I have been in one way or another glued to the internet since I was 12 years old. I am now 36.
Most of my experience has been positive – it has been a place to find community, inspiration and knowledge. But recently I’ve begun to realise that I’ve spent a long time living in ignorance of the internet’s darker side. For example, the world of 4chan (a site where users can post any image and remain anonymous) didn’t really cross over with mine – until it did.
I’ve met a lot of friends online through music communities on microblogging platform, Tumblr. In 2010, Tumblr was hacked by 4chan users who claimed Tumblr was stealing their memes and rehashing them into unfunny jokes. In response, the 4chan gang unleashed swathes of gory, disturbing and pornographic videos on Tumblr, as well as viruses and a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS), in an orchestrated attempt to disturb and upset Tumblr users. The attack became known as Operation Overlord.
Back then, I remember the whole thing threw me. I knew darker, more seedy parts of the internet existed, but the idea of people in a fellow online community flooding my online community with deliberately disturbing material? That felt cruel. I was lost.
Assuming I am ‘correct’ or The Most Informed Person breeds intolerance, and listening to other people’s point of view with an open mind and a curious determination to understand them can help me to consider my own opinion more thoroughly.
So at that point, I started to look for answers. I searched for knowledge and understanding of people who are different from me, in places I would never usually gravitate towards.
I hated what I found but I have made a point since then not to stay ignorant. Assuming I am ‘correct’ or The Most Informed Person breeds intolerance, and listening to other people’s point of view with an open mind and a curious determination to understand them can help me to consider my own opinion more thoroughly.
As a result of a conscious effort, I am now painfully up to date with what self-proclaimed misogynist, alleged rapist and human trafficker Andrew Tate is spouting from one month to the next. And I am uncomfortably familiar with right-wing rhetoric on social media which is riling up the masses against people who no longer live where they were born.
But at the same time, I’ve found that even when I try my hardest to stay privy to the internet’s latest subcultures and algorithm changes, I’m still largely out of the loop.
I’ve found that even when I try my hardest to stay privy to the internet’s latest subcultures and algorithm changes, I’m still largely out of the loop.
This became clear to me when Charlie Kirk was killed in September this year.
I had no idea who this person was or why someone might want to kill him. Even once I saw a photo, I only faintly recognised him. For anyone else who has been shielded from this man by their echo chamber, he was a right-wing political activist who used his Christian faith to defend his views on Islam, trans rights and abortion.
I did not know how powerful, or how strongly tied to Trump and the US Administration he was. I had no idea that Kirk and his ilk were being admired by children and teenage boys for their conservative, fundamentalist views.
The depictions of these right-wing figureheads were like memes to me. I just didn’t take them seriously. I was numb to Kirk and what he stood for because I had seen it memeified so many times through my own curated social media feeds. The people, the communities, the political and activist accounts I’d chosen to follow shaped my perception of this man to such a degree that I barely registered him as someone to be aware of.
if I didn’t understand the weight that this incredibly influential man carried, what good is it if I spend a ridiculous number of hours online? The algorithmic nature of the internet keeps even the most curious of minds ignorant
The whole episode begged the question: if I didn’t understand the weight that this incredibly influential man carried, what good is it if I spend a ridiculous number of hours online? The algorithmic nature of the internet keeps even the most curious of minds ignorant and that is terrifying.
I have more information at my fingertips than any generation before me, but while my head has been bowed on the screen, I missed the dark shadow looming over myself and everything I care about.
This year, I’ve been forced to acknowledge that my relationship with the internet is full of contradictions. For all my desperation to stay current, I am much like an older person romanticising the ‘simpler’ days of the 1950s. I am looking at it through the nostalgic lens of how it formed my social circles, educated me on things I would not otherwise understand, and gave me the life I live and love today.
That wilful ignorance, I have realised, is almost childlike and in the wider comprehension of the world I live in, it isn’t useful – to anybody – to stay in the luxury of ignorance. It’s inexcusable, really.
So, what now? Honestly, I cannot say.
All I know for sure is that I need to spend more time looking upwards, outwards, and trying to be part of good, tangible change in the world.