Has Online Toxicity Changed Your Internet Usage Habits?

Hexmage-PA

A few months ago my phone gave out. Rather than get a new one, as I had before, I've instead elected to try and go phoneless. My primary motivation for doing so is to avoid the temptation to frequently access the Internet. Whereas when I first got a smartphone years ago I was excited to be able to look online whenever and wherever I wanted, in recent years I've come to believe that online toxicity has gotten so bad (even in places like this forum, at times at least) that it has had a negative impact on my mental health. I shared my decision with my therapist (who I was able to start seeing two months ago thanks to a reduction in my work hours), and although she was a little concerned she did mention that other patients of hers have shared a belief that online toxicity has led to poorer mental health for them (Rick & Morty co-creator Dan Harmon also shared a similar sentiment, ultimately leading him to abandon all forms of social media other than Instagram).

I was inspired to start this thread after reading a short article yesterday featuring CNN's Don Lemon:

Don Lemon, who has been on CNN since 2006, says the “toxicity” of social media and the balkanized, vocal state of the nation in the Trump era make him uncertain whether he will remain on the air doing his current show through the 2020 election.

"I don't go on social media anymore. It's so toxic. Everything catches up with you. I don't know if I can deal with this level of toxicity for so long."

Deadline: CNN Host Don Lemon Doubts His Ability to Withstand Toxicity and Stay on Air Through 2020

Here are the new rules for Internet use I've decided to impose upon myself:

- Only look on the Internet after work to avoid seeing something before my shift that might damper my mood at work.
- Check social media (like Facebook) only once every few days.
- Mostly stick to things I know I'll enjoy.
- Limit my exposure to places online where it's likely I'll see toxic behavior.
- Try to keep in mind that social media attracts and rewards toxic behavior and that these toxic users aren't necessarily representative of most people in the real world.

Has anyone else had a similar experience?

TehSpectre

I have learned to meme people who are mean on the internet into oblivion.

They always seem surprised when you meme them back.


I actually go look for toxicity and call it out. It's one small way of doing my part to help the internet.

Trolling for good.


Real talk: I'm serious. I outed a Nazi the other day by poking him until he revealed his true face and got banned from a Facebook group I frequent.

I know this isn't for everyone, but as someone who can wade into the sludge that is a comments section, I feel it my duty to keep doing this.

Fuzzy Cumulonimbus Cloud

I deleted Twitter because it was so toxic that it kept me up at night. I've heavily limited my Facebook use and snoozed anyone who is too vitriolic. I think it is a very real problem and it is emotionally unsustainable to engage with toxic content day in and out. We wouldn't walk down the street and ask every single person's opinion on a subject. Why do we let ourselves do it online?

Stabbity Style

I used to check /r/conservative fairly often because I wanted a look at conservative viewpoints to ensure I wasn't just imagining them as some great evil because of extrapolated ideas they didn't have. But I realized that even being exposed to that kind of rhetoric was extremely toxic and not good for my mental health, even if it wasn't being directed at me specifically. Unfortunately it's kind of seeped all over the rest of reddit, too. I should probably just cut out most of my usage of it, but there's still some subreddits that I find useful or really enjoy, like the Final Fantasy XIV one.

Mortal Sky

I definitely avoid the vast majority of Reddit, and a few other sites of its style, as much as I can

Even the rare subreddits and hobbyist forums I do occasionally check, because they're places relevant to hobbies that aren't relevant to most of the PA userbase, are vulnerable to people ranting about off-topic stuff like political correctness and other things that offend people who like South Park too much

Fortunately those sites rarely ever go full MAGA, but it still makes me grumble

Tastyfish

It's honestly something I've only experienced third-hand for the most part - as in commentary/articles on it etc. My facebook is fairly healthy other than the odd older relative sharing something stupid, but people generally don't engage one way or the other with them - other than occasionally to point out that clicking share on the more "innocuous pet-friendly" Britain First style posts is going to lead them getting the more unpleasant stuff come up in their feeds. Never seen the point of Twitter as a social media platform and this honestly seems almost like one of the more blunter forums I regularly visit.

