Violence on social media TOWARDS THE END OF THE BASHING AGE?
Two years of pandemic with lockdown episodes in most countries form an unusual context in which to observe social communication practices. Have ??physical distancing?? and ??remoteness?? impacted such practices as observed in the previous period? What does the period tell us of the risks which opinion movements represent for social life and the reputation of corporations? Have lessons been learnt since the end of the pandemic period? Are we back to "normal"?
In 2023, an international academic institution asked me to look into the issue. Here are some data gathered from public sources to feed reflections, and a recent add on regulation prospects.
Violence on social media: a permanent issue
?The internet public space, and particularly social media, are known to display more violent expressions than the other forms of social communications. Internet users, including in the corporate world, have learnt the lesson, sometimes at their expense. Some nonetheless continue to expose themselves inconsiderately.[1]
?That internet users have become conscious of the risk is shown, for example, by the increased number of requests for the term ??cyberbullying?? on Google’s search engine[2].
The level of sensitivity to the cyberbullying risk rises steeply after the creation of Facebook in 2004 and Twitter in 2005. It seemed to reach a plateau since 2012, perhaps even with a trend to decline, which may signal the precautions taken by internet users, and particularly social media users, to protect themselves or expose themselves less to the risk.
The period of the pandemic, as commented by the same source, seems to show that: ??Despite this pattern continuing for several years, there was a notable reduction in searches for “cyberbullying” in Fall 2020. This may be due to the large amounts of upheaval in student’s lives as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and switch to online learning, but without further data, it’s difficult to say for certain. All we know is that since this initial dip, search traffic seems to have returned to its usual pattern.??
Another sign of the conscience of the risk to face violence on social networks is to be found in the measures taken by platforms to reduce the presence of violent contents.[3]
Facebook: violence and graphic content actions as of Q4 2022
Published by Statista Research Department, Mar 9, 2023
In the fourth quarter of 2022, Facebook took action on 15.5 million pieces of violent and graphic content, down from 23.2 million in the previous quarter. Facebook allows the sharing of graphic content that raises certain issues and hides this content with a warning. The second quarter of 2022 saw the most amount of violent and graphic pieces of content removed from the platform, totaling over 45.9 million pieces. The statistic represents the amount of content acted on, including violent content covered with a warning.
The reduction in ??physical?? social interactions in 2020 thus may have resulted in a reduction of violence on the internet. Which would confirm the interpretation of the Google search statistics for ??cyberbullying??: it may be that ??social distancing?? would reduce the overall level of aggressivity (except domestic in the case of lockdown episodes). It may also be that, especially during the first year of the pandemic in 2020 and the first lockdown episodes, people were more concerned with their health, perhaps stunned by the occurrence of the pandemic, and thus less available to trigger dogfights on the internet... or having them inside their homes.
The peak of aggressivity noted in 2022Q2 corresponds to a high point in the Congressional investigation of Donald Trump’s role in the 2021 attack against the Capitol in Washington, DC.
An acceleration, but no landslide in the use of internet
The relative slowdown in violence on internet during the pandemic is not a result of a reduction, nor even of a slower growth of the overall social media use.[4]
The preexisting trend in the increase of social media user numbers has accelerated during the lockdown periods (we have circled the periods) which occurred in many countries over 2020 and 2021. But the compensation which this represented for the reduction in physical interactions did not result in an increase in violent contents on social media, much to the contrary, despite the fact that more internet users was combined, during the period, with an increased level of internet use, and particularly more use of social media.
The pace of growth in social media users has returned to its pre-pandemic level by mid-2021.[5]
A sensitive context for corporate reputations and brands
All corporate stakeholders are today to be found in majority numbers in the internet public space. With societies becoming more alert and more reactive to issues involving corporate activities, such as climate change, diversity, inclusiveness, or governance, the exposure also becomes more critical for corporate reputations, and for brands representing products, services, or corporate interests on the jobs or stock markets.
