Simple Question, Simple Answer

Charles Arthur waxes about the teh interwebs and those awful anonymongs who make it so nasty. You almost detect the undercurrent that something needs to be done about those nasty anonymongs –  as opposed to dealing with them oneself by deleting and banning, by ignoring them and if all else fails by dealing with either the site in question or their ISP.

But the police are less interested in people being simply antisocial online.

Well, no and nor should they be, because it isn’t a police matter. Someone saying something unpleasant is hardly the crime of the century now, is it? And we can deal with nasty words fairly successfully –  at the very least we can switch the computer off. If we get into the realm of stalking, then yes, the police will need to be involved, but mere antisocial comment (and I suspect what we mean here is unapproved or unacceptable comment as deemed so by the grauiandista).

(You can understand they might find, say, gang violence on the streets a higher priority.)

I should bloody well hope so. Oh, let’s see, what shall we respond to –  a gang fight involving stabbings and shootings or a bit of unpleasantness on the Internet? Of course, they might just decide that the latter is a lower risk and will still see their crime stats going in the right direction…

That leaves the rest of us to deal with those who find it very easy – pleasing, even – to do just that.

There you go, then –  that was simple, wasn’t it? We can do this, it is relatively easy and it is up to us to manage it as we see fit. That’s why social networking sites, blogs and fora have the facility to delete and ban miscreants. We don’t need the police and we don’t want them involved.

So should we all have to use our real names when we go online, to force us to respect each others’ boundaries?

No.

But then the internet’s own lack of boundaries stymies you.

No, it doesn’t. Delete and ban. Simple really –  even Arthur could manage it if he tried.

You can say things in the US that you can’t in the UK because of the First Amendment.

Which means that the US has a better understanding of the freedom of speech principle.

You can say things in the UK that you can’t in Saudi Arabia.

Yeah, well, Saudi is a raving theocracy, so isn’t something to aspire to, is it? That we are better than them isn’t exactly raising the bar very high, frankly.

If people live in the US and post on a British forum, which country tries them?

Hopefully, no one.

And anyway, there is value in making everyone equal through pseudonymity: it means that those who make the best arguments, marshal the best facts, should prevail in debates, and anyone can point out that an emperor has no clothes on.

And thus, the author answers his own question. As he acknowledges, it is possible to track people down if it becomes necessary –  I’ve done it when a troll just wouldn’t take a hint. But, most of the time, delete and ban does the trick.

So, just because it can be a bit rough out there, it doesn’t mean that anything needs to be done. We are adults, we can look after ourselves. We don’t need more legislations, we don’t need knights in shining armour riding in from Westminster doing something –  anything –  to fix what ain’t broke. Leave us alone –  that is all that is necessary.