Occasionally a bit does seep in, but then it seems so ludicrously over the top (and generally isn't directed at me, I certainly lurk more than I post) it seems hard to take seriously. Like driving past a crazy guy who's randomly swearing at all the buses that go past, rather than anything personal. And of course, I don't read the comments on any news articles I read - but that's just common sense.

Certainly can see how it would be different if you were more in the public sphere though.

mrondeau

Well, it did manage to make me mostly avoid multiplayer games when I don't know, personally, the other players. And in the few cases where I do play with random people, avoid and disable all forms of chat if possible.

dispatch.o

I have found as I get older I just don't care about the internet or the random opinions of people on it. My Facebook has never been a highlight reel or scoreboard for how popular I am. I've comfortably had like 15-19 friends who are mostly immediate family and people I know who I remain in contact with. All posting/comments are disabled and always have been.

I was a teenager when the internet exploded. I feel like everyone around me who was aware of the way things were going all realized it wouldn't be a good thing. I've never really been present online in a social way.

I play games and ignore people. There's no information about me anywhere and no way in which someone here could reasonably harm me in meat space. In always being guarded, I think my habits have not changed at all.

When I see someone trying to get the perfect Instagram picture of a grilled cheese at a restaurant, I wonder how humanity failed so badly. Maybe I'm the toxic one?

mrondeau

dispatch.o wrote: »

When I see someone trying to get the perfect Instagram picture of a grilled cheese at a restaurant, I wonder how humanity failed so badly. Maybe I'm the toxic one?

No, that's perfectly reasonable. They are not even using a good lens and lightning.

A Kobold's Kobold

I'd imagine a lot of the current situation regarding toxicity is an unwillingness and/or inability for websites to moderate their own sites effectively, but that's another thread entirely. I have kept my mouth shut about who I am exactly and where I live because I don't want bad actors coming to my door or swatting me or whatever if I ever decide to become a Content Creator™.

Reznik

I nuked my reddit and twitter accounts. Never had Facebook or Instagram, never will. I don't play anything with voice chat. I pretty much avoid social media and stick to select forums.

I dream of the day Facebook dies.

exis

10-15 years ago, prior to the creation of social media as we know it, I was heavily involved in a number of online communities. Mostly forums or within video game communities (particularly WoW). I would put a lot of effort into staying engaged and relevant. Often this meant deliberating for a long time about what I was posting, not necessarily because what I was saying was important or complex, but because I was very concerned about how it would be perceived by others.

I gradually started to withdraw from forums as it began to dawn on me that I never really came away with a fresh perspective or received any actual benefit from the time and mental effort I was expending to stay engaged. The conversation would continue on without me, the people I disagreed with would continue to say disagreeable things. It didn't really matter. I started getting into the habit of typing out long-winded replies, then stopping before I posted and thinking that it really wasn't worth the angst I was creating for myself, deleting my post and closing the tab. Eventually I just stopped frequenting those places. Similarly, I developed a habit of immediately muting all voice chat and mostly not responding to text chat within games. I found it just always caused me stress and anxiety.

Now I read stuff online but barely ever engage (the odd post here being the exception). It used to be really important to me that I was a part of an online community. Now the internet is more of a window into (some parts of ) the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm missing out but I honestly just don't need the stress of getting myself into arguments with people who aren't going to change their minds anyway. Like the idea of arguing in the comments of a news article is just astounding to me, and I don't understand why anybody would ever engage.

Paladin

I drink internet like iocane to anesthetize me to the toxicity of the real world. Nothing anybody can say to me will ever be as bad as the abuse the internet can give.

Arch

I was a very big proponent of social media...now this forum is the only one I check and keep up with in any way that resembles regularity.

It's a shame as well- the vast majority of the people I have been closest to have moved away from me (undergrad, a job, then grad school, plus a postdoc, plus a new job....all in different cities than I grew up in have that effect), and many social media platforms have been the only way to keep up with their lives easily.

