There’s been a lot of hullabaloo lately in the mainstream media and in the blogosphere about “civility” amongst bloggers and their commenters. What started as a story about technology blogger Kathy Sierra receiving salacious, crude, misogynist comments and death threats has turned into a sort-of crusade by some bellwether bloggers to address the apparent online civility gap. Today, the NYTimes reported that Tim “web 2.0” O’Reilly and Jimmy “Wikipedia” Wales have set to work crafting a non-binding, self-imposed “Blogger’s Code of Conduct.”
In typical blogosphere fashion, the debate surrounding this issue has morphed to the point where it no longer has anything to do with the problem of online civility per se. Rather, the debate is about whether the proposed Code is…
- a despicable, free-speech squashing, politically correct, whiny, abridgement of our Internet-given right to be assholes, or…
- just a bad idea.
Bloggers, many of whom I respect, like this one, and some of whom I do not, like this one, are up in arms (if keyboards and TypePad accounts count for “arms”) over this wiki/document saying that it’s at worst a first step down the slippery slope toward online speech restrictions, and at best a really dumb idea that will never work.
I’m going to break ranks and come out in support of the Code, albeit with a heavy caveat. So if you’re game to hear my argument, first read the Code wiki (bearing in mid that it is subject to change – being a wiki and everything).
Now there are going to be some who will want to parse the language of the Code. How does one define "troll," for example, or who decides what counts as an "ad hominem attack?" Remember though, this Code is strictly opt-in. Nobody is going to act as the arbiter of the Code. It would be up to each of us to decide for ourselves how best to interpret the document (or to ignore it). The point is not to create a rule book so much as it is to shift the culture (more on this in a minute).
By saying that we are going to blog by the Code, we are saying that we recognize that there is some online behavior that is socially unacceptable. We're saying that we acknowledge that online culture has it's own set of norms (Danah Boyd would call them "social scripts") just like real life (RL) does. So: just as we can (mostly) agree that it's not socially acceptable to walk up to someone on the street and call them a "fucking douche" in RL (even though it may be perfectly legal to do so), so we might also agree on certain behaviors that are (or should be) similarly frowned upon online. Where those lines will be drawn is still being worked out and that's what this Code is all about -- figuring out what we mostly agree is and is not okay. We will never all agree on the vagaries -- we don't all agree on RL social norms either, and pushing back against those societal norms is not only fun (DanZ!), it's absolutely necessary in a free society. So it will be with this Code or whatever online social scripts result from it and the discussion it engenders.
So if the goal is to steer the ship -- to shift the online culture in a way that lifts up the level of discourse and benefits the most people -- who better to lead the way than O'Reilly and Wales, two online bellwethers who are already responsible for some considerable online culture shifts? If they could get Cory Doctorow and Amanda Congdon on board they'd get the job done in a hurry.
For an example of successful online culture-shifting, just look at the netroots' attitude toward DRM and copyright law. It appears that the average netizen's stance on copyright issues is extremely liberal compared to that of most other folks. Take a look at the discussions raging at ars technica for a sense of the wind direction w/r/t copyright and DRM. I think this attitude is a direct result of alpha-bloggers calling foul on bad law (the DMCA) and bad product design (malicious DRM that treats customers like criminals). Now, online culture is widely united in its opinions about DRM. So it could be with online civility. If the "cool kids" are doing it, others will follow suit.
CAVEAT
There is, of course, the potential for backlash. Remember back in the late 80s (I'm showing my age here), right around the time the environmental movement got it's shot in the arm? People started talking about being "socially conscious," by which they meant, "let's start paying attention to other people's feelings for a change and stop being so self-centered and mean-spirited." College campuses -- the incubators of social change -- took the attitude farther than was probably prudent by instituting hate speech policies and ask-before-you-kiss rules and whatnot and soon the political right was throwing around the pejorative term "politically correct" to describe those who would squash your God-given right to be a racist dick. Remember, no legislative change had been proposed -- it was strictly a backlash against a prevailing culture of niceness. "How dare these politically correct liberal bleeding hearts call me a racist dick for using the word 'nigger!' They're abridging my freedom of speech," the racist dicks would say. Using the term "politically correct" became a get-out-of-jail-free card for every misogynist, racist homophobe with a big mouth. The culture shifted back so hard that even expressing your personal displeasure with "fag jokes" meant you were a politically correct culture Nazi out to muzzle the entire concept of freedom of expression.
Believe it or not, it is possible to be both personally against certain types of speech, and 100% in favor of strong freedom of speech protections. Evelyn Beatrice Hall's paraphrasing of Voltaire seems appropriate here: "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
But I fear the cognitive dissonance of the above paragraph may be too much for many people and they will perceive the Blogger's Code of Conduct as an attack on their freedom of expression rather than what it really is: an extension and refinement of it. Nobody is suggesting enforceable rules of any kind. Nobody is going to take away your ability to moderate your own blog as you see fit. The very fact that we're talking about it at all may be enough to wake people up a bit so that the quality of online discourse is affected positively overall, or there may come a ferocious backlash wherein even calling someone a "troll" becomes a badge of the speech oppressors.
/my2c.
UPDATE: More food for thought...
