LESSONS OF INTERNET BURLING

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

First, about six months ago, I spoke to a teenager who was being bullied on the Internet. Then I read the story of a teenager, Amanda Todd, who was hunted to suicide by a huge virtual crowd on the Internet. Then, a couple of months later, I talked to a psychologist whom one of his former clients began to harass online, trying to involve several more people in this harassment. Plus on the "live" he watched as the persecution unfolded against another psychologist. The Internet is a good space, but the trouble is that it provides space not only for the good, but also for all sorts of psychopaths and unbalanced people who have a huge stage for “self-expression”. I talked and shared my experience of cyberbullying, which unfolded against me in 2011-2013. And it seems to me that this experience of cyberbullying and the lessons I have learned for myself may be useful to someone else.

Without going into details, I will describe the situation itself: in 2011, in response to a critical article in LiveJournal, one pseudo-psychological organization launched a mini-war against me on the Internet, the main goal of which was my personal and professional discrediting on the Internet and beyond (how it seems to many people that if they discredit a person, then they discredit her arguments). Articles were written and widely circulated that I am a crook, homosexual / "propagandist of homosexuality" and a pedophile in one bottle, a slave trader, a crook; all my Internet resources (Skype, social networks, e-mail) were hacked twice, anonymous letters from “outraged citizens” came to work (I was still teaching at the university), allegedly reviews from “victims” of my “harassment "of students. Well, and a number of smaller nasty things. How did I experience this? Judging from the outside - well, he seemed to be ironic about it. And internally … It's hard. What happens when, day after day, you discover how a lot of people (or so it seems) are clever enough to vilify you?

Shame. There is no escape from it - sticky, burning, gnawing from the inside and squeezing all the insides into a solid black hole. It would be fine if they insulted me personally - this is quite “worrisome”. But this is the shame that arises in a situation when the crowd runs through the streets and shouts something like "did you know that such and such did such and such a thing ?!" And it doesn't matter that "so-and-so" is sucked out of a finger, invented or blown up to the size of an elephant - the main thing is that people hear this and begin to look at you with a slightly different expression in their eyes. I think we are all familiar with the situation of having to prove that you are not a camel in response to someone's slander. And here you are no longer a camel - but a molester and pedophile in alliance with a swindler and a human trafficker. At some point, it became scary to somehow prove themselves on the Internet - it seems that a huge crowd is just waiting for this moment to cackle, poking fingers at you. "Aha, here he is!" Any situation in which the attention of a large number of people is suddenly attracted to us is quite stressful, and for that very reason …

It was like I was branded as a leper. The shame was complemented by two more moments that accompany the bullying and made this situation very traumatic for me.

a) Feeling the process is out of control and one's own complete powerlessness. To file a lawsuit? On whom? Dozens of anonymous accounts with obfuscated IPs? To file a lawsuit with the complete inertia of law enforcement agencies? When lawyers keep repeating about the futility of the case? “Well, if you are going to wave the court order, which says that“the information contained in the article “So-and-so is a defender of pedophilia!” Is not true - so what?”. And the truth - so what?

b) Generalization of the perception of the situation. There is a feeling that all people in the world already know about this story, even those who pass by into the store. As soon as you light up your face or say your name - and that's it, they recognize you and giggle (in the face or around the corner). It's irrational, but that's how toxic, toxic shame works. And it also seems that this is forever. That you will never wash off this stain, that people will always remember what happened, wherever you go. And also the feeling that this persecution will never end. She is forever. No exit. The world is bad, you are bad, and there is no way out - these are three thoughts that lead to depression.

The shame and melancholy that flood the consciousness lead to two more assumptions, again reinforcing this damn shame. First assumption: people will believe everything that is written in these "revealing" articles / comments … That they will not understand what is what (and this is often the case) - but they will immediately take it on faith. And, moreover, they will well remember your name and face right off the bat, and you will not be some nameless psychologist for them, about whom someone wrote some nasty thing (and the devil knows if the truth is there or not) - but exactly the one who is the libertine and propagandist. Second assumption: people care about it … Everyone cares about someone calling someone on the Internet so and so.

And, as if this cocktail is not enough - is added self-deprecation … “There was no need to get into all this at all!”, “Why did I write this article !?”, “Why can't I just pick up and score on all this, I'm a psychologist !?”, “My loved ones also suffer from this! Victimblaming (“it’s your fault that you were treated this way”)? I have it! There were certainly well-wishers whom I could not fucking send back then, with comments like “Forget it, this is nonsense!” bullying you can discover your weaknesses”and other winners of the competition for the most dumb commentary.

The world shrinks to the limits of the monitor. And the Internet - to the limits of bullying. There is nothing outside of it. There is no future, there is no way to return the good name. Everyone is against you, how do you get out? How to continue living without curling up in endless shame, how to find the strength to straighten up and again and again present to people in conditions when bullying emotionally bends into a ram's horn?

The main enemy is not the ones who persecute. It is useless to fight this legion of ants - having spent your strength on one, you will no longer find the strength for the next ten. The main thing is shame, powerlessness and generalization, which kill the will to fight and live.