I've taken to going back to older methods ("older") and find myself texting my friends more often when I want to see what they've been up to. I don't know if it makes our relationship any deeper or more meaningful than when I would write on their posts, but the effect on my mental health has been great.

I no longer get a barrage of people posting their Best Moments, or Fun Things Arch Wasn't Doing, or posting some Angry Rant about Some Big Social Issue.

I didn't realize how much these things were negatively impacting my health until I deleted Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram from my phone.

These days I can only use those services in a browser window, and the combination of the busted usability in a web browser for these services, plus the immediate bombardment of advertisements, bullshit news stories, and outrage media immediately reminds me why I don't have them available to me 24/7.

There have been some downsides though- most of the communities I would like to be a part of (i.e. the gaming communities in my area) all coordinate events through Facebook, so I almost missed some new meetups I wanted to attend.

Overall though, yes, the toxicity of social media (and the internet) in general has definitely changed my browsing habits.

Javen

In terms of which sites I visit? Not really.

But I don't treat the internet as a community anymore. Just a resource. Years ago I had many friends on this very forum that I would consider some of my closest. I met my partner whom I have been with for a decade on this forum.

I still visit here, obviously, and I still spend a decent amount of time on social media. But I no longer form connections with other people through the internet.

Xaquin

I just booted every trump supporter I know and barely read comments anymore.

I also stopped trying to sway peoples opinions on things I know to be false (trump is intelligent, vaccines are bad, etc.). It never changed anyone's opinion. I came to the realization that many people are idiots and simply wish to remain so.

NEO|Phyte

Not much changed for me, because the communities I float through actually care about moderation. Theoretically have a facebook, basically never used it, last time I logged in was a few years ago when I got one of those "hey someone tried getting into your account" emails. Did the password recovery, left it at whatever longass string of characters it set, haven't gone back. I could just delete it I suppose, but it's not like that'll stop them from making one of those shadow account things.

Feral

Define "toxicity."

What I think of as toxicity (harassment, abusive behavior, doxxing) is not what drives me away from social media. I'm more or less immune to that stuff - I'm a fairly comfortable cishetwhiteman, I'm not worried about somebody yelling epithets at me on the street like Don Lemon. Internet fuckwads don't really bother me.

What bothers me is just the repetitiveness. I don't need to see sixty variations on the theme "Trump is a jerk" in the same day. I don't need twenty people imploring me to donate to Planned Parenthood. I already did!

I might share your politics, Karen, but is the 14th meme you've posted about immigrant kids this week actually changing anybody's mind who wasn't already convinced by memes 1 - 13? Do you think that 14th meme is actually going to spur anybody to action at 7pm on a Thursday?

Hexmage-PA

Arch wrote: »

I was a very big proponent of social media...now this forum is the only one I check and keep up with in any way that resembles regularity.

It's a shame as well- the vast majority of the people I have been closest to have moved away from me (undergrad, a job, then grad school, plus a postdoc, plus a new job....all in different cities than I grew up in have that effect), and many social media platforms have been the only way to keep up with their lives easily.

...most of the communities I would like to be a part of (i.e. the gaming communities in my area) all coordinate events through Facebook, so I almost missed some new meetups I wanted to attend.

Overall though, yes, the toxicity of social media (and the internet) in general has definitely changed my browsing habits.

For me personally Facebook hasn't been that big of a source of stress since I stopped checking it as often. However, I did just look on there for the first time in a few days and saw where a friend of mine I haven't seen in person in a while posted that she was going to stop checking Facebook because it was no longer a fun diversion for her and instead a source of anxiety and anger. I'm not exactly certain what transpired, though.

Feral wrote:

What I think of as toxicity (harassment, abusive behavior, doxxing) is not what drives me away from social media. I'm more or less immune to that stuff - I'm a fairly comfortable cishetwhiteman, I'm not worried about somebody yelling epithets at me on the street like Don Lemon. Internet fuckwads don't really bother me.

