Outrage fatigue and shitty journalism

[squ1d]

An increasing number of news items seem to be generated in the following manner:
- A journalist with an agenda (any agenda) is looking for a story
- An event happens that the journalist is interested in
- The journalist logs onto twitter and searches for tweets about the event that contradict the journalists position on the event
- Preference is given to the most extreme and badly written tweets
- The journalist publishes an outrage story about online trolling, citing said tweets

This is not journalism. It doesn't prove the existence of a trend or further a useful debate. So long as there is anonymity there will be bad behaviour. You can find negative comments about ANYTHING in the sludgy online pool of "free speech" if you look hard enough. With modern tools the technology does the hard looking for you. The fact negative comments exist somewhere proves nothing.

Strangely, I think most of this problem is the corollary to the anonymity issue: the unwashed masses have made the internet a tool of narcissism, giving away identity and personal information with aplomb, inviting interaction to facilitate bathing in glorious likes and comments and positive reinforcement. This is particularly true of celebrities, but then these days, my entire Facebook feed is largely made up of people engaged in overt acts of self promotion and vanity. Everyone wants to be a celebrity.

In this environment, it is trivial for the sad and anonymous to be abusive.

[Thumper]

I find this interesting and believe that I pretty much agree with the post.

[Rommie]

Me too.

I pretty much stopped clicking those years ago, when Hunger Games came out and there were tons of people upset that there were a half dozen tweets complaining that the character Rue was played by a black girl. She's described as such in the book, but they'd misread, but whatevs I've misread character descriptions tons of times only to realize it years later. So even if these people were racially motivated in doing so... so what? So far as I could tell, it was a tiny handful of complainers out of millions of people who likely saw that film. Completely statistically insignificant.

Outrage fatigue is the perfect term for it.

[Swift]

One of many reasons I completely avoid Twitter.

And I completely agree squid. And even when it doesn't go down exactly like that, lots of news organizations, particularly TV news, now report stuff off of Twitter like it is actual information/facts/news. CNN and Headline News love this kind of nonsense. They will be reporting some story and the bulk of the reporting is of the form "John123 tweets 'XYZ is the worst'" but "Mary321 tweets 'XYZ is the best'". Why should I give a rats ass what these two people think. It just adds to the misnomers that facts are determined by consensus and "good" journalism means reporting both "sides" of a story, even when one side is complete and utter bunk.

[Swift]

I'm trying to imagine Walter Cronkite reporting that President John F. Kennedy died in Dallas today, and Bob987 tweets "Good, never did like the guy anyway".

[squ1d]

I pretty much stopped clicking those years ago, when Hunger Games came out and there were tons of people upset that there were a half dozen tweets complaining that the character Rue was played by a black girl. She's described as such in the book, but they'd misread, but whatevs I've misread character descriptions tons of times only to realize it years later. So even if these people were racially motivated in doing so... so what? So far as I could tell, it was a tiny handful of complainers out of millions of people who likely saw that film. Completely statistically insignificant.

A perfect example of this kind of non-story.

[squ1d]

Why should I give a rats ass what these two people think. It just adds to the misnomers that facts are determined by consensus and "good" journalism means reporting both "sides" of a story, even when one side is complete and utter bunk.

I know what you mean. Like having a scientifically dubious (and borderline retarded) climate-change denier with equal air time to a scientist in a story about the environment.

[SciFi Chick]

I agree with everything that's been said. Sometimes, when I'm bored, I find myself clicking on this shit, and then I feel like part of my oxygen has been sucked away forever more. I'm pretty much over Yahoo! They are the worst for this kind of crap. It's like the media has decided the Facebook method is awesome, so they'll just use memes instead of actual journalism. WTF?

[SciFiFisher]

I don't even have a twitter account.

[Sigma_Orionis]

I don't even have a twitter account.

Dude, it's a minor miracle that you have a Facebook account. Thinking about it, the fact that BOTH of us have Facebook accounts is is right up there with the "loaves and fishes" thing

[SciFi Chick]

I don't even have a twitter account.

Dude, it's a minor miracle that you have a Facebook account. Thinking about it, the fact that BOTH of us have Facebook accounts is is right up there with the "loaves and fishes" thing

Yeah - vendic was almost pleased when they started questioning his name status on Facebook.

[Thumper]

I don't even have a twitter account.

Dude, it's a minor miracle that you have a Facebook account. Thinking about it, the fact that BOTH of us have Facebook accounts is is right up there with the "loaves and fishes" thing

I have no idea what either of you are talking about...

[squ1d]

In spite of my rant, there are some friends and family I have on Facebook that make all the horror worth keeping the account. They post about interesting stuff they do from time to time, and occasionally point my attention towards some amusing snippet of news. It gives me a good way to keep up to date with the broad brushstrokes of their lives. This is useful when they're in another country.

[Sigma_Orionis]

I don't even have a twitter account.

Dude, it's a minor miracle that you have a Facebook account. Thinking about it, the fact that BOTH of us have Facebook accounts is is right up there with the "loaves and fishes" thing

I have no idea what either of you are talking about...

Of course you don't

[Rommie]

Similarly, I would never give up my Twitter or FB handles. Too many friends spread around the globe for FB, and made too many friends via Twitter. Sorta like here, I guess.

[SciFiFisher]

I don't even have a twitter account.

Dude, it's a minor miracle that you have a Facebook account. Thinking about it, the fact that BOTH of us have Facebook accounts is is right up there with the "loaves and fishes" thing

I have no idea what either of you are talking about...

[SciFi Chick]

I've learned how to purge the people that drive me nuts without actually unfriending them, so that has helped a lot.

[geonuc]

FB is mainly for food photos and cat videos. And the occasional political rant. I've had a twitter account for some time now but rarely tweet and don't even check it that often.

With respect to the OP, I've taken to challenging some outrageous statements made on FB, but not many. Often, I enjoy reading other people do it. Yosh is particularly good at tossing stupid or ignorant arguments into the trash pile.

[SciFiFisher]

FB is mainly for food photos and cat videos. And the occasional political rant. I've had a twitter account for some time now but rarely tweet and don't even check it that often.

With respect to the OP, I've taken to challenging some outrageous statements made on FB, but not many. Often, I enjoy reading other people do it. Yosh is particularly good at tossing stupid or ignorant arguments into the trash pile.

Indeed!

[vendic]

He's also pretty good at posting them too! lol