Social Media Hurts

The City of New Orleans finally has the go-ahead via court order to remove the monuments to the Confederacy at Lee Circle, the P.G.T. Beauregard statue at the roundabout in front of City Park at Wisner and Esplanade, and the Jefferson Davis monument on Canal at Jeff Davis Parkway (wait, maybe we should rename the street, too??).

All three of the statues are to be removed by contractors (to be selected by bid submitted to the city), with the bases and pedestals remaining in some cases, presumably to be replaced with statues that are more in line with anti-Confederate modern, anti-racist and politically-correct practices.

In an older blog, we recommended (as did our readers) the the Confederate heroes be removed and that city erect memorials to famous musicians (remember renaming Lee Circle as Toussaint Circle—I love that one). Wouldn’t we rather memorialize our music rather than our racist past? Who’s going to make that decision on the replacements, anyway?

What’s really interesting about this court ruling (that approved the removal of the statues) is that there are troubling questions how the city will be able to insure the safety of the contractors who will win the bids to remove the statues. According to local newspapers, one contractor who had been selected to remove the monuments had his car torched, and other bidders who had responded to earlier proposals were threatened with boycotts and loss of business, mainly through social media.

Whether or not the threats on businesses via social media come to pass, it’s very troubling that these posts generated enough perceived hatred to prevent the city from using the standard bid processes to get the status removal process done. Businesses are afraid to participate in the bid process for fear of being

It’s scary when social media posts can threaten the very existence of any business who’s operating legitimately, and/or destroy the business’s (or individual’s) reputation. Thus is the power of social media.

Social media isn’t always justified in its ability to stir up support–or animosity–towards an individual or a business. And reinforcing negativity towards some people has often been called internet bullying. It’s again a matter of what’s real and factual versus the opinion of the masses, who many times don’t check facts, and who may use Facebook or Twitter to create or amplify negative perceptions, even if they’re not true. We’ve seen this clearly in what happened in the last Presidential election. In fact, our  current President just tweeted a completely unproven accusation against the former president on wiretapping which is unsubstantiated. But I would venture to say that anyone who was predisposed to support President Trump jumped on this tweet (despite the facts or lack thereof) and took it to be truth, then blew it up to create a storm of controversy. This is dangerous. It creates a mob mentality. Social media is supposed to connect us, but in effect is actually creating polarization of thought.

While social media can legitimately create mass support for a cause that’s good and true, it can just as easily destroy an innocent person (or at worst, a person or business that’s made an innocent or even thoughtless mistake). It’s sort of like the game of “telephone” that we used to play as kids. The message invariably changes as it gets whispered into the ears of more and more recipients, until the original message is totally distorted, or destroyed; good intentions are misinterpreted or portrayed as malignant, when in fact, something altogether different may be true.

Recently a local business leader’s husband made an innocent comment on her blackface Zulu makeup during Mardi Gras that went viral, hit social media and got totally blown out of context and control. It was embarrassing to the business leader as well as her husband. This is the danger of using Facebook and Twitter for every little comment and photo. Sharing is fine. But maybe in this time of total lack of privacy (self-imposed by social media), we shouldn’t share every damn thing.  In fact, why do we now feel that we must share everything from the moment of childbirth to death on Facebook? There may be some things that shouldn’t be shared with strangers or even friends on social media.

OffBeat recently had a similar issue when we published a poorly-edited review that was deemed by as sexist and hurtful (we have apologized and removed the review online). The Facebook mob mentality brought out much negativity towards OffBeat that had nothing to do with the actual incident that occurred. Oh, the “power” of social media. It gives everyone a voice. The problem is that the voice may escalate without merit into a roar, a scream…and internet terrorism can ensue. It truly degenerates into a mob.

Social media can be supreme in its ability to connect people, and correct social ills, but it’s also used to create a mob that is ready to attack with unwarranted provocation. It’s massively more damaging and hurtful than it needs to be to the person or entity that’s  the subject of the vitriol. If we’re all truly connected by social media, then we need to have a little compassion for each other’s ideas and POVs, be more tolerant of mistakes, and not jump to conclusions about someone’s character or reputation before checking all the facts. Mobs very rarely change the world for the better.

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