We love our commentariat, and, of course, the Harpies all met—first on-line and then IRL—because we were commenters on Jezebel. But the truth is, as Michelle pointed out in her post earlier this month on the Awl: “Internet commenters (and I’ve been one! Still am!) are assholes; on this I think we can all agree.”
More and more sites—especially news sites—are figuring this out, which prompted a story today on CNN whose headline read: “News sites reining in nasty user comments:”
User comments on news sites, while vital to interactive storytelling in the digital age, often read like scribblings on a bathroom stall: anonymous, offensive and full of hate.
Rants…prompted a Buffalo, New York, newspaper to discontinue anonymous user comments on its website as of August 2. Commenters will be required to register with their name, city of residence and phone number — more information than most news sites require — and staffers will attempt to verify their identities.
PhDork once described the comments section of both the (liberal) New York Daily News and the (not-liberal) New York Post as being the intellectual equivalent of “monkeys flinging their poo at the wall.” Even in a large city like New York, the vitriol—racist, misogynist, neighbor-on-neighbor hateration—in the comments on local news stories can be astonishing. In smaller cities, it’s even more likely that you know the person flaming you anonymously, or snarking on you, your family, your church, your home, etc. Things can spin out of control pretty quickly. So if a news site—or any site—is interested in maintaining some reasonable level of civil discourse, what are they to do?
The debate over inflammatory online comments always seems to boil down to whether users should be allowed to post anonymously….
“With no name attached, the commenters basically wear a hood and swing a sharp axe,” said Robert Steele, director of the Janet Prindle Institute for Ethics at Depauw University. “The intent in allowing and encouraging these comments online is to increase page views and time spent on the site. It’s a business motivation.” (ed: O hai, Nick Denton.)
I suspect that if everyone had to attach his or her real name, the comments would be a very quiet place indeed. There’s a hell of a lot we’ll share anonymously—good, positive, supportive or enlightening stuff—that we wouldn’t tell a roomful of strangers if someone handed us a microphone. And of course, most trolls, or just plain internet assholes, wouldn’t spew their vitriol unless they can hide behind anonymity. There’s also the issue of safety. There are a lot of wackos out there and the internet—Google especially—will expose you to way more of them than your meat-space will. Would you risk letting everyone know who you are and where you live?
Some Buffalo News users have already expressed concerns for their personal safety if their names and hometowns are posted along with their comments.
Wrote one user, “I’d rather not take the chance that some lunatic does not agree with my point of view and tries to tell me that face to face.”
This actually happened to me last year. I had posted some comments on a Jezebel article about a Modern Love column, pointing out the rather obvious creepiness and misogyny in the author’s essay. The author of the column saw my comments, and while they weren’t especially mean or snarky—or different from other commenters’ comments on the article—he took offense and googled my commenter name, which led him to this site. He then launched a barrage of hostile and vaguely threatening e-mails and comments. I ignored the e-mails and blocked him from the site, figuring there was nothing to be gained by engaging with someone so obviously hostile—and with a prison record (which was one of the things mentioned in the Modern Love essay). When I didn’t respond, the e-mails continued, becoming even more unhinged, and the dude began copying them to the other Harpies, and even Anna Holmes, the editor-in-chief of Jezebel.
Creepy dude’s e-mails and general creepiness were alarming enough that I consulted with a former prosector who specialized in stalking crimes. His advice, which I’ll pass along in case you ever need it, was to send a brief e-mail saying “I’ve read your e-mails. I do not wish to have any further contact with you. I ask that you not e-mail me again.” Once that’s done, if the dude continued to send them, I would have some recourse under New York’s anti-stalking laws. I did send that message, and the e-mails immediately stopped (possibly because, having been in the system, the dude recognized what I was doing by sending that e-mail.) But it was very disturbing at the time, and I was extremely grateful that the creepy dude only knew me as BeckySharper, and that there was no way he could connect my commenter name with my real one.
Personally, I’m in favor of open anonymous commenting, provided it’s moderated. I think there’s more benefit than risk. It’s easy enough for a site to block trolls or ban commenters who continuously violate commenting policy—we have certainly done our fair share of both here—but I suspect most sites don’t have enough staff to handle the job, especially local newspapers, which are run by skeleton crews these days anyhow.
Just out of curiosity, how many of you would comment under your own names—on this site or any other? Is there an ideal way to handle commenting or do we just need to make it up on a case-by-case basis? Go ahead and…y’know…comment…
If you are confident enough to have an opinion, you should be confident enough to sign your name to it. Mind you, NefariousNewt is a nomme de plume, and I use him to avoid complications that would do just what was outlined — give the unhinged and ignorant the ability to harass me in real life, something I don’t need.