I wish I could say that, but I can't help but be bothered by the "Men Are Trash" meme that I see very often now. I understand where it's coming from (I don't trust most men myself, despite being one), but I also know that the same toxic masculinity that inspires women to repeat that meme also causes men themselves a lot of psychological pain (for example, showing emotional vulnerability is mocked and dismissed with "man up" or "grow some balls", which often leads young men to suicide). I'd rather see some kind of positive approach to the problem instead of people just shitposting.

schuss

I quit facebook, but that was mostly for data privacy and competence principles. I've been on the internet a looooonnnngggg time, so most things are kinda eh as I came up in the era of zero moderation. I can't recommend it, but I've stared into the abyss so long it's just a dark spot now. I try to be relentlessly positive in my own life, but won't hesitate to call out bullshit where I see it.

Hacksaw

I use Facebook to stay in touch with my union brothers and sisters. Twitter, Instagram, and all others don't interest me and don't factor into my internet usage at all.

This forum is actually my most active and preferred form of social media: at least here if someone is being a shit-fucker, the mods aren't afraid to dropkick them off the boards in a heartbeat.

ElJeffe

I tried Twitter for a bit, mostly out of a sense of professional obligation to my writing career, but it never took. It just all seemed so very but whyyyyyy.

I'm technically on Facebook, but was never very active, and haven't checked it in probably a year. I'm on instagram, but I only pay attention to actual friends.

It's more the inanity than the toxicity that keeps me off. That said, I honestly don't think it's possible for social media to exist without a large amount of both. Keeping the toxicity away requires more effort than its ever going to be practical, and so I think the options are "toxic social media" and "no social media".

I'm not sure which one is better for society.

Frankiedarling

It’s only as much stress as you let it be. It took a long time and years of self reflection but these days I can see someone bash the Prequels and not immediately rage post in reply. It’s made a huge difference!

JaysonFour

I usually only post in a few places on the net- I tend to stay out of most anything political (except for threads here) because I have no desire to expose myself to the racist wailing of the uneducated hordes of Trump supporters who blindly troll every political video/site/social media like flies on shit. I have a YouTube I use to listen to game music and such, and an ancient Facebook I no longer use because I used to be in a depressive rut because of it.

Unregulated social media is a blight on the internet- it's pretty much the ultimate confirmation of the GIFT. The fuckwads weren't silenced or swatted, and now they've spread like a cancer (one's even president of the U.S.) to infect social media all over.

I was on sites all over back in the day, but not so much now; there's only so much in the way of stupid I can take.

Nobeard

I've not been affected by internet toxicity because I actively avoid it. Mostly because from the very beginning of my internet usage I assumed that most of it was a cesspool and have acted accordingly. Also, I have very little desire to engage with other people in general and always have. This forum is the only online community I have ever wanted engage with. Turns out that when you proactively weed out people that are a) assholes, b) disingenuous, or c) to stupid for words, what's left is an interesting group of people.

Oghulk

I've been cutting myself off from more and more social media. I don't follow as many political threads on PA, I don't look at twitter almost ever now, Instagram is entirely just nice pictures of people enjoying their lives and I don't have FOMO depression anymore so that's alright, Facebook is entirely for grad school organizing events and stuff.

But the PA political threads and twitter got to a point where reading through the political news, the current events of the day, etc. actually started to make me extremely anxious. I started noticing how it affected my body physically. Just information overload of the same "everything is awful" all the time, and even the nice news always feels saccharine

And really taking myself off that slow-drip has made me a lot happier day-to-day.

RT800

I used to get pissed off at the toxicity in some competitive online games.

These days I just find it kind of hilarious.

Nobeard

ElJeffe wrote: »

I tried Twitter for a bit, mostly out of a sense of professional obligation to my writing career, but it never took. It just all seemed so very but whyyyyyy.

I'm technically on Facebook, but was never very active, and haven't checked it in probably a year. I'm on instagram, but I only pay attention to actual friends.

It's more the inanity than the toxicity that keeps me off. That said, I honestly don't think it's possible for social media to exist without a large amount of both. Keeping the toxicity away requires more effort than its ever going to be practical, and so I think the options are "toxic social media" and "no social media".

