Most of us do a lot of reading on social media. We read news on Twitter, we follow celebrities and politicians (want ideas on who to follow? Here’s a list of some of the most-followed on Twitter), we see trends and updates from friends in our Facebook newsfeeds.
We can be passive readers, or we can be actively engaging by liking, commenting, and sharing. It’s more fun to engage, and it helps us to build our global community.
But what about Internet safety?
It seems like the trolls are everywhere these days. There is a risk that, if you put yourself out there, then you are subject to trolling. (If you’d like to read more about trolling, then try this article: What is Internet Trolling?)
It’s tempting to stay safe, stop engaging, and shut the door on the trolls.
But is there another way? Can you continue to engage on social media and still have Internet safety? I believe that you can, but you have to develop some toughness.
The typical advice is “don’t feed the trolls”. This means to ignore them. Don’t respond to them and don’t let it bother you.
I don’t know about you, but, although I think it’s good advice, I’m a little uncomfortable with it.
When I was in Kindergarten, a little girl assigned to sit next to me liked to pinch me on the arm. My mother told me to ignore her and she’ll stop. I still remember how uncomfortable I was to follow my mother’s advice, ignore her, and not stand up for myself.
Kids these days are not told to ignore bullies. Instead, the experts encourage us to encourage them to report bullies. Perhaps we should do the same with trolls, but the problem is that they’re just so prolific. We’re busy people and we can’t report every troll. Who would we report to anyway?
The other option would be to engage with trolls.
That is, to stand up for ourselves or for others, and shut the trolls down with our logic, reasonableness, empathy, and morality. According to the Dangerous Speech Project, it can be possible to reason with trolls: Considerations for Sucessful Counterspeak.
If you’d still like to engage on social media but you’re concerned about Internet safety, here are some other options:
- On a personal Facebook profile, you can choose who sees your posts. Read here to learn more: Choose Your Favorite Facebook Friends.
- If you have a Facebook business page, check your settings. You can limit your audience, block certain words, and turn on a profanity filter.
- Don’t read comments.
- Block offensive followers.
- Don’t invite feedback by asking open questions.
I invite your engagement! Please like, comment, or share.
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