We convince by our presence. –Walt Whitman
Good morning Gentle Reader. As a tap root that supports our exploration this morning I offer us four definitions. These, of course, are not the only definitions available to us – and that, as they say, ‘is the rub.’ This morning, Gentle Reader, I invite you to hold the four I offer today.
Freedom = the condition of being able to do, say or think whatever you want to
License = excessive freedom; freedom without responsibility
Responsibility = moral accountability
Empathy = the ability to share someone else’s feelings or experiences by imagining what it would be like to be in that person’s situation; caring about people and acting responsibly on that care, not just for yourself, but for others.
Consider this: We tend to judge the value of the information provided us by the quality of the source. This guiding principle is negated today by social media and our ability to employ social media anonymously. We have the license to slander, to dehumanize, to attack, to bully, to lie, to misrepresent (the list could go on and on). We defend this by invoking the concepts of ‘freedom’ and ‘freedom of speech.’
Traditionally, the value of information was enhanced or debased not so much by its content, as by the authority we vested in the author/messenger. We still vest authors and messengers with authority – that is, we ‘trust them.’ And at the same time there continues to be a dramatic increase in the number of folks who ‘trust’ the author or messenger that choose to remain anonymous.
Anonymous communication is distorted communication. On the other hand, consider that almost all communication in our society is distorted communication (freedom from distortion requires equality of participation – a participation rooted in the moral commitment to ‘seek first to understand’ and then second ‘to seek to be understood’ – as imperfect beings this ‘ideal’ is not attainable).
Consider, Gentle Reader, that what really matters today – in the age of social media anonymity – is not freedom of speech but personal moral responsibility rooted in empathy. This is the alternative. Currently we embrace what Bauman calls a license for irresponsibility. This, it seems to me, is an enormously large and venomously deadly ant-social, anti-empathic, pro-destructive dis-ease that is allowed to run amok among us.
Social-Media has become a weapon of mass destruction fed by a tap root of anonymity and license. Generally, in cultured societies, the more potentially deadly the weapon, the more difficult it should be to obtain a permission to possess it.
Social-Media (along with the bygone ‘Wild-Wild West’) is, today, a stark exemption to the ‘weapon rule’ that is widely assumed to be indispensable for the sustaining of a civilized life. Slander, invective, calumny, slur, smear, casting aspersion, defaming, marginalizing, demeaning and bullying belong in the arsenal of social-media rooted in the ‘anonymous.’ This is not only deadly to the person; it is deadly to our society.
It is a paradox (or is it ironic) that the aforementioned dis-eases are crimes in the ‘off-line’ life (think: ‘real life’) and yet they are not crimes in the ‘on-line’ life.
Which ‘life’ – the on-line or the off-line – will assimilate the other? The dominant one will assimilate the other and the rules of the one being assimilated will be adjusted, if not negated. We already experience that the ‘on-line’ is increasing its dominance over the ‘off-line’ – license is trumping moral responsibility and freedom and our ability to be empathic (especially with the ‘other’ – the ‘stranger’). With license, everyone can become a killer – and remain anonymous.
As Hannah Arendt noted many years ago: license without moral responsibility means ‘responsibility of nobody.’
“The logic is simple: Empathy is why we have the values of freedom, fairness, and equality — for everyone, not just for certain individuals. If we put ourselves in the shoes of others, we will want them to be free and treated fairly. Empathy with all leads to equality: no one should be treated worse than anyone else. Empathy leads us to democracy.” –George Lakoff
Searcher-Seeker 