I'm not sure which one is better for society.

The joke answer is No Social Media. The real answer is it doesn't matter. Toxic social media is a symptom, not the disease.

Gvzbgul

I enjoy toxicity in gaming but i find myself clamming up on social media because of toxicity. Partly because its randoms online so its easier to dismiss or challenge. While facebook and the like has people i know and care about irl sharing these opinions i vehemently disagree with.

I wouldnt put the blame on social media as i have the same reaction irl. Its easy to argue against [insert hot issue] or whatever online with internet randos but on facebook or with a coworker i rarely do so and instead remain silent. Giving them tacit approval even if i dont want to.

HerrCron

Hacksaw wrote: »

I use Facebook to stay in touch with my union brothers and sisters. Twitter, Instagram, and all others don't interest me and don't factor into my internet usage at all.

This forum is actually my most active and preferred form of social media: at least here if someone is being a shit-fucker, the mods aren't afraid to dropkick them off the boards in a heartbeat.

Yeah, pretty much this.

I have a very limited and locked down social media presence on Facebook, which is continuing mostly through inertia.
Twitter, reddit, twitch etc etc are automatic no goes, and I have extensions to block the comments on youtube.

So, yeah, compared to the sum total of the wide wide world of the internet, what I don't avoid is basically a rounding error.

Dongs Galore

I've been posting on 4chan since 2006 and I aint stopping

been called a cuck a few times but all you gotta do is hit em with a smug anime face

doomybear

if you enjoy the forums and appreciate the work the mods do you can always support the forums by joining Club PA for $1 (or more) at the top right of the site

Dongs Galore

facebook: only still use because my irl gaming groups primarily coordinate there

instagram: literally just use it because a couple of old hs friends like to post bikini pictures and they're still cute and it reminds me of a time when i was virile and handsome and they looked at me with interest rather than pity

twitter: i use it for hentai

discord: i immerse myself in right-wing outgroups because those people are the only ones who play the obscure wargames i like. i call the admin a stupid fat hick motherfucker when he denies the holocaust. he calls me a libtard and mocks me for getting the outcome of 2016 wrong. we have fun playing videogames

reddit: sometimes i browse videogame or porn subs but not often. I've been finding porn since web 1.0 and im better at it than the average redditor. i am also better at videogames.

Local H Jay

Agreed with the Facebook lock down. I have one as "legacy" account and because I use it for login simplicity (I know I know)

I don't post much to it, but I'm not really afraid to get political. It's a shame, my father, whom I care for very much, is an outspoken bigot on fb. It's disgusting and I've confronted him about it many times, but it never goes anywhere. He either shrugs it off or refuses to engage me with any kind of logic.

It's a shame, I love my dad. He's a kind dude. But he's been brainwashed by those around him... And the internet. He gets all his news off FB, it's not even funny to me anymore. I used to be bemused at first, but now it fades to dull horror as I see my father once again telling immigrants to go home, a man who was so generous to me throughout my whole life.

It's an eye awakening experience to see someone you love become something you hate. I haven't actually seen my father in around 5 years. He's deathly afraid of planes and, I'm not really going out of my way to see him. I won't lie, my father's presence on the internet has caused a rift between us (and my siblings).

I screencap all his worst stuff, so I won't forget. There have been times where I tried to rationalize or be charitable with his character, but I know it's fucked up beyond repair. I worry about him alot, but it's also completely altered my view of him as a person. Its like an episode of Black Mirror or some shit, what started as me giggling on 4chan in my teens turned into the downfall of Western civilization

Henroid

Online toxicity hasn't just changed my use of the internet, it's changed how judgmental I am of others and the bars people have to clear to being a friend, let alone being on my good side to begin with. Which goes hand in hand with the whole social aspects of the web; communities on Discord, Twitch, etc.

wandering

What concerns me, mostly, is the repetitiveness of social media. Do I really need to see sixty variations on the theme "Trump is a dick" in the same day? Or a bunch of people telling me to donate to Planned Parenthood? I've donated already!