The impact of stakeholder opinions is all the more critical that opinion-sensitive intangible assets, which are brands and goodwill, represent a larger share of companies’ value. Both brands and reputation are today strong pillars in balance sheets, and analysts watch closely how those assets can see their value impaired, more or less permanently, by opinion movements affecting them in the public arena.
The growing influence of extra-financial rating is a result of this relationship between societal values and financial value. It is expected to become even bigger as a decision factor for investors.[6]
Activist groups in any stakeholder category can potentially express themselves with violence in the internet public space against the behavior of any instance seen as detaining power or carrying weight in decision-making processes. This is particularly frequent in matters affecting constituencies in the vast areas of environmental, societal or governance matters. This situation changes the scene for public or private organizations’ executives.
The composition of corporate reputations as perceived in public opinions evolves along similar trends: ??ethical??criteria tend to carry increasingly more weight.[7]
Whilst the qualities and value attached to products and services continue to weigh the most in perceptions, Governance (“Conduct”) has gradually emerged over the last decades as a key criterion, and Citizenship has seen a remarkable emergence alongside Governance. The relative decline of the Performance (i.e. financial) and Innovation (i.e. technical) components results from the increasing share taken by the more ethical and emotional components of reputations.
Such evolutions towards increasing importance of ??irrational?? criteria as opposed to ??rational?? ones are all the more noteworthy that public opinions’ judgments not only carry more impact on corporate performance or on political favor, but that overall, the ??Reputation?? element attracts increased public attention.
A new dimension for ??compliance??
The increased frequency with which companies have faced ??litigation?? risks over the recent decades has led to a strengthening of the compliance function in most companies, with legal specialists staffing them and establishing compliance procedures.
With societal matters becoming more sensitive, the compliance function should include or link up with specialists of public opinion in order to manage the reputation in a way that would reduce the litigation risk or help face the litigation risk when it occurs.
Ethics remains a matter of laws and regulations, but the public arena has its own standards and expectations, that may go beyond or differ from what laws and regulations stipulate. And public opinion judgments are often quicker, blunter and more volatile than court actions and decisions.
With recourse to violence, be it symbolic, rhetorical or moral, having become a ??normal?? component of activist drives in the public sphere, watching compliance to ethical and behavioral components of corporate activities is only wise. It will mostly result in managements avoiding to expose themselves to polemics, the most damaging situation of all opinion risks, and the most widespread on? social media.
Global bashing, cultural biases
There is no locking down societal emotions. Floods always find a crack in barriers. Bashing can be global if networks are, and they are. Hashtags mark the tide, as was obvious over recent years with #MeToo, or #BlackLivesMatter. There is, therefore, a potential for global bashing if a global brand, a famous name, or a world-known personality is targeted even by a less global, or even by a local activist voice claiming respect for a universal human principle. It is a matter of time for the bashing to spread, and time is what social media can abolish.
The main factor controlling the dissemination of a bashing episode is cultural viscosity. Universal principles are lived in local systems. The familiarity of a society with any given principle is a prerequisite for the members of that society to mobilize in its defense or for its promotion.
Fear for one’s health or one’s life is universal, and #Covid19 or its likes very quickly became the most frequently used hashtag worldwide in 2020. The cause of women is culturally determined, and it took ten years, and supportive circumstances, before the 2007 #MeToo initiative started to spread significantly.
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Reputation is personal. Bashing still more so.
A reputation is attached to the existence of a legal personality, be it physical or moral. Reputation is a matter of status, in all senses of the word. Similarly, any bashing initiative will target a person, physical or moral, but in any case legal. The more personal, the more effective the attack will be in the public arena.
The need for an effective bashing campaign to target a person is linked to the effectiveness of personal attacks in the public space, but also to the judicial developments which this allows. Whenever a legal person is publicly attacked, there are chances that the person will want to defend itself, particularly if the attack presents a valid cause for legal action. Competence in litigation communication will be necessary for the attacked person to avoid falling into the trap of the polemic risk which any legal action, in such circumstances, will include.
The personal reputation of management executives is the ultimate target of the public bashing of the organizations which they head. Cases abound of CEOs, political leaders or other prominent public figures whose careers came to an end after a public bashing episode.