Anonymity in commenting is like throwing rocks off a highway overpass, or blowing up mailboxes with M-80s, or leaving flaming bags of poo on people’s doorsteps — it’s the tool of the childish and juvenile.
Well, obviously this isn’t my real name but if someone were to follow the link to my blog and then do some digging they could find out a great deal about my real life, including my name. But if you required a real name, sure, you could have it. I aint ashamed of what I say here.
I feel I was very lucky to learn the “almost nothing on the internet is truly private” lesson very early in my Jezebel commenting/blogging days and have since only written things I wouldn’t mind defending to someone’s face or having written on a giant billboard in front of my house.
I don’t know if you know who Dooce is, but she turned off anonymous commenting last year and requires at least a legitimate email address to participate. The number of comments on her posts went from literal thousands to 40 or 50. The amount of hate has decreased to almost zero and the comment section is actually enjoyable again.
My husband and I discussed this issue last week while debating Blizzard’s decision to require posters to the WoW forums to use their real names. He, a white/male/hetero/able-bodied/etc. member of the U.S. military who has nothing to hide and very little to fear from anyone, was strongly in favor of the idea as a way to combat the rampant trolling. While I admit it probably would do a lot to cut down on the vilest comments that pop up around the internet, the big sticking point for me is that it would also discourage already-marginalized people from joining discussions for fear of exposing themselves to harrassment that a) wouldn’t have otherwise come up because other posters weren’t aware they were female/had an identifiably-ethnic name/thought they were another gender/whatever, and/or b) could potentially escalate to real-life harrassment where before the harrasser wouldn’t have been able to track them down.
There are a lot of things I’m not willing to discuss under my own name on the internet. Anonymously, I will freely discuss being bisexual and having had an abortion, but those are both things I am reluctant to talk about when my name is attached (both for fear of anonymous troll harrassment and for fear that certain family members might find out and cut me out of their lives). I’ll talk about the subjects abstractly, but it definitely loses a compelling dimension when I have to leave my own experience out of the equation.
The only answer, in my opinion, is more stringent moderation. I realize that takes a significant amount of effort by real, live people, but I think if sites are committed to fostering real conversations, then that’s something that needs to be made a priority. Taking away commenter anonymity shifts the burden onto the commenters and exposes them to risks that many of us will simply find unacceptable. As I said to my husband, most of the people who are in favor of this idea are white dudes named John Smith.
I tend to comment under my own name or under an identity that is fairly easily traceable to me, at least by the blog/site owners, mostly because of the reason Newt gives above. However, because of how downright nasty some commenter pools can be, I tend to stay away from commenting in general. This is probably the only place I actually post comments on anything approaching a regular basis. Also, because I’ve found the people who comment here to be able to strike that balance between being opinionated and respectful more often than not, I also actually feel like commenting more often than I do, and am more likely to come check out the comments rather than just reading the posts in my Reader because, again, the conversations around the posts are interesting and don’t degenerate into name-calling and comparisons to Nazis.
There are other sites where the name I use is not clearly linked to me or is linked to another identity I use when I don’t want to be harassed, but I’m rarely moved to engage with assholes in the first place.
As for using one’s real name in general, I think the worry is justified. Blizzard’s change in policy, namely:
“The first and most significant change is that in the near future, anyone posting or replying to a post on official Blizzard forums will be doing so using their Real ID — that is, their real-life first and last name — with the option to also display the name of their primary in-game character alongside it.”
caused a lot of concern and led to one person demonstrating just how easy it is to track a person down in real life. (See here http://seewhatyoudidthere.com/2010/07/07/realid-changes-the-very-real-ease-of-stalking-in-the-internet-age/ for details.
Kotaku Australia’s shorter, more to the point version is here: http://www.kotaku.com.au/2010/07/what-can-one-guy-do-with-your-real-name/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+KotakuAustralia+(Kotaku+Australia) )
So I don’t know. I mean, on the one hand, it makes sense to use your own name because I think it would make people think twice about acting like assholes online. On the other hand, it means that people who aren’t assholes (or who would opt not to be assholes if their real names were up there) could be opening themselves up to the crazies. But then again, wouldn’t it just be like a giant version of Facebook? If you’re comfortable with FB, then why not this?
I was absolutely ready to say I’d unhesitatingly discuss most things, including politics and sex, with my own name.
