Social Media - The New Weapon of Mass Destruction

The biggest difference between man & animal is not sheer intelligence. It is the ability to narrate. The skill of storytelling. It is storytelling that has led to inventions and discoveries, art & poetry, and, yes, war & in many cases, destruction. It is almost as critical to our evolution and survival as food and water. The narrative has brought us out of caves into the 21st century; if we are not careful, it can also march us to the end of humankind. Anthropologists suggest that the discovery of fire did not just herald the ability to cook food, it also started a new cultural movement - sitting around campfires, telling stories. These stories started with instruction and warnings and later evolved into making one another laugh, inspire, love or fear. For centuries storytellers used the stories of men or monsters flying in folklore before someone decided to invent the machine that could make this a reality. Not long ago, a face-to-face call was something we watched on Star Trek and thought of it as science fiction.?

Carmine Gallo, keynote speaker and author of Five Stars: “The Communication Secrets to Get from Good” has this to say about narrative. “Recently, I’ve talked to prominent neuroscientists whose experiments confirm what we’ve known for centuries: The human brain is wired for story. We process our world in the narrative, we talk in narrative and--most importantly for leadership--people recall and retain information more effectively when it’s presented as a story.” No wonder teachings of Christ are laden with parables and stories. So how is narrative a bad thing? Enter Social media.

The continuous rise of Social media is a testament to this theory. Whether it is through pictures or in 280 characters, everyone is yearning to tell a story. Everyone on Social media has an agenda, and everyone has a narrative. Some want to profile themselves and show the world they are better than how the world perceives them in real life, some want to expand their business, and then some want to start a war.?

If you look at the last ten years and the political movements and upheavals during that period, you can trace back the origins of Social media. From the Arab Spring & Twitter revolution in Egypt to Brexit in the UK to Trump in America, Social Media was ingrained in every movement, good or bad. All these movements had one defining characteristic in common - Social media. In one Tweet, a protestor from Egypt summed it up the best “We use Facebook to schedule the protests, Twitter to coordinate, and YouTube to tell the world.” Egypt is one of the best examples to illustrate the power of Social Media influence where the country’s overwhelmingly young population was using it. Over 60% under the age of 30 were users of Social Media. But this was not the age of Cambridge Analytica.

As the power of Social Media influence grew, so did the awareness of its influence and how to use it. Today it has become the weapon of choice for power brokers around the world who realize the effect it has on changing human behavior. Throughout the ages, communication tools have been used to wield power and garner support. From the time when books were used to influence reason and attitudes to when Hitler used films to make millions of Germans follow him around like a Sheppard. Whereas books, film, radio, or TV have a regional effect, Social media influence is global. It took years in the case of books or months in the case of TV to influence or engrain a thought. On Social media, it happens in hours and sometimes in minutes.

The art of persuasion is rampant on Social Media both on the micro and macro levels. Individuals, communities, and companies are doing it now, even countries. Many consider Aristotle the father of persuasion. He laid out a DNA for persuasive arguments to be effective and called them “appeals.” According to him, Ethos, Logos, and Pathos build an effective argument. Ethos is based on character and credibility, Logos is logic, but the most important building block of an argument is Pathos which is emotion.

Research by scientists has revealed that emotion is the fastest path to the brain and if you want your story to spread wide and fast, Pathos is the best tool to apply. The advertising industry learned this and has been applying this effectively for the past many decades. There is a reason why cats and babies are the most highly engaging content on Social Media. Communication has evolved rapidly in the last ten years, and the rise of digital media is the reason. Words like “Whack” and acronyms like LOL have become part of our daily lexicon. But this digital influx has not just changed the way we speak. It has also changed the way we behave. From rallies to revolutions, our dependency on Social Media is not underestimated by anyone.

It all started with the first social media site in 1997 called six degrees which helped people to make friends and upload their profiles. In 1999 the Blogging phenomenon started, which is one of the most powerful tools in influencing human behavior. Within a few years, social media spread like wildfire. Sites like MySpace & Linkedin emerged, Photobucket & Flickr came, and Youtube launched in 2005, which proved to be a game changer. Today 3 platforms lead the way in influencing Human behavior, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube. Facebook leads the pack with 2 billion users. Right behind is Youtube with 1.5 Billion users, and Twitter, with over 350 million users. These combined are almost half the population on earth. Despite having fewer users, Twitter wields far greater influence on humankind than its peers. The accelerated spread of Social Media in the last ten years has proved one thing;

“People are stupid,”

and here is why it is so dangerous to be stupid on Social Media.

