The advice has long endured: “don’t feed the trolls.” Which is, essentially, don’t attempt to reason with someone immune to reason.
This made sense for Web 1.0 when everything was new and anonymous. That’s when we learned not to even read the comments section.
It made just as much sense in Web 2.0: the social media era. We learned that some people only serve to degrade conversation.
It doesn’t work now.
When the United States elected a man whose best skill was trolling, it stopped working.
Why?
Because, in a democratized internet, when the stranger on the other side of the screen has the same power as you, you really can ignore them.
The classic vision of the troll was a middle-aged man living in his parent’s basement, not the most powerful man in the world.
When a troll has no power in the real world, our response of ignoring them most often works. Because there is nothing the troll can do to make themselves be heard.
When the U.S. President and the world’s richest man are trolls, they quite literally can’t be ignored! They can raise a retaliatory army of followers. News outlets have to cover them. Their words and actions define public policy!
It’s time to update “don’t feed the trolls.”
Removing trolls from platforms has been remarkably effective. They can’t be eliminated, but ignoring them doesn’t do that, either. It has done the much better job of drastically reducing the impact of the most powerful.
It also means we have to affirmatively deal with trolling as a behavior. Ignoring trolls works on the individual basis when there are few of them. But it does little when trolling becomes a normalized communication strategy used by many people and by the powerful.
Content moderation has done wonders for social media. Even as it is unpopular with some and loathed by some others. It is imperfect, but will eventually help define the accepted rules of the game.
I’d rather not outsource all of that work to an algorithm.
Updating “Don’t feed the trolls” means
Learning about trolling,
Figuring out what the troll is trying to do,
Keeping the focus on the main subject, and
Rejecting the idea that the person is making a simple argument.
Trolls are fed by attention. But if we can’t ignore them, we must reject the trolling behavior itself.
And it takes an entire internet culture to stop feeding them.
Episode 38 of the Make Saints podcast: “The Biggest Challenge to Communication”
the episode script
The last few years have provided some real obstacles for our communities, neighborhoods, and families.
And one obstacle that I have heard a lot, perhaps more often than any other, has been communication.
The simple fact that in March 2020, we suddenly couldn’t be in the same room with each other felt devastating to us. Humans are social creatures. And we couldn’t sit at a table and share conversation over coffee. No proverbial water coolers to talk at.
And we all knew email wasn’t going to hack it.
As much as we adapted and tried new ways of connecting with one another, for many, it didn’t feel like enough. And in that way, it is easy to blame the pandemic itself, or the lack of face-to-face opportunities.
“It’s just not as good” we often say.
And yet, even as many of us got more and more face-to-face time, I would still hear about communication. Here we are! We fixed the problem, didn’t we? We’re meeting in the same room. We’re gathering face-to-face. So why didn’t the problem go away?
The problem isn’t a lack of communication. Or bad communication. It’s that we don’t understand communication.
Two Ways
There are two ways we communicate. Synchronous and asynchronous.
Synchronous means “existing or occurring at the same time”. So synchronous communication is the sort that happens all at once.
Being in the same room with another person, which many of us value for the nonverbal communication cues we get, is the epitome of synchronous communication. Because we’re all there together, experiencing the thing together.
Another example of this is a phone call, facetime, or zoom meeting. We are on the call at the same time.
Asynchronous is the opposite: not at the same time. Examples of this include letters, email, and text messages. Essentially, anything written or recorded means you have done it and someone else will receive it later than that.
The beauty of Asynchronous communication is that we can take our time to craft a message. While Synchronous benefits from spontaneity and timing, Asynchronous offers more specificity and planning.
Asynchronous communication also affords us brevity. If I take 30 minutes to craft a note or record a short video that will take someone else 5 minutes to read or watch, I’ve saved them twenty minutes of pleasantries and about 15 minutes of trying to explain the concept.
The difference between these two is paramount.
And there is genuine benefit to both. One is no better than the other. It’s just that one can be more valuable for certain situations than others.
