How to Reason With Someone on Social Media
Social media is a battleground.
All day, every day, brave keyboard warriors fight for truth and justice in the world.
The Cons own the Libs.
The Libs own the Cons.
The U.S. Capitol gets stormed.
The Woke and Antifa verbally murder literal Nazis and MAGA’s.
QAnon save trafficked children from the Elite pedophile ring.
Anti-vaxxers save the world from autism, mind control, and Bill Gates.
And of course, snowflakes get triggered (and the Libs get owned again).
If none of that made sense to you, that’s ok. I believe that before we can start to understand how to approach the tactics of reasoning with people on the internet, we first need to explore the environment that we all play in.
Strap in.
The Internet has morphed into a bizarre place. As I described in a previous article that was probably way too long and a bit disjointed, the architecture of the Internet has undergone a metamorphosis of infinite proportions. There are as many architectures as there are users. It’s quite a mindfuck when you think about how many people there are and how different our tastes all are at the individual level.
The Internet has become strange because of a few factors. Put simply, it’s because we became temporally, socially, and economically fragmented. These fragmentations, combined with a shift in the way media is produced — from top-down to bottom up — allowed online communities to prosper. Subcultures began as online forums, but then social media came along and gave these subcultures a fertile environment to grow.
Social media gives us a personalized lens through which we view the world. That deeply personal feel, combined with how algorithms help us find like-minded individuals, is what powered online subcultures to unforeseen numbers.
Like-minded individuals cluster together in communities. These communities could be formal, such as a Facebook group or a Discord server, or they could be informal, like the people you interact with the most on Twitter or Instagram based on what the algorithm serves you each day based on your actions. These communities are highly influential with shaping our lens of the world.
In 2016, Edgar Maddison Welch of Salisbury, NC had recently gotten internet access in his home. Like most new internet users, their journey often begins on social media. Welch joined social media sites like Facebook and YouTube, and because of his friends, interests, and searches, the platforms began sending him suggestions for content rife with conspiracy theories. Welch began watching videos of Alex Jones, who runs InfoWars, a website infamous for spreading conspiracy theories.
Welch stumbled upon information about the PizzaGate conspiracy theory. The completely baseless theory alleges that a child trafficking ring operated by high-ranking Democratic members like Hillary Clinton was being run out the basements of a network of restaurants in the United States. One of those restaurants was the Comet Ping Pong Pizzeria in Washington D.C.
Incensed by the story, Welch decided to play the hero for these children. He even tried to recruit a few friends to join his cause. They declined his offer. That didn’t sway Welch. On Sunday, Dec. 4th, the 28 year-old father of two made the 350 mile drive north to D.C. to investigate Comet Ping Pong on his own. He was armed with a AR-15 assault rifle, a .38 revolver, and a 12 gauge shotgun.
Welch entered the restaurant. Patrons fled the packed establishment. Employees fled out the back. When he searched the restaurant, which doesn’t even have a basement, he found nothing. Welch fired a number of rounds into a cabinet, damaging a computer. Miraculously, no one was injured or killed. Welch surrendered to police shortly thereafter. He was sentenced to 4 years in prison.
I’d wager that reading Welch’s story was absurd to you: how on earth could someone: a) believe that story was true?; and,
b) get so pissed off that they drive 350 miles armed with an assault rifle to wage vigilante justice on a pizza parlour?
The story was meant to illustrate that social media and online communities in general are incredibly manipulative to the general public. We are not created equal in terms of our cognitive ability to determine fact from fiction. It’s really tough to do even if you are a traditionally intelligent person. In fact, research shows that a good measure of one’s ability to sniff out fake news is your level of cognitive reflection.
Fake news deliberately exploits our cognitive biases and emotional reactions to them. Research shows that fake news spreads 6 times faster than real news. Why?
Well it’s partly because fake news is written to be more outrageous and emotional. Strong emotions are closely tied to virality. But troll or bot accounts also aid in the virality, giving wings to fake content through targeted amplification*. They are designed to recognize fakes news and give it that first boost to help amplify the message.
Once bots and some popular accounts like Alex Jones, who profit from fake news and conspiracy theories, spread fake news, it catches fire with real people, and before you know it, we have to deal with the fallout. This could be something simple like a ridiculous counterclaim to a current event, or it could be something like PizzaGate or a fake story that causes the stock market to crash.
*A great exercise to introduce yourself to this mechanism of social media manipulation is the Spot the Troll Quiz that Clemson University offers.
History lesson over.
As you can see, social media has completely warped our perception of the world. Algorithms dictate what we read, whose lives we see more often, what products we buy, and even who we date. So it should come as no surprise to any of you now that trying to approach a discussion from your own frame of reference is pointless.
