Don’t I know you from somewhere? Online trolls and other fairytales
Recently there has been a discussion if the owner of one of the social media platforms will be changing its logo. The “iconic” image is to be replaced with something new; undoubtedly this will also change in due course for as long as the medium is still relevant. Whilst people feel strong about brand representation that is something peripheral to what social media represent in recent years. Social media for a long time have been accused of harboring the worst of human interaction, tolerating intolerable actions from hate speech to incitement to violence. Is this however a fair representation of social media?
We build/cultivate and imagine in social media. They are the key to our online identity and in some ways will explain our conduct with others. Some link different media together, so that you can check Facebook to get an idea of who they are, can check their LinkedIn on education and work experience, you can read their tweets/retweets, you can follow their conversations on yammer, you can get updates of their lives on Snapchat, check their Instagram to see their photos and for the more active ones TikTok where communication is encapsulated within small video fragments. If you were to combine these social media together you can get a very good idea about a person without ever knowing them in person. Social media have ushered the era of virtual representation and people becoming clearer of how this representation works. Clearly there are those who thrive in these and others who struggle.
The ones who manage to use social media effectively can develop a personal brand and even become “social influencers”. A person that has influence over others to promote goods and services…to do so they have to build a reputation and social media works towards establishing just that. Connecting different parts of social media works to their advantage as their profile works towards their credibility of being a “real” person. The people who make it become the protagonists assuming the role of a hero, a modern-day prince/princess with a back story that is endearing. Whilst they drip feed their story of adversity with personal details of some private aspects of their lives, they also provide their followers with the commodities that they promote. I lost someone important to me, had a terrible experience at school, faced health problems but look at my stylish hat. These are the cargo trousers I left an abusive relationship in, and my cropped t-shirt is a strong statement to being environmentally
sensitive. Obviously, I deliberately exaggerate the statements here and in fairness no one will be (at least I hope) so deliberate in their product placement. What is very clear is that our social media influencers spend a significant amount of time building content and by devoting more time to that they need the necessary financial support. The top influencers have millions of people following them, a reach that
very few people have ever had before. Never before, a young person offering make-up tips, a reality star or a dancer had so many people interested in their lives. The very top of them have more than 500 million followers and we are close to the point that some of them will be reaching over a billion! What started as a personal (cottage) industry of one topic issue, has evolved into an all-consuming enterprise. The more the followers, the greater the demand for additional information. The more information, the more exposed the influencer becomes. Then marketing follows as the reward. The heroes of social media have to find ways to make an income and endorsing products seems to be the main way to do so.
The kingdom of social media doesn’t only contain heroes; there are also villains in the story. The people whose profile is not personal, doesn’t include any private details and who seem to have as their main focus to attack others. The term troll appeared in the early 90s when online identities seemed to be separate from our social ones. It was expected in a new domain that people will assume roles and whilst some went for the hero of the community others took a different turn. The early trolls under the protection of cyber identities hid their frustrations and brought to the community something we have in the real world, bullying. The evolution of social media that requires a different presence and the rules the internet community tried to deal with them meant that some of the original forms of trolling started disappearing, but were never extinguished. In fact, they became an equally useful commodity, almost equal to the influencers. Our heroes play the part of the product promoter; they look good and provide us with goodwill stories; on occasion when the appeal of the hero wanes, and people try to use social media to mobilise on social issues or promote alternative stories that’s when the trolls come in!
Out of their caves they come, trying to shut down conversations, mislead people and even intimidate people into silencing them.
This brings me to the main point of this blog; originally the internet seemed to be a worldwide phenomenon that was all inclusive and slightly anarchical. People found on the internet a companion, an ally, an adversary. It became a foundation for a virtual ecumenical community. Well, that was until big business moved in and brought in their usual tactics. The cyber world became more like our physical world and the cyber identities were quickly replaced by professional ones. At this point the internet is much more regulated and monitored than ever before. Which begs the question; how come there are so many accusations of misinformation, and intimidation now? How come such a regulated medium allows bullying and intimidation to continue? I am astounded even now to see on social media reactions on social medial about stories that do not simply lack social sensitivity they are intentionally inflammatory to coax reactions and offend people. I am still astounded to see the political alliances of the troll army and their reactions to open conversations. Therefore, it is not surprising that several minority groups have accused social media of doing very little to protect them from attacks and the use of pejorative language that has its place in a history of shame. Maybe because social media provides a fairytale with princesses and trolls, they do not have the space for those who do not promote a marketed lifestyle. Life is surprisingly diverse, and marketing is only one side of it. Ignoring some of the bigger social issues, using
trolls to shut down the conversations our global community needs, will not do. In academia the sign of a good debate lies in the ability to bring in evidence and support all claims with accurate and relevant information. Some of our colleagues are trying to take some of their knowledge outside the classroom into social media; I salute them, as we have been trying to engage as much as we can, but I also worry that the actual model that social media is built upon also at fault. Maybe it needs some rethink; there is no question that we are all equal, but we do not all have the same knowledge.
