SURVEY ON MANNERS
A new survey shows 80 per cent of people believe cellphones and tablets are making us less civil to one another.
H ave you ever caught your lunch date surreptitiously texting under the table while pretending to be enthralled by your conversation?
Or posted a favourite photo from a party only to have someone you don’t even know mock you, calling you fat and ugly? You’re not alone.
Three out of five people who use social media say at least a few times a month someone is rude to them. And the rudeness doesn’t stop online.
Technology was blamed by more than 80 per cent of people surveyed by Insights West as the cause of our growing incivility, making it the No. 2 reason ( behind parents not teaching their kids manners) that people think we are becoming less civil to each other.
“The No. 1 issue, at 93 per cent, is parents failing to teach their children properly and the second is technology,” said Mario Canseco, vice-president, public affairs at Insights West.
“When we didn’t have this type of technology, we seemed to get along much better,” he said. “We were probably saying good morning to the guy at the coffee shop.”
Instead we’re hidden behind our cellphones and other gadgets, tweeting, posting, texting and SnapChatting with our virtual friends while ignoring the world around us. Or worse — letting the door slam in their face.
And when we’re not face-to-face, there is much lost in our interactions.
Dr. Joti Samra, an adjunct professor in psychology at Simon Fraser University and a clinical psychologist with a private practice in Yaletown, said the predominant component of our communication is non-verbal. It could be the tone of our voice, body posture, or other signals that can only be picked up when we are talking, not texting, tweeting or interacting online.
“When we’re limited to words, we lose the non-verbal component,” said Samra. “And often messaging gets lost in translation.”
Added to that is the speed and brevity of texts and online posts.
“In the Twitter age you are communicating a message in 140 characters,” said Samra. “We are losing the art of conversation, we’re learning to communicate in very short sound bites.”
And Samra said we can be so engaged with our online world that we ignore the people we are with in the real world.
“How often do you see four people sitting in a restaurant and all four are on their phones?” she said.
“All of these factors can contribute to incivility and disrespect.”
And the stats can’t be blamed on old folks just not understanding the digital age.
While 85 per cent of people aged 55 and over blame technology for our bad manners, 82 per cent of those ages 18 to 34 say the same and 86 per cent of those aged 35 to 54 point to technology as a culprit.
When it comes to online incivility, younger people seem to suffer most.
Some 70 per cent of those aged 18 to 34 said someone has written rude posts on their Facebook wall, posted nasty tweets directed at them or otherwise been rude to them online. That drops to 60 per cent among those aged 34 to 55 and among the 55-plus set who are on social media, only 39 per cent say they have noticed people being rude to them online.
At 16, Erinne Paisley has been on Facebook for three years, she uses Instagram, has Twitter and Tumblr accounts. She says social media doesn’t cause rudeness but makes it easier to be rude.
“On social media there is the disconnect issue. When you’re on social media you’re not saying something to a person’s face, so it’s a lot easier to be rude.
“I don’t think we can blame social media for people’s rudeness. It’s not like those thoughts are created from social media but they are voiced through social media, which gives an easier platform to voice those thoughts.”
Paisley said it also intensifies bullying, whether through school cliques or people launching online attacks against public figures and others they don’t even know.
Is social media making us rude? Or just giving us a forum to show our true colours?
Simon Fraser University communication professor Peter ChowWhite suggests the latter. “Some people like to be a jerk. I bet you 10 bucks people who are jerks online are jerks in real life,” he said. “It says more about the personality than it does about the communication itself.” Chow-White said he is still shocked at just how racist, sexist and homophobic online communication still is. Rather than being separate from the way people behave in real life, online behaviour only reflects attitudes that are now more hidden. While it may be risky for someone to launch an offensive rant on a crowded bus, the risk is much lower in the online environment where you can be anonymous, he pointed out.
“It’s good they’re not comfortable to do that in public anymore, but it has not gone away — it has just gone underground,” said Chow-White.
“Technology doesn’t cause anything,” he said. “It’s not an actor in society, it doesn’t have its own will, its own mind or anything like that. We do things with technology, it augments our activities.
“Does it give more avenues for people to express meanness? Absolutely. You go to the YouTube comments, go to all the comment pages and this is where all the sexist, the racist, the nasty people come out and they hide behind anonymous identities.”
The YouTube comments section, known for being an online cesspool of the darkest, most offensive rants, is undergoing a cleanup. YouTube has announced a number of changes to its comments, including new tools to allow video creators to moderate comments and select who can see the comments.
People’s perception that technology and social media are eroding our civility also reflects the fact that the technological changes are still fairly new to us, according to Chow-White.
“Technology and social media are still a source of anxiety for people,” he said. “The Internet and social media especially haven’t quite faded to the background. We don’t have these conversations about people’s behaviour on telephones.”
Kris Krug, a Vancouver photographer and longtime digerati who built his first website in 1995, echoes Chow-White’s contention that the online world only reflects our real world thoughts and behaviour. “I don’t think the technology changes core human nature,” he said.
The online world also lacks the nuances that you get in face-to-face conversations, said Krug.
“Try being sarcastic, it doesn’t carry well online,” he said. “It’s lacking context and the non-verbal cues.”
Krug said the online world tended to be a more civil place back in the day when it required particular skills to engage online.
“The Internet has reduced the barrier to entry on many things, it has lowered the barriers to entry for being rude to people, or leaving your rudeness there for the world to see. There is also definitely a feeding frenzy effect.”
American Caitlin Seida was a victim of that frenzy when a Halloween photo she posted on her Facebook page went viral. Writing about the experience recently on Salon.com in a story headlined “My embarrassing picture went viral,” Seida wrote about how a photo of her dressed up as Lara Croft: Tomb Raider was lifted from her Facebook page and reposted on numerous social media sites.
“So I laughed it all off at first — but then, I read the comments,” wrote Seida, who said her struggles with polycystic ovarian syndrome and a failing thyroid gland cause her to be overweight despite a healthy diet and exercise. “What a waste of space,” read one. Another: “Heifers like her should be put down.” Yet another said I should just kill myself “and spare everyone’s eyes.”
Seida was able to track down a number of her attackers through their Facebook profiles, which surprised them, she said.
Nicky Jackson Colaco, privacy and safety manager for Facebook, said her company has taken the position that the site should have real identities.
“We think when people use their real names they are more likely to be accountable for their actions and be less likely to do things or say things that they wouldn’t say in the offline world,” said Jackson Colaco, who wasn’t commenting on Seida’s case but on the question of civility and social media.
Jackson Colaco said just as parents teach their children to show compassion in real life, children must learn compassion in the online world.
“I think as the Internet grows and as we see more people using social media, we will see a lot more attention paid to the idea of compassion online,” she said.
Peter Cavan, whose job heading up external communications at Pulse Energy includes digital strategy and social media, said technology and social media can amplify emotions.
“Technology and social media can certainly make negativity more visible,” he said. And social media amplifies messages instantly, giving no time for second thoughts.”
When it comes to our obsession with technology, behaviours that once might have been considered rude are now the norm.
Naima Salemohamed, a student at the University of Victoria, points out that while texting or checking Facebook on your smartphone in high school may be frowned upon, it’s hardly noticed at university.
“Nobody is going to say anything to you, it has just become the norm,” she said.