Trigger warning: this chapter contains graphic hate speech.
The first time somebody told me to kill myself, I was 26 years old. I have since lost count of the number of times that strangers encouraged self-harm during the four years I worked at The Channel. I have always had a pretty robust sense of humour, but I can’t find it in myself to make light of the things people said to me on the internet, simply because they disliked a video I was in. To this day, the YouTube Comments Section is infamously chaotic, but it was extra spicy back when I first entered the chat.
Launched in 2005 in tandem with the platform’s debut, the Comments Section became synonymous with the very fabric of social media’s wider early identity; sites were not just for hosting content, they were designed for engagement and commentary, making users more invested in the platform than, say, a television network. The idea was that real communities could be built around creators, but the shadow side of the feedback loop was that it created a culture of digital anonymity, which became a breeding ground for hyperbole and vitriol, AKA hate speech.
During the “Nymwars” (a term given to the counterattack on pseudonym culture) of 2013, Google’s rolled out a requirement that all YouTube users must have a Google + account to engage on the site. While great in theory, this didn’t stop people from creating burner accounts to facilitate their spiteful alter egos. I joined The Channel two years later and still winced at the “feedback” I received in The Comments Section. The producers assured me that “it used to be a lot worse”. I can’t imagine.
People I had never met called me fat, ugly, and stupid. They tore apart my clothing decisions, asked me if I was missing chromosomes, likened me to a block-faced Minecraft character, and declared my voice to be a “cancer”. On the more extreme end, I was told my mother should have terminated me in the womb, and I received comments (mostly from those identifying as male) publicly detailing how I should be physically or sexually assaulted. Whatever “worse” was, I am glad I did not know it.
My soul is yellow. I want you to know that. It just is. I don’t know exactly what happens when we die, but I do believe in souls, and I know with absolute certainty that mine is buttercup yellow. It’s shiny. It sings. It belly laughs. Actually, if you know me, you’ll be aware that I’m prone to a bit of cackle. I have lines under my eyes from a life spent having an absolute hoot with a beloved gang of fellow jesters. I am good-natured. I am a goose on the loose. I am a clown on the town. I am happy. I am sunshine. My soul is yellow. When I read the things people wrote about me in The Comments Section when I was in my mid twenties, it hurt me. Worse, it stripped me of good humour. It dulled my sparkle. For a little bit, my soul became muddy.
Leafy is Here
When I encountered the then-popular YouTuber LeafyIsHere around a year into my career at The Channel, I entered a lengthy period of notable challenge. I had a particularly strong distaste for his “commentary” uploads from the outset, as Leafy appeared to be the unofficial figurehead for internet trolls. Posting under a pseudonym himself, the then-20-year-old fostered a culture of toxic reaction videos, garnering both significant backlash and attention for cyberbullying, notably of vulnerable people, and the encouragement of problematic behaviour from his “fans”, who were known to spam others videos with negative comments such as “hiss” or “KYS” (kill yourself). I felt this to be both insipid and corrosive; it monotonized repugnance and normalized cruelty, yet I watched as his audience skyrocketed.
The Channel’s vast growth appeared minuscule in comparison to Leafy, which did not go unnoticed by the producers. In response, they encouraged me to create a listicle video that would trend-latch onto his success. While I, somewhat rebelliously, made it clear I disliked this man in my coverage, I was riddled with unease at giving him airtime. I worried that views were of a higher priority than values, and this time it wasn’t as frivolous as smutty thumbnails; this was furthering the narrative of internet bullying.
Fear & Anonymity
Bullying, of course, is nothing new. Neither is socially sanctioned cruelty. For as long as humans have formed social groups, we have looked both to establish hierarchy and discharge insecurity. I believe very few people are actual sadists, but I do believe rather a lot of people are susceptible to fear.
“Othering” or “mocking” individuals is a well-documented and seemingly timeless behavioural response to fear: the fear of hierarchic collapse, the fear of being ostracized from a group, and the fear of being targeted oneself. In short, fear leads people to do unkind things in a distorted bid for stability and belonging. Add in a layer of anonymity to the mix, and accountability has left the building. This, historically, is when we have had ourselves a hugefuckingissue.
Mobs & Masks
Before the internet, people achieved anonymity in two ways: by becoming part of a collective unified “mass”, or covering their face by way of a mask…or, in the instance of the Ku Klux Klan, for example, both.
By being part of a mob, or wearing a mask, individuals have found a way to dissolve their identity, personally absolving themselves from blame for some of humanity’s biggest atrocities. While a few figureheads and scapegoats may have been taken to task, it took more than one compelling orator, or dictator, to enact witch trials, lynchings, and genocides. The unidentifiable are the unaccountable. So… let’s circle back to the internet, which has essentially handed us all a hall pass to The Purge…
Ambient Internet
Gratefully, cyberbullying in my more impressionable years was restricted to the usage of the sole family computer, and fell foul of the battle of landlines vs dial-up internet. With an elder sister, and a mother who loved to yap on the phone, I’d score maybe an hour of MSN time after school, IF I WAS LUCKY. After which, I was oft unceremoniously turfed from my swivelling perch at the altar of the Packard Bell, forced to “go play”, read, watch TV, or whateverthefuckweusedtodothatwasn’tscrolling. IF the internet was ever an unsafe space for me through classroom drama, chat rooms, or internet forums, at least it had edges. It had parameters. It had a log-off time. It was not the fourth dimension that it is today. It did not live in my pocket. It did not follow me into my bedroom at night. At 26, I may have shed a few tears in the aftermath of a pelting of mean comments, but I do count my blessings that I was an adult when they hit me. I was old enough and in tune enough to know my yellow soul. I dread to think what would have happened if I had been exposed to unfettered access to The Comments Section when I was young. I do not have children, and this is one of the thoughts that has kept me from pursuing a life wherein I create them. I cannot imagine how parents are handling the unquantifiably vast issue of an ever-expanding, ever-present digital sphere.
Unwittingly unleashed by the dot-com era, the digital town square, has only got louder and more encompassing in my lifespan. People are emboldened to behave on the internet in ways they would never dream of in the flesh, and we are more online than ever. Nobody has ever walked up to me in the street and called me fat, told me I am worthless, or told me to end my life. I think it is because it’s a lot easier to know the colour of the soul we’re speaking to when we can look one another in the eye. Like the internet, the Comments Section perpetuated connection, but from a distance, which can be altogether very distorting.
Now What?
As it happens, Leafy isn’t here anymore; he was banned from YouTube less than a year after I quit The Channel. It was a long time coming, and I do heartily believe we’re all better off without a poster child for monetizable malice. However, he was never the real issue; he was a symptom of a much wider problem. Similarly, “KYS” is no longer an acceptable troll retort; YouTube and other social media platforms eventually began restricting harmful comments. Well-intentioned, yes, but AI-policed censorship has opened a Pandora’s Box of other issues and has made somewhat of a martyr of controversial figures. The banning of figureheads and specific verbiage are short-term solutions to systemic issues. Leaders are interchangeable, and people have a documented history of creativity when it comes to cruelty.
Observably, algorithms reward engagement, and what is more clickable than shock, and more discussable than fear? If cruelty truly is a fear-driven response, and fear is more marketable in the attention economy, then things might not be so rosy in our foreseeable futures. The Comments section didn’t invent bullying, but it may have handed us the mask we have always reached for.
There is no maximum capacity at this party, only one’s ability to handle the room.
To be continued.