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Reflecting on Research Access
I am currently undertaking a part-time PhD and, as part of my qualitative research project, I need to keep a reflexivity diary, reflecting on my own position in relation to the subjects of my research. My first entry reflects on the process of negotiating access, and I thought it might make an interesting subject for a criminology blog!
As a reflexive qualitative researcher it is important constantly to reflect on my own position in relation to my research and my participants. I am about to start collecting data but only after a very lengthy process of negotiating access (12 months). This process was one in which my own position and history had a significant influence.
For my first project, I am conducting detailed qualitative interviews with serving prisoners. This required approval from the HMPPS National Research Committee (NRC). As a former HMPPS employee, I thought that my inside knowledge would be helpful – indeed at a later stage, in negotiating access to specific prisons, I think it has been. However, at the stage of submitting my application for national approval my prior experience added emotional baggage.
I worked for the Prison Service for nearly 12 years. I really enjoyed working with prisoners and I also enjoyed the camaraderie of working within the tight community of a prison. I worked with some lovely individuals who were dedicated to helping people and who supported me personally in my career. However, the Prison Service is a large, unwieldy organisation and large unwieldy organisations do not always treat individuals well. There were several times in my career when I felt that the organisation had treated me badly: when a recruitment freeze was introduced just after I passed the assessment centre so that I was stuck in limbo without a permanent job; when the in-house MSc was abolished (with no replacement) just before I was due to start it; when I ended up taking on my boss’ responsibilities as well as my own with no promotion or increase in pay; when my request to work part-time after maternity leave was declined; when my post was put on the “surplus list” during a phase of job cuts. It was not all negative – as I say, I enjoyed the work very much, I was proud to be a prison psychologist and there were times when the organisation was good to me (I eventually had a different distance learning MSc funded by the Prison Service, and I was able to take a 12 month career break following my maternity leave) but those negative incidents felt like personal insults when I was working hard. The biggest kick in the teeth came more recently in 2020 when I applied to re-join HMPPS when my tenure on the Parole Board came to an end. I had an unremarkable remote interview and was then turned down. I knew that HMPPS advertised for qualified psychologists every month, so there were plenty of vacancies – that they didn’t want me when I knew I was a good psychologist and had already given them the best years of my career really hurt.
Since then, I have started my PhD and secured a great job with St Andrew’s Healthcare which suits me better and has taken me in a new direction. The memory of the rejection was still lingering, however, when my initial research application to the HMPPS NRC was rejected. I felt like they were kicking me in the teeth again. My initial application was for a piece of research with both a quantitative and a qualitative element. The feedback in relation to the quantitative project was so devastating that I scrapped this part of the research altogether and focused on the qualitative part only. To be fair, the feedback was justified and the re-written proposal is for a much more methodologically sound piece of research, but it still felt personal at the time.
Conducting research during a pandemic is not easy. By the time I had responded to the NRC feedback and was ready to re-submit, there was a resurgence in COVID-19 cases and the NRC were not accepting any further applications. I was advised not to re-submit until applications were being accepted again, otherwise I would have been rejected with no chance to re-submit again. This caused a three-month delay and I had to chase to find out when applications re-opened. When I finally re-submitted, my application was not rejected, but I did receive a long list of requests for further information. Some of these seemed very petty. Responding to them was a significant piece of work and the sense of personal rejection and being made to jump through hoops returned. I was very grateful to one of my supervisors who read my responses before I submitted them and helped to remove the irritation that was evident!