The need for managements to protect the particular asset which a CEO represents, as well as they do other key assets of their companies, should be recognized more broadly. Including, if the case happens, in order to themselves take the initiative of severing bonds when there is matter for public outrage in an executive’s behavior. Such cases also abound.
Developing an ??opinion culture?? in managements
Bashing episodes can find their origins in any compartment of managements. They may result from decisions or suspicions in finance, human resources management, technological choices, market strategies, etc.
Managers in charge of each function in any organization should be aware of the fact that, however relevant and efficient their actions in their specialty, there may be one stakeholder category which, for reasons remote from the specialty competence, will publicly express dissent for a moral, ethical or other ??irrational?? reason. A ??good decision?? from a management point of view can be resented as ??violent??, socially, morally, even physically, but stakeholders whom the decision may affect in their lives, their beliefs or their interests.
Managements use research, insights and data to form and document their plans and their decisions. Such research, insight and data must today include the state of public perceptions. Because perceptions are facts.
Limiting violence?
The steps taken by social media platforms to limit violence, as illustrated above with the case of Facebook, are only a beginning. The rising conscience of the excess of violence, as well as of false information disseminated on social media, gradually increases the demand in society for measures to fight such situations. Even if limiting or removing contents could lead to restricting the freedom of information or of expression, as shown by Pew Research Center in the United States[8].
Action is expected, for example by the American public in the context of the late Trump administration, more from tech companies than from government, but from both in growing proportions.
In the context of China, measures can be radical. In late January 2022, a one-month campaign was launched by the Cyberspace Administration of China, following the suicide of a 17-year old boy. The government’s measures are presented as follows?:
??Besides, the law alone cannot curb such violence. The channels these culprits use need to be cut. That's why the CAC's latest move is helpful. They plan to shut down a number of social media accounts that are inciting violence and hatred. Hundreds of millions of users are posting questionable content on social media such as WeChat Moments, Douyin and Kuaishou. All of them too need to be regulated.?
The campaign will last a month, after which those managing social media platforms themselves need to keep an eye on the information on their platforms.?[9]
The sentiment of violence can be described as universal, but the description of an action or a situation as ??violent?? will depend on the history and culture of the society in which the event takes place. And measures to fight or limit violence on social media will be considered as appropriate, or not, according to the diversity of contexts.
Yet, the trends in government regulations, platforms monitoring and the general disapproval of bashing or bullying in societies seem to converge towards applying to the particular form of public space which the internet has become, rules similar to those which societies and their institutions have developed for the more traditional forms of public space.
The question of regulation
A short commentary published by RAND on their website in October, 2023, offers a clear description of the issues and of the options to tackle them:
“Throughout U.S. history, Americans have upheld free speech protections as critical to the defense of democracy. But as an online extremist ecosystem has spread across social media, claims to free speech also have shielded actors that threaten democratic civil society. In just the last two years, social media platforms were used to organize a seditious conspiracy, to advance white supremacist ideas, and to sow disinformation that weakens both civil society and national security.
Given the profound challenges posed by social media, corrective measures need to go beyond “deplatforming” bad apples. But how can the United States make such a structural change without compromising the democratic tradition of free speech?
The leading policy recommendations can be grouped into three categories: regulation by a federal agency, holding platforms liable for their content in civil court, or requiring data transparency and reporting.
None of these would be easy. All would require new legislation that could withstand Supreme Court scrutiny. And yet, without some kind of government intervention, social media companies are unlikely to self-regulate effectively.”[10]
This is an encouragement for institutions, but perhaps still more for citizens, to continue paying attention to the issue, and support to the quest for appropriate answers.
[3] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1013880/facebook-violence-and-graphic-content-removal-quarter/
[10] https://www.rand.org/pubs/commentary/2023/10/protecting-free-speech-compels-some-form-of-social.html
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Navigating the digital terrain demands wisdom and kindness. Aristotle believed we are what we repeatedly do - excellence, then, is a habit. Let's foster environments that uplift. ????