Shame. Shame does not arise when we do something bad. Shame arises when people turn away from us. It rises to transcendental values, when it seems that everyone has turned away. Therefore, it is important - sometimes even vital - to find support in family, friends, and colleagues. Find those who will not turn away from you. For me personally, the most supportive were two messages that I received in different forms from those who were around.

a) “I know you personally - and I know that it is not so. I know that you are not like that. And I'm ready to talk about it, if need be."

b) “If someone believes this nonsense that is being said about you, or does not even try to check it, then thank God that you will not intersect with these people anywhere. You are just from different worlds."

No "forget it!" - this, on the one hand, infuriates incredibly (“you yourself would have tried, you are our enlightened, to hammer”), and on the other hand, it undermines the determination to do something. An attempt to "score", to pretend that you are above all this, not to react in any way, will sooner or later turn into an explosion, because we are social beings, and only psychopaths with antisocial personality disorder can completely (and without psychological consequences) ignore bullying. For the rest, ignorance is fraught with illness.

Talking to friends, no "it's okay", "I'm great," and so on. Because hiding the fact of bullying convinces the body that you - and exactly you - have done something shameful. Otherwise, why are you hiding? It is only important that friends and relatives do not have those messages about which I wrote above.

And it was also important not to enter into dialogue with those who organize this persecution, support or “doubt” your adequacy, demanding proof that you are not a camel. There is no need to try to oppose them directly, enter into correspondence, respond, endure insults, cope with the approaching despair, bumping into a blank wall out of their misunderstanding and a dull desire to mock. This burns up an already small emotional resource, and encourages those who persecute them to continue. It was my mistake, and I did not realize it right away, unfortunately - but not too late either.

Impotence. Learned helplessness syndrome, based on the feeling that you will never and never be able to influence the situation - one of the most destructive for the psyche. Something needs to be done, even if the effect of this is small - the very fact that you are protecting yourself is important. The only question is what exactly to do. In LiveJournal, I created a community that I used simply to refute the articles that were written about me. The very fact of this work turned out to be healing for me, released the energy of anger and made me confident that at least something I could oppose to the dregs that are splashing out on the Internet. If someone was interested - I just gave the link - and that's it. In addition, in my LJ I sometimes published small informative posts, and on the front page I posted a note that if you find something out of the ordinary about me, go to this page, it will be clear where these legs grow from.

In addition, these my articles and materials were a striking contrast for those who still wanted to see what kind of demon in the flesh is. People expected to see some kind of psycho, but it turned out - a normal, adequate person. I knew about this contrast, and it gave me confidence that, thanks to it, people would even more doubt what had been written about me.

I also wrote a couple of materials about this bullying organization (one of them at the request of the psychological community in LiveJournal), and also went to a scientific conference on pseudoscience, where I spoke about them. How reasonable was that? This move was ambiguous. I think that from the point of view of stimulating confrontation and persecution, this is not the right decision - the malice from the other side has grown even more, since there was a certain effect from this. But this was already the second year of the confrontation, when I came to my senses a little, and this retaliatory blow was made for my own sake. For self-esteem. To release the accumulated anger and hatred into a more constructive version - yes, a little revenge … Another thing is that these materials, as a rule, influenced those who even without me doubted the teachings of my "opponents", and did not influence the fans in any way, therefore I moved away from the idea of fighting something in the name of something. What is closer to me now is not struggle, but simple enlightenment. The voice of reason is quiet, it is not difficult to outburst it, but if this voice does not subside, it often breaks through when the loud enemies get tired.

Generalization. It seems that the brand is on you forever. And that they will never calm down, they will rage until the end of their lives. And that everyone believes in the nonsense they wrote about you. And that everyone cares about you … But when the first wave of shame receded for a while, I began to try to find support in reality, knowing that emotions greatly distort our perception. And I gradually realized a few things.

- Storms on the Internet are, most often, storms in a teacup. It seemed to me that a lot of people were involved in the persecution, but when I counted them, I counted about two dozen. Well, a few hundred more - or even thousands - of people have read it all. Several thousand - into millions. And most of these hundreds are those with whom you would never have crossed paths anywhere without this persecution. A significant part of my current subscribers do not know anything at all about what a terrible scammer and slave trader I am:)). And there were even more people who were not interested in this "srach" at all. The psychologist and some murky types are wetting each other? Well, to hell with them, we are not interested.

- I realized that I am not the navel of the Earth. As for the specific me, most of those who read the "revelations" do not care. I was some kind of psychologist whose name was not remembered or which was forgotten after two or three days at most. The consciousness of people is excited by such scandals, but it also quickly cools down or these impressions are interrupted by new, fresh ones. Tell me, how much do you remember the public scandals that took place last year, and who was their defendant (except for very well-known personalities who are constantly in sight)?

- I realized that there are much more critically thinking people than I thought. On the Internet, many people expressed distrust of what was written already at the stage of acquaintance with the revelations. Many were influenced by their acquaintance with my materials or blogs. And among those who picked up hysteria and bullying, there was not a single person with whom I would like to communicate.

How are things now? A couple of bots sometimes still follow me on the network, and where someone leaves a link to my materials about this pseudo-psychological sect, they generate tons of "compromising evidence". In most cases, it is completely fruitless … Or some of the real "fans" of the teachings of this organization reproachfully try to shame me with bad words addressed to their guru, completely ignoring all the words about bullying. I meet some characters in the comments on LiveJournal, those who were in that organization, worked for it and were aware of the bullying (or even participated in it). I pass by - I despise them, the people who hide behind these accounts, but I give my disgust to keep me away from them.

And so - there is life after all this. And this is not forever.