“ONE ILL-JUDGED TWEET GETS RETWEETEDDISAPPROVINGLY, GOES VIRAL ANDWITHIN DAYS THE ORIGINAL TWEETER ISA PARIAH, RECEIVING DEATH THREATSAND LOSING THEIR JOB”2 other. Then in 1976, the psychologist Professor Ed Diener gave
1,300 children the opportunity to steal sweets and money, while
they were trick-or-treating on Halloween. They stole significantly
more when their identity wasn’t known. They also stole more
when they were in groups rather than flying solo. Heym says
that people are more likely to exhibit angry, aggressive behaviour
in crowds, too. “People feel less identifiable, and we feel more
confined and intruded into our personal space,” she says.
In this way, the infectious anger of Twitter mobs is all too
familiar, and it’s a terrifying force. One ill-judged tweet gets
retweeted disapprovingly, goes viral and within days the original
tweeter is a pariah, receiving death threats and losing their job.
Meanwhile, the angry tweeters are gleefully getting high on mass
righteous justification. If you fire off an angry tweet, getting
liked and retweeted might further stoke your rage, which can
be thrilling in itself, or it might cheer you up so much that you
don’t even feel angry any more. “Anger is quite a sensational
emotion,” says Balick. “There can be a snowball effect where
you become attached to the exciting sensation you get through
your newsfeed, even if it’s an unpleasant emotion like anger, and
that that’s pretty much what emotional contagion is.”
But is Twitter configured to keep the anger flowing? “I don’t
know about intentional design,” says Balick. “What I do know
is that hot emotions that set hearts racing, such as anger, fear
and sex, tend to be more contagious.” If these topics tend to get
passed around more, it’s likely that algorithms will exacerbate
the contagion.
While people might get a kick out of venting on Twitter, Balick
doesn’t think it’s productive. “Processing anger is productive,” he
says. For example, if you get angry with someone for continuously
poking you, and they apologise, this is processing. Talking about
it with a friend or partner would also help you process it. “To
just shout out into the streets, ‘I hate it when people poke me,’
triggering other people to say, ‘I hate it when they poke me too!’FEATURE WHY ARE WE SO ANGRY?WHEN
INFECTIOUS
ANGER LEADS TO
PUBLIC SHAMING
In2013, Justine Sacco, a 30-year-old
senior PR officer, flew from New York to
South Africa to visit family. Frazzled
from travelling, she sent a flurry of
sardonic tweets to her 170 followers
ahead of boarding a connecting flight at
Heathrow. It was one she says she
intended to mock her white privilege
that got her into trouble: “Going to
Africa. Hope I don’t get AIDS. Just
kidding. I’m white!”
When she landed 11 hours later,
#HasJustineLandedYet was trending on
Twitter. Members were calling her racist,
demandingshe loses her job and
thrilling over the thought of her face
when she switched her phone on upon
landing. Someone duly photographed
her after she landed and posted that on
Twitter too. She subsequently lost her
job and became a pariah.
This toxic call-out culture has become
somewhat of the norm online.
Celebrities are being regularly ‘cancelled’
(which means losing their followers as
people stop supporting) over ill-judged
tweets, and many more ordinary people
have been fired, even receiving rape and
death threats.
What possesses individuals to be so
quick to judge and shame? “When you
are engaged in social media, it almost
feels like it’s happening just in your
head, so you’re likely to be less
inhibited,” says psychotherapist Dr
Aaron Balick. Sometimes, however,
people jump in deliberately, “to get off
on the energy,” or they are seduced by
the chance to “bond over giving a
righteous justification.”
In October 2019, the former US
president Barack Obama spoke out
against call-out culture. He said that on
social media, “[People think] the way of
me making change is to be as
judgmental as possible about other
people, and that’s enough ... [but] that’s
not activism, that’s not bringing about
change. If all you’re doing is casting
stones, you are probably not going to get
that far.”
CASE ST U DY