Having submitted the answers to these further questions I waited for ages for a reply. By this stage, I was on first name terms with the reviewer on the NRC. She had sent my application for further feedback from the HMPPS Interventions Team (one of whom I had worked closely with in the past). I was given further questions to answer (which seemed to miss the point of what I was trying to achieve). I tried my hardest to remain positive and to suppress the irritation. HMPPS had the power and were entitled to it. They had every right to reject my research application. Just because I had been a good employee in the past, did not oblige them to give me research access. I resigned myself to receiving a final rejection and started to think of other ways to explore my research questions. And as I reached this point of acceptance, I finally received a positive response saying that my application had been accepted!
Since then, things have moved quickly. I revised my University ethics application in the light of all the amendments I had made following the HMPPS feedback and this was quickly approved. I approached individual prisons for specific access and received positive responses from HMP Grendon and HMP Onley – in these cases possibly reaping the benefits of personal connections from my time in the Prison Service. I will be going into HMP Grendon in early January to start to recruit participants. I no longer work for HMPPS or for the Parole Board, but my status as a Forensic Psychologist and as a former HMPPS employee and Parole Board member will have an influence on my relationships with participants. They will have had experiences with psychologists (and may have had experiences with the Parole Board) which may be positive or negative and which may facilitate or hinder trust in me as a researcher. I will need to look out for these influences and reflect on them as the research progresses.
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Is Britain really “the best country in the world for children”? Discuss
Criminology is a social science which means it is based on evidence. Quite often students and academics write x person believes that something is the case. My response to that is generally, Criminology is not a religion and therefore the issue of belief should not arise. However, as humans we aren’t always looking for evidence in our everyday lives. We have a system of values and beliefs which we live by whether those have come by religious or secular means. Some of these are incredibly problematic, evidence of racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-Semitism and many other prejudices. Others are more gentle, reflective of the frailty of human beings and understanding of the mistakes we all make. These values and beliefs are so ingrained within us, we don’t often question whether they are right or wrong, but they do guide the way we think and behave as we progress through our lives. Maturity, the lived experience and learning, enable us to change, enhance or even discard, those values and beliefs, we once held dear.
It is therefore evident that no matter how hard we try, elements of belief cannot completely be eradicated, not in our personal lives and not in our professional or academic lives. Humans are social, they do not exist in a vacuum but are very much subject to the zeitgeist in which they find themselves living. These social influences impact how we understand our world, our behaviours and our words and it is this I want to explore in this blog entry.
As a society we recognise that we have vulnerable members, the elderly, the very young, the ill, the disabled, the pregnant and so on. Lots of words are written and spoken around the need to protect, support, nurture and enable people to thrive. Certainly, there is legislation to ensure provision, for example the Human Rights Act, 1998 and the Equalities Act, 2010 to name but two. Additionally, we are often reminded that we should #BeKind and to always consider #Wellbeing and #MentalHealth. All of which seemingly presents the UK as a caring, thoughtful environment in which to raise children….
This week in the media we have seen a frenzy of approbation focused on a BBC presenter accused of something (never quite made clear, what) that may or may not be criminal activity. Twitter and other forms of social media have been alive with supposedly “authoritative” commentary clutching onto every fragment of information they can find. It seems that commentators are divided into a number of camps:
- Those that are concerned with the legal ramifications of commenting
- Those that are concerned with the safety and security of those at the centre of this; those suspected of offending, those suspected of victimisation and the families of both
- Those that are concerned with using these events to promote a particular political viewpoint, generally around #DefundingTheBBC, #DontBuyTheSun or suggesting that this story is being used to cover up other more important news such as Boris Johnson’s failure to hand over his whatsapp messages to the Covid Inquiry
- Those that are concerned with accusing a variety of different people, regardless of any evidence to support, often using highly derogatory language.
Whichever camp commentators situate themselves within, it is evident that the furore has been created out of very little information. For many their arguments are based on the commentator’s personal prejudices, they like this person but they don’t like another and so on. In many cases we can see homophobia and bigotry on full display. Whilst some are claiming that this is done in the name of protecting children, it is never explained how this is achieved by engaging in witch hunt or writing “paedo” or similar pejorative terms on social media.