Then I remembered that I’m currently unemployed and, if these types of comments came up in a google search, it could seriously hurt my chances of employment. So I guess not. I wish we lived in a world where I could post things like “abortions for everyone!” and “I like giving handjobs!” and it wouldn’t affect my employability because we’re all adults. But we don’t.
There’s anonymous, and then there’s anonymous. At every site on which I comment, I provide my email address (and it’s my real, in use email that uses my last name). Likewise, I’m Av0gadro everywhere I comment, whether it’s a political, parenting, or cooking place. That’s anonymous, (although I doubt I would be difficult to track down for a stalker), but it’s not the same at the anonymous comments on, for example, CNN.
I don’t know who the regular commenters here are, but because they’re regular, I know a lot about them and know how seriously to take their comments. On bigger, less civil sites, I know who’s a libertarian or just likes harassing the blogger from their user name. That’s just not the same kind of anonymous.
If I had to comment under my real name, I would talk about my husband and children a lot less, and on, for example, a feminist website, I think that would hurt the conversation sometimes.
And Nadia, I never talk about politics on Facebook, even when other people do. It would be like talking about politics at my slightly racist, conservative grandmother’s house. Literally, because she’s my Facebook friend.
@Amanda: that’s the greatest concern for anyone. Of course, you can also be bollixed by someone who shares your name — if it’s close or exactly the same — if they get Googled and a potential employer thinks you are them.
@Av0gadro: I only talk about politics — for the most part — under this name on FB, were I don’t have contact with anyone I “know.” It’s actually odd to live this dual life, having two separate personas who are essentially the same person. It’s kind of like being the Internet version of The Hulk.
I post under my own name almost all the time. I feel comfortable doing so because a) I limit the personal information I put out there and b) like Blondgrlz, I only put things out there that I would have no problem saying if I were face to face with someone. I too learned the hard way that putting personal info out there is NOT a good idea.
But I don’t see a problem with websites requiring personal info in order to register with them provided users have the right to not have ANY of the information (name included) available for others to see. That way, they stay anonymous with other reading the comments, but the site can still have some control if things get out of hand. And while I know it is very easy to make that info up, I feel that most trolls stay away from places that require them to take such steps.
I would probably comment under my own name on this site. Jezebel…eh. Probably not. Even though I don’t say anything that I wouldn’t be comfortable with anyone I know in “real life” reading I just feel that community is SO huge and the potential for lunatics online stalking you seems much higher.
Every comment I leave anywhere is easily traced to my real identity. I feel strongly that, for me, it’s worth the hazards it invites.
But as news article commenting goes, I have trouble seeing the point of comment threads on stories that are not columns or opinion pieces. I live in Indianapolis. It isn’t the biggest city around, but it’s not the tiny town people think it is; our greater metro area is over a million people. Still, there are never, ever useful or valuable comments on the paper’s news stories. There is only flaming, trolling, and responding to trolls. What, exactly, is a reader’s dashed-off anonymous comment supposed to contribute to the reporting of news? The option to comment on non-opinion news stories seems to me to reside wholly in the realm of hit-bait.
I don’t ever use my real name online unless I’m doing something political–like signing a petition or contacting my representatives.
I think pseudonymity works pretty well on the interwebs. For example, I don’t know hardly any of the regular commenters on the blogs I read in real life, but if I see a comment by someone whose name I recognize, I’m more likely to give it credence.
I’m a big fan of the “moderate the shit out of it” approach when it comes to comments. Requires a lot of labor (especially at larger sites) but it’s the only way I know of to avoid the “monkeys flinging their poo at the wall” phenomenon and still have a useful conversation. (Leaving aside the “OMG, the big mean feminists are CENSORING me!!!?@!#!@#” issues)
If real names were the only option, I wouldn’t post anywhere at all, except to update my CV. My last name is unique.
I think that within the setting of a given site, consistent pseudonymity is a reasonable requirement, and is motivation enough for most people to behave decently.
There are also always going to be people who are stupid, privileged, and/or young enough to post all sorts of trollish nonsense under their real names.
I’m against actual names for reasons already mention but also because I think even if your online person can be linked to an actual person with little effort the perceived anonymity provides a measure of safety. Jumping a few hoops is enough to deter a lot of creeps which provides relief for the system as a whole and less cover for the truly dangerous.