Your frame is yours and yours alone. There are certainly similarities between similar individuals or populations, but the level of personalization that social media has achieved for each of us is astounding.
So what can be done?
When you come across a post or a comment that is just way out of bounds according to your personal compass, pause and take a breath. Social media companies want you to react quickly and move on to the next item.
Content that elicits an a fast-rising emotional response get the most engagement. Research shows that content that elicits a negative reaction stays with you longer, so if you’ve ever been verbally attacked online, that’s why you’re still thinking about it hours later.
Once you’ve taken that breath, decide if it’s really worth it to engage. One could argue that most internet discussions are pointless, and I’d certainly agree. But we’re human, and sometimes you just need to jump into a conversation.
(After all, this isn’t an article about why you should avoid engaging on social media as much as possible (even though that should be everyone’s goal in a post-COVID world), but rather to improve your interactions right now.)
So we’ve chosen to engage.
Great, now let’s see what we’re up against here. An anti-vaxxer? COVID-denier? an SJW? A Lib? A NeoCon? A snowflake that needs triggering?
Let’s pick one to use as an example.
I’m a science grad, so I’m going to use an anti-vaxxer since outrage against these people is something that’s near and dear to my heart.
So like all internet subcultures, anti-vaxxers have a specific framework that they use for navigating the world. They’re an interesting bunch because they transcend political boundaries. Some are on the left (crunchy all natural anti-vaxxers who cure disease with turmeric and mind-shredding psychedelic teas), or on the right (Dale Gribble imitators who stockpile ammunition and think a New World Order is imminent).
They don’t trust authority, whether that’s health care officials, pharmaceutical corporations, or the government. And what’s really interesting is that they’re all over the map in terms of income. Some are really rich and ignorant, like the group of Californians who helped bring measles back, while others are poor and lacking in scientific education, like the group of Californians who helped bring measles back.
What unifies these groups are their moral values. According to moral foundations theory, moral reasoning in humans is based on five moral foundations: care, fairness, loyalty, authority, and purity.
Anti-vaxxers are so passionate and united across economic and political borders because the concept draws on all five of the moral foundations. Care of their children, fairness for vaccination choice, loyalty to their in-group, rejection of authority, and disgust at injecting a foreign agent into one’s body.
Knowing this, it becomes obvious as to why anti-vaxxers are so zealous about their views. This shit runs deep. In order to interact with someone like this, you need to understand that the traits that align them with an anti-vaxxer in group are also pervasive in how they view the world. Social media algorithms know this, and it’s why so many anti-vaxxers also buy into other conspiracy theories. The cognitive vulnerabilities are very similar.
Now that we understand the moral drivers behind an anti-vaxxer’s belief system, it’s time to meet them head-on. Antivaxx propaganda is similar to other conspiracy theory material. It’s carefully designed to elicit emotional responses. There’s no room for nuance with memes.
When you run into someone like this, you can’t immediately challenge someone and call them stupid. What good does that serve both parties? It just drives the wedge in further. Remember, your frame is yours and yours alone.
Instead, ask them why they think the way they do. Express concern and understanding for why they think the way they do. Based on the moral objections outlined a few paragraphs above, craft your approach with those in mind.
For example, if someone answers: “I think vaccines are dangerous because there’s formaldehyde in them.”
That’s a disgust response. People associate formaldehyde with preserving dead bodies, so it makes total sense that someone would be grossed out when they learn that vaccines contain formaldehyde.
So meet them head on with empathy: “Hey I totally get it — formaldehyde is used to preserve dead people so I can see why you’re grossed out. I used to be as well. But did you know that there’s more formaldehyde in a pear than a vaccine? See, our bodies actually make it naturally during metabolic processes, so you’ve got nothing to worry about. It’s just to help preserve the vaccine”.
If there’s still push back, I like to call out the tactics of propaganda they’re using. Don’t address the material; address the intent behind the material. Go meta on their ass.
Highlight why the material they’re sharing is flawed and what purpose it’s serving. Bring them along for the analysis and disarm them completely. Demonstrate how they’re being manipulated. Remember, these people value freedom and don’t want to submit to authority. In their eyes, they’re part of the resistance. Rebellion is why most internet subcultures form.
This is not foolproof. Social media and internet subcultures have legitimately ruined people’s lives and can be indirectly attributed to real world violence.
But my hope is that by having more reasoned discussions with people, things will slowly start to improve. You may even rescue someone from a subculture that’s inherently dangerous to themselves or others.
And to recap, you can keep this image handy to help as a reference point.
