick and Zoe.

I think another huge part of that is the difficulty in gauging the veracity of earnestness or sarcasm over the internet, which has been a problem since day one when it comes to electronic communication.

It's even more difficult today to gauge that in a public internet landscape that is full of snark, sarcasm, and intentional false-positives. But like @patrickklepek and Zoe have made their point - it's worth speaking up with positivity, honesty, and empathy to break the current imbalance in conversation.

Really enjoyed Patrick's segment. Though it's basically a retreading of a lot of his points during his previous tedx talk, Patrick makes for such a surprisingly engaging and charismatic host anyway that I enjoyed listening to it all again. His bit regarding his dad's death and the Patrick appreciation thread in particular is a story that's always nice to hear.

Even though I can sometimes find Patrick to be a little... off-putting, I still can't help but respect his many efforts (and successes) to becoming a better person, and for how much dedication he puts in trying to make at least some sort of difference regarding the internet.

What a wonderful talk @patrickklepek. Passionate and insightful, you nearly had me in tears at some points. Take longer laugh breaks after your jokes, many of them were quite funny, but there wasn't enough time to let them sink in.

@patrickklepek: Hey I'm the guy who asked about calling out 2048 man on twitter and if it was not clear at the time you two absolutely killed it. The "don't ignore trolls" approach was refreshing to hear and you both delivered the message with the right amount of concern, accountability and sensitivity that could really make it work. Great job!

I would really hope you watch the video at some point because talk about this very specific point and why we don't think it holds much water. In short: not "feeding" the trolls does not necessarily make them go away and pretending a problem doesn't exist doesn't get us any closer to coming up with coping mechanisms/solutions. What you advocate for is to hope all of this just magically disappears.

This is not the first time I have heard someone in your situation tackle this subject, but this is the first time I have heard someone get this deep with it. Great work.

I think there's some merit in injecting more positivity so the negativity isn't overwhelming. When I was working as a social worker I was taught the positive sandwich, which is, anytime you want to say something that can be perceived as negative or that the other party can be upset by (and we're talking about giving constructive criticism to colleagues), you put it in the middle of 2 positive things that you say. That way, you start off saying something good about that person so the dialogue starts off on a positive note, then you provide your feedback/criticism, and then finish by saying something good again so you don't leave off on that potentially negative note. So having more positivity all around will naturally bring that ratio up.

The one odd thing I felt about the panel was that there was no banter between Patrick and Zoe and that it was pretty much 2 mutually exclusive but thematically consistent talks.

Good talks Zoe/Trick!

Thanks for uploading this! Really inspiring talk from both of you. :)

@patrickklepek you're alright.

I do not have time to watch the video, but having heard most of the rhetoric related to this topic, I will say this: unless you are willing to accept and promote stricter laws against anonymity and bullying on the internet (real name handles, prosecution of bullying), you are not going to win any battles.

Those who bully do so primarily because they want a reaction, because they wish to validate themselves and their actions by proving that they can elicit a response. Any reaction at all to the bully other than utter dissociation leads to efficacy. Banning, reasoning, attacking--none of that helps. A response, no matter how small, is a response.

I will rigidly argue that ignoring internet bullying is best. Unless someone is making legitimate, or potentially legitimate, physical threats against a person, his actions should be disregarded. It is only when we acknowledge that we become victims. When we ignore, when we go about our lives caring not for trifling attacks, we effectively devictimize ourselves and demonstrate strength. And in such cases, we need not even concern ourselves with purported battles; if one does not engage, then a battle cannot, by definition, take place.

Literally couldn't take my eyes off it. Really great and interesting stuff. Don't know if I can be that good force on the internets though, I'm too cynical about trolls. All I think is "well, they probably live miserable lifes anyways, let's not engage"... it's bad, I know.

Absolutely nothing, say it again.

@industryapologist: Oh, ok, so you would call this sort of thing criticism? [link]

Edit: apparently I can't link this link. Possibly content filters? Paraphrased here, from Patrick's tumblr:

"You're a fucking insufferable [racial slur] and I wish you would die."

What sort of criticism would you call it? I am curious, because it is unfamiliar to me. Constructive criticism doesn't usually have racial epithets, as far as I recall. Would you call it expert criticism? Quality criticism?

@industryapologist: "it's cool your dad is dead" is sure some grade A criticism. I'm pretty sure Ebert said that once

Zoe actually spends a great deal of time in her part outlining exactly what you're looking for. It is well worth watching.

Loved this panel. Really happy to have been there and hope to see more like this next year.

I've heard Patrick talk about this stuff before and I still believe that what he says is totally valid, but I found myself really appreciating Zoe's portion of this panel as well...Great job to the both of them. Awesome talk :D !

Sure some people will always be jerks, and they'll probably do it very loudly. A lot more people will be quietly supportive and helpful though and I totally agree that it would do everyone a lot of good to try and turn the volume up on them.

Thanks for putting this out there Patrick. The internet can really be a strange, wonderful thing and I'm glad you're out there looking to make it better for everyone.

@tr0n: Not boos, 'Scooooops!' :)

Terrific talk guys, really enjoyed it!

Gonna share this with a few folks.

The internet will forever have jerks on it. If your site/community explicitly doesn't allow it, then you'll have a more filtered version. It's not just going to vanish.

I agree with what Patrick is doing, I just don't think the result is going to be there outside of a subset of the video game industry. Also the bullies on the other end can be to blame as well. Bullying is apparent on any community, even the ones against bullying!

Glad to see this up. I think sometimes Patrick is over sensitive but I don't disagree with his points

I did get a chance to attend this talk, and I also got a chance to tell Patrick on a random chance meeting at PAX that I thought it was very good, but I just wanted to reiterate that I really liked it - this was actually my favorite of all the panels I attended this weekend. Patrick and Zoe outlined the problem really well, analyzed it thoughtfully, and offered practical solutions to making the internet a better place. So often panels tend to be "lets just talk about this thing" and end up feeling a little aimless, but this felt really cohesive and well thought out and productive. Awesome job!

Awesome, wanted to see this!