As for policing, I always feel weird doing this but Cracked had a great article on the subject that threw out some neat ideas:
http://www.cracked.com/article_16765_5-ways-to-stop-trolls-from-killing-internet_p2.html
The part that I think is good to remember is that even without legal names an internet forum is still a community and can posses the same social pressure regarding behavior.
I’m with bluebears. On smaller sites, I would feel free to comment with my real name, if only because most of the sites I comment on, I discuss to my less feminist literate friends, so they already know.
Larger sites though open the door unfortunately to possible unpleasant circumstances, so I would avoid it on sites like Jezebel.
And @Blondegrlz: I know dooce, and now that she has a smaller, more friendly community in her comments, it’s made the site better in my opinion
I post under my name, and link to my blog that you could probably use to find me if you were really interested in doing so.
I am more than happy to expose my internet identity when commenting. I am NOT happy providing meatworld contact details. I’d put in city/town, but I wouldn’t put in phone number. There’s an everlap between the two, obviously, but there’s also a line. I don’t feel safe posting direct information about real world me on the intertubes.
I also am not interested in signing in individually to every site i want to comment on, just from a convenience point of view. Make it too hard and I’ll realise I don’t really care enough to contribute to the conversation. Which then leads to the extreme sides of that conversation being the only ones there, becuase the middle people get caught on the barrier to entry. I feel like disabling anonymous comments and requiring a name, email and/or url is a pretty good filter a lot of the time.
I wouldn’t – I have an unusual name, which unfortunately makes me pretty googleable.
And while I don’t say anything here I wouldn’t be prepared to defend, but at the same time, I don’t need curious aunts and uncles stumbling across my views on contentious issues without my knowledge…
As a journalist who dealt with her share of nutty readers over the years, I’m all for it. I write something and have to stand by it, so should you. It keeps you responsible. I blog under my journalist byline, and nothing I write is written without the expectation that someone anywhere on the globe may read it.
That said, it’s fine to keep phone numbers and contact info private. Any online publication that chooses to publish that is wrong.
I’m with Molly and Amanda and the like on this. My commenting would be much more restricted if I were using my full name. I don’t say anything I wouldn’t stand by (or take responsibility and apologize for, as the case may be) in faceworld, but I don’t want to be stalked, and I don’t want potential employers to know about my sexual history, or religious beliefs, or that I’m a mother, for that matter. I wouldn’t feel free to talk about my family, friends, or co-workers, etc.
I prefer draconian comment moderation, myself, but that’s obviously not always possible. That leaves what everyone’s already mentioned about establishing hoops to filter out the drive-by assholery.
I wouldn’t be happy to post under my own name. I dont’ say anything I’m not happy to say in real life to under this name, but I do know from that experience of actually discussing those issues in real life that other people have issues with them on occasion. So my pseudonym gives me a bit of breathing space…
Trolls don’t bother me. They’re easy to spot and are the online equivalent of the kid at school who just had to be heard no matter what the noise was. It’s the commenters who invest in an identity and still write vile hateful stuff that worry me. Take a a look at Comment is Free on http://www.guardian.co.uk for a taster!
My commenting would also be more restricted if I were using my real name. I just don’t like sharing details of my life with everyone. I don’t talk about my SO or details of my personal life to everyone at work so I wouldn’t want to do that publicly on the internet and have it be traced to me.
When you write a letter to the editor (at least to the paper here) you have to provide a name, address and phone number, and the paper will call you to verify that you wrote the letter. If they publish it they print your name and your geographic area, which is up to you to provide. It can be a neighborhood or something more general, like a city. My question is why the internet should be different than that. Newspapers print lots of stories about touchy subjects and readers can choose to comment or not under the rules the paper has set. It would be a loss if people couldn’t post some of the intimate stories that help us all learn about the life experiences of others and help those who have gone through difficult experiences to deal with those. But I’m also all for requiring people to take responsibility for the words they want to put out into the public arena.
Hmm, good question. I comment under a username on a forum that is mainly populated by white men (and assume everyone else is a white male), to avoid the initial “TITS OR GTFO” that comes up whenever a woman posts under an obviously feminine handle. Since then, I’ve revealed my gender and dealt efficiently (I believe) with any sexism I come across on the forum – it helps that the moderators are intelligent and some of them are even feminists!
I would be OK with posting under my real name, but I have a pretty common last name. I too, have learned my lesson (hey, Livejournal), and even though I’m “anonymous” (not really, my email address is my name) it’s not anything I wouldn’t say in public. But then, I’m relatively privileged – I’m a het middle class white woman with a degree, employed in a field that is somewhat 50/50 men and women and that tends to have liberal views.