Mankind has always been like sheep being herded by a shepherd. The absence of thought leadership has usually resulted in obliterating the community at its worst and chaos at its best. Media took over this thought leadership in the last 100 years. Societies usually depended on mass communication to guide them in decision-making. For example, whether women should vote or not. Should the LGBTQ community have equal rights? Should Muslims trust the USA? and the media was answering a million more questions around the world. The theory of Frame setting and Frame building is being used at its best by people setting the message through the media as they deem fit. In complete Ethos, as told by Aristotle, media had credibility and trust. And there was a good reason for it. It was being regulated by one authority or the other around the world.?

It started with the printing press in the mid-15th century in Western Europe. As communications became mass communication, the church and the state started taking an interest in what was being said and what should be said. In the mid-19th century, the telegraph, telephone, and wireless helped emerge a new media, and Public radio broadcasts started. This and later Television were both heavily regulated. Even today, there are things you can and cannot say on these mediums. Enter Social Media, offering new thought leadership. A media that is self-regulated by a single owner of the platform & a platform on which anyone with a decent following can become a thought leader. In fact, everyone on Social Media is a thought leader or tries to be one, including Kanye West, with over 28 million followers, and Kim Kardashian, with over 60 million. This is more than the population of Australia and Italy combined. And this is where the danger lies.

Hate groups existed worldwide with limited members, usually in hiding, preaching their hate. According to?safehome.org?simply existing on Twitter doesn’t give credence to hate groups’ messages, but amassing followers heightens the visibility of their hateful agendas. : “When we looked at hate groups that had accumulated 5,000 or more followers, we found the Federation for American Immigration Reform (@FAIRImmigration) had the largest number of unique followers on our list. Seventy-two thousand, to be exact. In addition, the Twitter account for the Bill Keller Ministries (@billkeller2014) had more than 65,000 followers, and anti-Muslim groups ACT for America (@ACTforAmerica) and Jihad Watch (@jihadwatchRS) had over 55,000 followers each.” Also, note these groups operate with multiple accounts.

There is a reason why hate crimes have spiked in the last few years, not just because of Trump. Even if you blame Trump for all the hate, guess which tool for him is the most effective tool to spread hatred. And it is not just a lack of regulation that makes Social media a threat to the future of humankind but also its reach. A hate group can now directly influence the government and infiltrate and exasperate other governments and their citizens.??

Nick Miller, the Europe Correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age stirred the hornet’s nest when in August 2017 he wrote an article titled ‘Getting it wrong could start a war’: welcome to the age of digital diplomacy. In this article, he discusses the new world of Twitter Diplomacy and spotlights the official Russian Twitter account that runs with the Twitter handle @RussianEmbassy. He describes the account as

“troll food, a rallying point for groups trying to drive a wedge between the West’s citizens and their governments and institutions, following the Kremlin’s diktat of divide and conquer.”

This account is a far cry from typical diplomacy and quite possibly is the exact opposite of how the Russian government mingles with the world. In January 2017, @RussianEmbassy teased not just the western diplomatic circles but also the world by posting a picture of “Pepe the Frog” (a symbol chosen as the mascot by the alt-right) & this tweet accompanied Pepe “In today’s papers pundits call on [British Prime Minister] Theresa May to disrupt possible Russia-US thaw. No trust in Britain’s best friend and ally?” It was a deliberate move to generate controversy and the magic dust in Social Media called ‘Engagement’. It got around 10,000 retweets.

One of the Russian Twitter Embassy’s authors, Konstantin, describes it “we are not afraid to be aggressive to get heard. If we use an image of Pepe the Frog and that means we get heard – then fine”. He knows controversy is the fuel needed to run a successful Social Media campaign. This tweet would lose half its virality value if not accompanied by Pepe’s picture. The key to any pitch is a call to action and follow-up. Pinned to the embassy’s Twitter page is a link to the “Russian diplomatic online club”, which promises “insights from top diplomats” – but reportedly also recruits its members into Russia’s ubiquitous Twitter bot army, automatically retweeting the ambassador’s messages.