Running alongside the news story above, we have another story around children. This time, the focus is on unaccompanied refugee children and the immigration minister, Robert Jenrick. Despite the inclusion of a pledge in the government’s manifesto stating
“Britain should be the best country in the world for children. We want to reduce levels of child poverty, and have high ambitions for the quality of childcare, children’s health and support for vulnerable children for whom the state acts as a parent.”
https://www.willispalmer.com/special-report-what-the-main-political-parties-pledge-on-social-care/#:~:text=The%20Conservative%20Party,state%20acts%20as%20a%20parent.%E2%80%9D
Jenrick reportedly demanded that a mural, depicting Micky Mouse and other childhood friends, be painted over in an asylum seeker reception centre. Can you imagine, wanting to stop children seeing images of cartoon characters, familiar across the world, at a time when their vulnerability is so heightened?
Not so for Robert Jenrick, allegedly, he wanted to stress that this was a “law enforcement environment” and “not a welcome centre”. What kind of society accepts the placement of children in such a punitive space and regime? What happened to being the “best country in the world for children”?
My final example, comes not from mainstream media but a personal exchange on social media. This exchange began with the posting of a picture of a toy, long acknowledged by many as racist, a hangover from our imperial past. If you’re not sure which toy, I’m talking about, Dr Peter Olusoga discusses it far more eloquently than I can here. I’m not going to rehash the exchange I had, as Olusoga notes, it went along very predictable lines. But what struck me was this insistence that it was childhood memories long past that mattered. Not that adults and children might be upset or hurt by the image and the narrative which followed, but that the adult white women’s childhood memories be left unsullied.
Each of these occurrences screams the same hypocrisies, children only matter when it suits, even better when they are imaginary, rather than here in the flesh (they can come in handy when looking to bolster your own prejudices). They also demonstrate that the only view that matters is your own regardless of how that may impact on others well-being. It is time for ‘deeds not words‘! Until our society is willing to acknowledge and confront our prejudices, both individual and collective, we will continue to wonder how injustices arise….
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Freedom From Torture
Two weeks ago, we marked Refugee Week. The Freedom From Torture Northampton local group put on a showing of Matar, and a short documentary about making the film. Whilst the attendance was small, the showings were powerful and there was some heartful discussion around the importance of raising awareness, compassion and understanding around refugees and asylum seekers. And the importance of giving space to those voices who have lived these realities rather than being spoken for, and often over. The importance of space and empowerment is something all Criminologists and Criminology students will be familiar with.
One week ago we were witness to the Court of Appeal ruling that it was not safe to send asylum seekers to Rwanda, despite Suella Braverman’s ‘dream’ for the Conservative Party to ‘stop the boats’ via this unethical and inhumane migration bill. And whilst a huge sigh of relief leaves my body, I can’t help but feel anxious and angry at what is to come next. These people (the Government) have come from positions of power, comfort, security, wealth, and education- all their lives. They have no lived experience regarding why people flee from their home countries, the desperate need to run from unlawful prosecution, to want a safer life for themselves and their loved ones. So how are they best placed to decide on what response, (if there should be one), the country takes to immigration? There is also a racial element in relation to this: refugees from Ukraine were not met with the hostility and hate from this country, unlike asylum seekers and refugees from Syria or Afghanistan. Why is that? Well, for one thing the structural inequalities around ‘Whiteness’ is a place to start. The Government seems to have forgotten that people are running from harm, torture, and death. Running for their lives for the hope of a kinder, safer life.
Three weeks ago I signed up to run the Royal Parks’ Half Marathon on 8th October 2023. I am fundraising for Freedom From Torture which, whilst specific to fundraising, supporting and providing treatment for torture survivors, also work to campaign against the hatred and harmful policies being spouted by the Government against refugees and asylum seekers. I usually run 2-3 times a week, providing my body is playing ball which frustratingly appears to be less and less the case, but never more than 10km. A half marathon is just over 21km! So I’ve got a long way to go. But this distance is nothing compared to the miles and miles people fleeing harm, unlawful prosecution and/or torture have to endure. All support, be it financial or sharing blog posts and raising awareness on social media is highly appreciated. The link to my JustGiving Page can be found at the bottom of the blog alongside a very pink picture of me after a 5.58km ‘recovery run’.
Fair warning: my social media and blog posts will be dedicated to how I’m getting on in relation to the training, distance, blisters and will be accompanied by unflattering pictures of myself after various runs! But it’s important to remember WHY I’m running and WHO I’m running for.
Thanks for the support: I’ll keep you posted! JustGiving Link.
Thoughts from the criminology team 