For instance, we all prefer face-to-face, synchronous communication for bad news. We all publically mock the idea of breaking up via text. But there are times when you really do hope nobody picks up the phone so you can leave a 90 second message. I don’t need to talk to you, I just need to pass this info along! Similarly, I don’t want to interrupt you, but let you know that I need a Synchronous conversation at some point.
Voice mail is an example of Asynchronous communication using a medium that was designed to be Synchronous. See how this can mix us up?
So this is where it gets more complicated. Because the difference between Synchronous and Asynchronous is time.
One is at the same time and the other is not.
Which means the time when Synchronous communication happens is fixed and Asynchronous communication is fluid. It is simply not now. Asynchronous time is undefined.
Voicemail is Asynchronous because I can’t determine when you will listen to it. Same with instant messaging and texting. We can have a conversation, but it is never truly synchronous because it is never happening at once. It is only ever an exchange. And one that can occur over the course of a minute or a lifetime.
The challenge for Asynchronous communication is that its timing is completely unpredictable.
I can send you a text and expect you to see it, but that doesn’t mean you will. And it is my expectation that is faulty. I am not justified in getting mad at you for not responding to a text right away.
If the person sitting next to you doesn’t bother to listen, you are rightly angry. This violates the nature of Synchronous communication. But we can’t expect other people to respond to email and texts like they are in the room with us.
Asynchronous communication also offers us the faulty assumption that we’ve completed our work of communication by sending the message. I put “talk to Steve” on my to-do list, type up an email, hit send, and cross it off my list. Done!
Except that I have no assurance that Steve actually got the message. Or understands it.
But remember,
Synchronous is not better.
It is entirely different. It is expensive. People have to be in the same room, schedule time and other resources. They must be willing to small talk and connect and use our “soft skills”.
It requires a different kind of planning and has the challenge of happening live, so there is no edit button. You don’t get to take back what was said. Or a poor reaction. And often, you don’t get to plan every second of the moment. Because we’re dependent on others for what they offer.
But most importantly, it is genuinely different.
“That meeting should have been an email.”
I’m sure you’re familiar with the phrase: that should have been an email. The meeting was boring, one-sided, and really kind of useless. The kind of thing that took us 25 minutes to get to, only to have someone drone on for 30-45 minutes, and you walked out with notes that simply read:
“Get the mailing done by Friday.”
We also know the reverse. Any email exchange that requires a reply to the sender’s reply should have been a phone call.
I hate hate hate setting up appointments by email.
For one, I maybe check it once a day. So, if you’re trying to plan some junk out, it better be at least a week away if you’re using email. Because you’re going to send an email about availability and then I’ll get you some times and best case scenario, you’ll say OK.
But more often than not, we’re going to send no fewer than 6 emails to settle on something we could’ve solved with a five minute phone call.
You are wasting my time if you expect me to check my email a second time today. It is Asynchronous communication. If you want an answer, make time to get the answer.
This is the biggest challenge to communication right now:
We aren’t thoughtfully familiar with the difference between Synchronous and Asynchronous communication.
Communication tools like Slack and texting give us the feeling that we can have instant results from an Asynchronous tool. That we can do our part and then the other will do theirs.
Or we are demanding Synchronous for everything, making everything into a face-to-face meeting, even when Asynchronous tools are far more effective. And far less disruptive.
So the simplest way to improve our communication with one another right now is to get better at two things:
Identifying the difference between Synchronous and Asynchronous communication, remembering that
Synchronous are face-to-face meetings and phone calls and
Asynchronous is everything else: email, text, slack, social media and
Deploying the strategy that is more useful to the situation.
Doing those two things could dramatically improve your communication and the communication within any organization.
If you want to dive into the weeds on this idea, read Cal Newport’s A World Without Email.
But of course, this isn’t the only challenge to communication. And I’ll share the second biggest challenge to communication next week.
In the midst of the COVID-19 crisis, it’s tempting to think you have something specific to do. But you don’t. No matter what you read online.
We aren’t all homeschooling our kids just because they’re home. And it also happens that school would be now.
We don’t have to run church services from our homes. Some of us are, but you don’t have to.
But most of all, you don’t have to keep us all together. That isn’t on your shoulders.