Tom Fletcher is one of the key influencers on Social Media and is widely recognized as the guru of digital diplomacy. He is an Oxford-educated former foreign policy adviser at 10 Downing Street to Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, and David Cameron, and who was also the British ambassador to Lebanon from 2011 to 2015. Nick Miller writes about how Fletcher sees social media as revolutionizing diplomacy just as much as the telephone, the fax, or email did. And diplomacy must adapt or die. According to Fletcher, as Nick writes quite literally – he believes one day we may see the first war triggered by a tweet. Social Media thrives on generating outrage.

In January 2018, a video surfaced of a Harvard professor, Steven Pinker, showing him showering praise on alt-right members. The clip was from a November event at Harvard that showed Mr. Pinker talking about the alt-right in superlatives, “the often highly literate, highly intelligent people who gravitate to the alt-right” and calling them “internet savvy” and “media savvy.” His clip went viral. The right celebrated their endorsement by a Jewish Professor by posting their acknowledgment all across Social Media, generating more outrage by the Left & the cycle continues.

This episode seamlessly demonstrates the tribal alignments where what is being said is overshadowed by who is saying it. It illustrates how Social Media is killing wisdom and cultivating illogical reasoning or, in simpler words, “Stupidity.” The ideology is that you must agree with your tribe, especially your tribal “Thought leader.” That is why every time a thought leader posts a ‘thought,’ we see people fighting like cats and dogs in the comment section. Those who align themselves with the leader will defend him to death no matter what he is propagating or even if they disagree with his thoughts. It has given birth to this new phenomenon that anyone who disagrees with you is either dumb or evil.

The concept of agreeing to disagree has vanished from debates and discussions. However, since this has become the norm, it is also transitioning to other mediums. So you see similar nonsensical debates getting higher ratings on other mediums. According to Big Think, a group of Dartmouth Researchers has studied the problem of the so-called “backfire effect,” which is defined as the effect in which “corrections increase misperceptions among the group in question” It states that when we read a news story that presents both sides of an issue, we simply pick the side we happen to agree with, and it reinforces our viewpoint. But when someone tries to convince us otherwise or presents arguments even if they are correct, we disregard them, and our original belief becomes even stronger. This study by Dartmouth researchers goes a long way to explain what is happening in the country now and how people are debating (read fighting) these days.

Trump has brought the Social Media debate and its influence into the spotlight. His harsh language on Twitter is an asset to his social media skills. People, perceive him as genuine, truthful, and credible because of his tone and manner. His Tweets have been noticed by defense officials in Washington as well. According to one report, Pentagon officials were confident the President was about to declare war on North Korea via Twitter two years ago.

CNN broke ground in communication by reporting news 24 hours a day. They needed a 24 hours news cycle to stay and thrive in business. They set the frame, and the diplomats or government officials had to respond to that news within 24 hours. Today these diplomats and government officials have to respond in real time. News on Social media becomes old news in 24 hours, and a lot happens in 24 hours.

According to Digital Diplomacy Blog,

“The hastening of diplomacy is especially problematic in the context of crises which are by nature high-intensity events in which decision-makers lack information and are forced to choose between imperfect options. Crises are also complicated by conflicting, and even false, information.”

Misinformation or disinformation can lead to dubious decision-making, especially when you are making in real-time. It is terrifying to imagine what would occur if automated Bots flooded Twitter with descriptions of North Korean missile movements and even began reporting on civilian casualties in Guam following a Korean strike.

Even more terrifying is the thought of hackers taking over Trump’s Twitter account and declaring war. So what is the solution? Humankind cannot survive without leadership they can trust. We cannot let the future of humankind rest on Mark Zuckerberg’s shoulders.?

The solution is the tried and tested method of regulations. On October 1st, 2016, the US Government handed over control of the world wide web’s “Phonebook” to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). The ICANN is a nonprofit organization composed of stakeholders from government organizations, members of private companies, and internet users from all over the world, now have direct control over the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, the body that manages the web’s domain name system (DNS). This means that a body currently exists that currently controls the internets’ phonebook. The scope of this body should be expanded, and a rulebook for Social Media should be written before it is too late. With smart thinking, the genie can be put back in the bottle.

Bibliography, citations, references

Nick Miller, the Europe Correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age

Big Think - Debates & Discussions on Social Media

Dartmouth Researchers - The Backfire Effect

Digital Diplomacy Blog - The next war

Tom Fletcher - Digital Diplomacy from the Social Media guru