The Idiot’s Guide to Not Being a Douche on the Internet
First off, let me start by saying that I am not the Queen of the Internet.
I don’t have any special training, and I’m not in a unique position to say how people should or should not behave online. I’ve had my moments of not-great online behavior, and though I like to think I’ve learned from them I know I’ll screw up again. But, hey—my college major was social psychology! So, here goes nothing…
Sometimes people act douchey online. Most of the douchiness is light and inconsequential but occasionally it blossoms into full-out douchtasticness. I’ve sometimes considered not going to MM events because of the discord I’ve seen blow up, and I know friends of mine feel the same way.
I’ve been reading a lot about personality disorders lately, and more and more I see the connections between bad online behavior and behaviors that if done in the real world would make a person seem extremely unbalanced. So I’m going to go through some of these. In Alphabetical order, because I’m a nerd. Maybe it’ll shed light on what not to do online.
(Also, much of this is taken from a great website called “Out of the FOG.” It’s a great resource for anyone who wants to learn more about personality disorders.)
Posts to FB, twitter, etc. are inappropriate if they do or show the following:
Alienate people – Cut off or interfere with an individual’s relationships with others, such as by making them side with you against someone else who is their friend or colleague.
Anger - Flinging a level of fury that makes people feel frightened, triggered, accused or just plain uncomfortable.
Baiting – A post intended to solicit angry, aggressive or emotional response from another individual.
Blaming – Identifying a person or people responsible for a problem, rather than identifying ways of dealing with the problem.
Bragging – If most of your friends are authors, they probably don’t want to hear incessantly about how great your sales are or how much money you make. Asking them to cheer you on puts them in the position to force a smile when really they feel shitty inside for not being as successful.
Catastrophizing – Your bad review is not, in fact, the end of the world.
Chaos Manufacture – Unnecessarily creating an environment of risk, confusion and destruction. (Can I triple highlight this one?)
Circular Conversations – Arguments which go on almost endlessly, repeating the same patterns with no resolution. (I think we can all agree that the issue of “women in MM romance” is not going to get resolved in our lifetimes. Maybe we should all just drop it.)
Denial – Pretending douchey behavior isn’t douchey, when we know better.
Emotional Blackmail – Threats and punishments used to control someone’s behaviors. Example—putting down reviewers on your timeline is a veiled threat to reviewers. If they give you low ratings, they’ll risk being attacked by you or your friends.
Favoritism – We all post pics of ourselves with our friends sometimes. But I bet we’ve also seen favoritism in action, as well as it’s negative consequences.
Gaslighting – Convincing a mentally healthy individual that their understanding of reality is mistaken or false. By perpetuating bad behavior online, we make otherwise sane people think bad behavior is somehow okay. This is a lot more damaging than you’d think.
Hyper Vigilance – This is what happens when we fear the next outburst online. We get paranoid.
Intimidation – Any form of veiled, hidden, indirect or non-verbal threat.
Lynch-Mob (online) – What happens when a bunch of people online get incensed and go after a target with emails, blog comments, and name calling. This occurs often in situations where members of the mob don’t have the full story or know the details of the conflict over which they’re raising their pitchforks.
Name-Calling – There is never, ever, ever any reason to name-call online. Not ever.
Narcissism – We are all mini narcissists of our own Facebook pages. But the least we can do is be nice about it.
Objectification – The practice of treating a person or a group of people like an object. “Reviewers” are not an object. “Readers” are not an object. Neither are authors, or gay men, or women. We are all human beings.
Proxy Recruitment – Manipulating other people into back you up, speaking for you or “do your dirty work.” Also known as “calling in the minions.” Please don’t.
Self-Victimization – “Playing the victim” is the act of casting oneself as a victim in order to control others by soliciting a sympathetic response from them or diverting their attention away from abusive behavior. (Nothing that happened in your past excuses you from behaving like a mature, rational, considerate person in life and online.)
Subtweeting – Posting something on twitter or Facebook that is clearly directed at an individual or group of individuals while not saying the individual or group of individuals’ name(s). This can happen with news articles as well, where the poster expresses sadness or anger over an article without a link, but the most insidious and hurtful are the subtweets directed at people.
“Some people don’t realise that putting people down without calling their name doesn’t make you sound clever in hiding something. It makes you sound petty and that you can’t handle actual confrontations.” -Kia Zi Shiru, author and reader
Thought Policing – Everyone online is entitled to think whatever they want. It’s a free internet.
I’m not sure if any of this is helpful, but these cover the basics of what I see as problematic online behavior. If we all tried a little better to avoid these activities, I bet the internet would be a much less stressful place to hang out.
Oh, and here’s one more definition for the glossary…
Rubbernecking – Watching in amazement as someone has a big, hairy, destructive conflict or meltdown online.
Don’t be that person everyone stops to stare at because they’re being such a douche. Live well, and tweet responsibly!
-Daisy
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