Isn't that the 14th meme you've posted this week about immigrant kids? Is it really changing anybody's opinion who hasn't already been convinced by memes 1 - 13? Is that 14th meme really going to compel anybody to action at 8pm on a Wednesday?

Incenjucar

I just... don't associate with toxic people. I didn't when I was a child and I was always comfortable telling people to get lost. I also remove myself from toxic environments. Hell, I have barely talked with a whole situation side of my family for years because of all the toxic people there.

When someone who is not a toxic person gets too deep into a toxic loop that I lack the patience to correct, I stop following their feed until they pull their head out from their butt.

There are parts if our lives where we have no choice in who we deal with, but outside of that you can choose to not engage with an online community.

HappylilElf

wandering wrote: »

What concerns me, mostly, is the repetitiveness of social media. Do I really need to see sixty variations on the theme "Trump is a dick" in the same day? Or a bunch of people telling me to donate to Planned Parenthood? I've donated already!

Isn't the 14th meme you've posted this week about immigrant kids? Is it really changing anybody's opinion who hasn't already been convinced by memes 1 - 13? Is that 14th meme really going to compel anybody to action at 8pm on a Wednesday?

wandering

ceres

The mods don't get anything from Club PA. Or like... paid. Certainly support Club PA, but it doesn't directly support the forum or any of its staff so do so with that in mind. If that's changed, somebody correct me.

Right now for social media I use this forum and that might be it. I never made a twitter account, was once active on facebook but now it's just for syncing mobile games, and honestly I only have the barest understanding of how reddit and instagram work. I'm still glad I don't have a twitter account, and leaving facebook behind has been an unambiguous good in my life.

Lately a few of the people I follow have left social media behind completely except where it's needed for work, John Green and Philip DeFranco first coming to mind. They've both found that when they shut their shit off their lives get better, or at least better lived. I have no trouble believing it.

daveNYC

I've never really done the Twitter, basically everything about that platform makes my skin crawl; but recently I've started avoiding blogs and posts and whatnot that go heavy on putting up tweets as 'content'. It's not toxic per-se, but the level of discourse is pretty freaking low (it's basically politics by sick burn) and even worse, the people posting these things seem to think that doing so actually does something. Like sure, we're running concentration camps for immigrants on sites where we had Japanese internment camps, but look at all these tweets full of zingers on the subject. Winning!

So yeah, I'm modifying my habits to avoid that sort of stuff.

davidsdurions

I use Facebook to stay in touch with a couple friends and family that are difficult to reach otherwise. Twitter is for yelling into the aether about politics, games, and customer service of companies who have wronged me. My Instagram is curated down to a few entities that I like to follow for various reasons but holy fuck still steer clear of the comments. This forum is the only other social space I frequent and it is a shining beacon among the dark fog of Internet forums. I loathe reddit and really anywhere else.

I’m close to dropping my smart phone and getting a relatively dumb phone for basic usage and just getting a nice tablet for sitting on the couch browsing. Which I expect to improve my experience of browsing because of the larger form factor and improve my stress levels outside the home because of not having this brick in my pocket constantly chirping for attention.

I’m also close to starting up my own slack/discord/website for the purposes of sharing things with friends and family. Removing the layer of advertisements and shitty moderation of Facebook but still having a method of sharing photos of my family with people I care to share with by just controlling it myself is tempting and I’m about to just go ahead and run it myself that way. Like, if people care enough, they can follow a link I’ll have automatically post on my Facebook that leads them to my personal website that if they have been invited by me will have a login so they can see the family photos if they aren’t willing to do the extra step then they didn’t care enough to begin with. If they want to share memes or chat, they can join me in my private slack/discord so I can moderate and avoid junk advertising.

It’s really just an evolution of what already exists to avoid the more toxic parts of social media and I’m surprised some of my family and friends haven’t already done it. I suppose the convenience of Facebook is strong, but I feel the drawbacks have now outweighed any inconveniences that just running my own social media bubble might have. Like I said, if they actually care they will follow me to where I am and where I choose to post things like photos of family. If not, then I guess it’s their loss.