Social Media: Where do we go from here?

I've been asking myself this question for a few days now, ever since the harrowing news of Caroline Flack's suicide. There's no point in me going into the depths of this bit because I just don't know what happened (more on this later), but it has awakened a sense of duty in me and makes me absolutely sure that we simply cannot keep going the way we're going.

Social Media is great. Most of us love it, use it in numerous aspects of our lives, and choose to document different parts of our everyday goings-on, whether that's through imagery or 160 characters of random thought/opinion. I'm an avid Twitter user, a mediocre "grammer" and tend to shun Facebook (other than asking for recommendations of plumbers!), but overall, I'm a big fan of social media.

What I'm not a big fan of, is unsolicited opinion. Social media has birthed the notion that whatever we think, no matter how it might affect the recipient, simply MUST be communicated to that person, even if it'll make them feel a bit, well, shitty. That could be in the context of slagging off their outfit or downplaying their professional accomplishments because you don't agree with their management style, or whatever. It's uninvited, completely subjective and frankly, none of your business.

Caroline Flack was vilified for well over 10 years by the press, but what's different today, is the level of vitriol she received from everyday members of the public to the extent that her most recent content had comments disabled. I can only speculate, but her DMs must have been a war zone. And why? Because she shared her life with followers - many of them completely faceless - welcomed them into her everyday life, then had to take the brunt of their hate as "part of the job" (you can read her statement, recently released by her family after her death, for more context around this).

As a professional communicator, social media is an unavoidable aspect of my job and luckily, since I'm predominantly working in the B2B space, I don't see the levels of utter acrimony from the general public. I'm very fortunate in that respect.

But here's the thing. Say I tweet about Brexit, for example, do I deserve to have replies telling me I "need a good seeing to" or that I need to "shut my fucking mouth before someone shuts it for me"? No. I absolutely do not. Both of those things (and more) were sent to me in response to a totally rational comment about Brexit recently and frankly? It's just not acceptable. I'm not having any more of it and neither should you.

The key issue, as far as I can see it, is that any person can start a social media profile. There's very little policing in place (and this is a good thing, of course) and therefore, the trolls and haters that can literally drive people to take their own lives (my late friend, Sophie Gradon, a crucial case in point here, too) can just get away scot-free and set up a new profile the next hour.

Where is does the accountability and duty of care lie? How can we allow faceless keyboard warriors to hurl abuse at others to the extent violence is incited, in some cases? What can we do as a society to combat this? When the hell did it become acceptable to spout whatever thought you have to the recipient without any thought for the consequence? I have many, many more questions.

There are several ethical conundrums about 'requiring I.D. to set up a social media account' (one suggestion I've seen) and - as far as social media companies are no doubt concerned, it's a big job that would get in the way of the whole making money thing. It just wouldn't happen. So, what next?

Ultimately, it falls to us as good humans to just... keep a lid on it.

I saw so many positive posts about being kinder to others in the wake of Caroline Flack's death, but then even last night, there were hundreds of awful comments about who, what and 'wear' at the Brits. These rules don't just apply to interactions with celebrities, they're about how we communicate with every single person we interact with online and I'm sorry, but we've all got to take more responsibility for how we react and the things we say.

Nobody deserves to be bullied, period, and somewhere along the road in our very fast-moving media, "real-life" and "online" became siloed. They're one and the same and you can only expect to spend more of your life online as time goes on, so we'd all do well to remember that it's not some mythical land where your words and actions don't have repercussions.

So to finish, a few tips to help all of us be a little more conscientious online:

1. Got an opinion on something a celeb/regular person is saying or doing online? Ok cool, but is that opinion going to potentially ruin their day? Destroy their self-esteem? Hurt them? Keep it to yourself. Ring a pal and rant about it if you must, but I promise, within half an hour you'll have forgotten about it and saved the recipient from reading something hurtful.
2. As I mentioned at the beginning, facts are important. Do you actually KNOW about the thing you're commenting on/trolling someone on, or is it regurgitated info from other social media users or even worse... The Sun? If you're going to pass comment on something and send this to another human, educate yourself about it. Not doing so will not only potentially hurt that person, but you'll look like a bit of an idiot, too.
3. Want to set up a faceless avatar account so you can troll people whom you don't know, will never meet and will probably be blocked by straight away? Just don't. Step away from the keyboard and channel that energy into going to see a mental health professional who can provide the help you so obviously need.
4. Want to provide unsolicited "constructive" advice? Ask yourself who it's actually constructive to. Them, or your ego.

I'm well aware that the issues around how we access social media are complex and innumerate, but seriously, we need to start being more accountable for what we say and how we say it online. What else can we do?

And as a general rule of thumb, as my Nana would say: "If you've got nowt nice to say, don't say owt at all".

Would love to hear your thoughts and opinions on this, dear network. #BeKind

Lauren