Nor is there somebody else whose job it is to keep you connected just because we’re physically distancing ourselves. You aren’t a baby bird waiting to be fed.
In the church world, there’s a growing sense that if we aren’t physically allowed to do church together, then we have to do something. The funny thing is that, in a sense, the conversation ends there.
We must do something, right?
But what? And who actually knows?
There’s no playbook for this crisis. We don’t have an actual pattern to draw on. Unless you consider the mixed history of spreading pandemics by not social distancing.
But the beauty of having no playbook for a crisis that requires social distancing in the internet age is that we get to make it up as we go.
Some of us are expanding into virtual church. Some are hosting Bible studies and coffee hours. Churches are rediscovering phone trees and call lists. But literally none of these are necessary. These are all creative responses in the midst of crisis.
None of us has to do anything. Instead, perhaps we ask ourselves What do we get to do?
We start at the point of opportunity rather than after the expectation.
At the beginning, in the ’90s, there was a lot of trust.
It was new. People were just learning to express themselves.
Then there was little trust.
It quickly filled with swamp and opinion.
And then people started to do amazing things. Like Wikipedia and Huffpo. Organized, networked, and verified.
So trust is relative.
Believe
Nobody has ever actually believed you can trust anything because it was on the internet. But today, plenty of people believe you can trust nothing on the internet. Many distrust the internet out of hand.
What has always dogged our pursuit of truth (terrestrial and virtual) is the discriminatory impulse to pick and choose what to believe.
But distrust of the entire institution, like all institutions, is as naive and small-minded as that ridiculous idea:
That anyone trusts it because it’s the internet.
Literally no one does.
No, we trust specific parts of the internet because they are peer-reviewed and verified. Because the domain-ownership is secure and it’s a trusted brand. Or because journalists we trust are staking their reputations on it.
I don’t trust or distrust anything because it’s on the internet.
I trust the person who wrote it, the institutions who fund it, and the researchers who do the legwork. Trust isn’t about the medium, but the messenger.
I listen to a lot of podcasts and subscribe to even more. If you don’t, you’re missing out.
For those who know the “NPR moment” well: imagine having them any time! Or perhaps every time you are in your car. Imagine hearing the show from the beginning all the way to the end!
For those whose Pandora stations have gotten stale: there are whole new worlds to explore while exercising.
For you! There really is something for everyone!
You don’t have to love internet radio as much as I do. But if you want to explore what it has to offer, I suggest checking out some of these: a few of my favorite podcasts for this first Friday of Easter.
noise-cancel the world and listen to some sweet theology!
Faith / Religion / Spirituality
Homebrewed Christianity & Theology Nerd Throwdown – Seriously good theology and discussions with a wide cross-section of the Christian academic world. Even though they use a lot of big words and move through concepts fast, listening regularly can be a seriously faith-shaping experience. My absolute favorite religious podcast.
The Moonshine Jesus Show – a practical show by two religious leaders. Mark’s a Presbyterian and David’s Episcopalian. They love the Kingdom, they love to explore, and one of them loves vestments.
The Via Media Collective – a collection of podcasts with an Anglican Sensibility, including Easter People, The Collect Call, and Padre’s Pods– An interview show hosted by Sean Maloney, an Episcopal priest and a friend.
Stories / Creativity
99% Invisible – My absolute favorite podcast. Hosted by Roman Mars, 99PI focuses on design and the design elements in our world that we don’t even notice. Like why American bank notes (the dollar) are absolutely atrocious design and the real reason LA never got a subway system. You have to listen.
This American Life – and all its friends – Perhaps the best thing on public radio, This American Life tells true stories on a common theme. There are some great shows that have a similar sensibility. Think of these as If you like This American Life, you should check out… Serial(of course), TLDR, Reply All, and StartUp.
Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me! – As much as This American Life is the best show on public radio, Wait Wait is my favorite one to listen to. It is a comedy game show about the world’s news.
Current Events
On the Media – My favorite news show is a news show about the news shows. Another public radio favorite.
The Gist – Mike Pesca’s week-daily news show is smart, contemporary, and always on target.