@krismcn – I’m basically with you. My real name (first/last combination) happens to be common enough that I only show up once on the first page of Google results, and that result is one that I personally control (so I’m comfortable with that). This screen name, however, is something I use a lot on different sites and I’ve tried to change it up recently because, story time!: my friend started dating this sort of creepy guy, and others of my friends wanted to mess with him by leaving a mildly snarky comment on his blog. They needed an e-mail address to do so, so I told them to use one of mine that I only use for stuff that’s not attached to my real name. Through the IP tracking info attached to the comment and the e-mail address, he found out this username, and then tracked it *all* over the internet, like reading through all my comments here, on Jez, on other blogs I commented on, even to restaurant review websites…he was never able to connect “baraqiel” to my IRL name until he asked my friend that he was dating about it, which is reassuring, but god damn, you know? I guess my point is that creepers be creepin’ — it was a good reminder that everything we say here *is* public and can be found by someone with enough dedication. It just so happened that this guy had essentially benign intentions but if he hadn’t, I might have been in some trouble. :-/
However, I am of the opinion that online communities based around IRL communities should require real names. You people could be halfway around the world, I’m probably never going to meet you or actually interact with you, but when you *know* the people trolling are people you’re going to see every day but you don’t know which ones they are, it can be very destabilizing.
Jaron Lanier wrote a really interesting book called “You are not a Gadget” where he talks about this. His idea is a middle way that I think many people here are advocating, like Av0gadro. You get your anonymous online identity, not attached to rl, but you use that same identity every where you comment and participate.
I wish I could get rid of some of the comments I’ve made in the past, not because of the content, but because I was using a name that’s way too close to my own.
I usually comment under some version of my name, and I’m comfortable with that. However, I’m only a sporadic commenter and limit my participation to only a few places. I have entire articles I’ve written for other sites that I wish I could take back, because I’ve completely changed my opinion, or because I truly didn’t know what I was talking about. Those embarrass me more than the comments I’ve written.
@JetGirl – I agree but then I’m a journalist too and if I blogged I would blog under my own byline and not an anonymous one.
Would I comment under my own name on websites I don’t know, I’m happy to stand by any comments and don’t have family members who care about the internet so that’s not an issue but I’m so paranoid about my name being connected with anything that’s not my job that I don’t even have a facebook account as I feel that you can be judged by your friends (and while I love many of mine they are not exactly subtle people at times). Basically I’m not particularly comfortable with the way that social networking blurs the lines between work and play and so I’m not sure that I would comment under my own name.
As a point however i do blog for The Guardian sometimes and I respond to readers in the comments there under my own name.
I comment with my real (and incredibly common) first name on a local news blog, because I also meet up with those people on a fairly regular basis IRL. However, on other sites/blogs, I use a different name, one that I’ve gone to great lengths to not connect to my Facebook. I live in a big city with a common name, if I say I’m so-and-so from Large City, it’s going to narrow it down to a few thousand people. I’ve also worked to remove my name from Google results unless it’s something I control (hello, paranoia about grad school admissions!). I think only one person has managed to connect my everywhere-else commenting name to my IRL name, and that one (benign) person has caused me to reel in my commenting on Jezebel by about 50%.
I’d use my real, and unique, name because almost anything I say (almost) would be something I’d express to anyone who’d be in such forums. I might temper it a bit or use kinder language which would definately be less satisfying.
I use the same handle everywhere, and have since the early Jezebel days, even though I don’t comment there anymore. I’ve got a meatworld FB account and one for this persona, with only a couple overlaps. I like being able to discuss issues without worrying about it turning up on a Google search for my very rare name. I live alone, and I’ve had enough close calls with staker-ish types to want to keep that kind of attention away.
As for trolls, even the best ones are engaging in behavior you wouldn’t get away with IRL. Stating an opinion 180 degrees from your own just to stoke conversation would merit an eye roll and a request to shut it or contribute something substantial. They’re just people who enjoy being the center of attention, and on the internet, they have found their nirvana. I’m all for strong comment moderation, as long as a discussion is allowed to go organically off topic. TWOP was brutal about that, and it kept things on topic but could be stifling.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Diana, Pursuit of Harpyness. Pursuit of Harpyness said: Commenters Suck (Except Y'all, Of Course) @ http://bit.ly/bEpEG4 [...]
I’m one of those people with a unique name. I only publish professionally using my real name; personal stuff is put under a pseudonym, and yes, that includes my FaceBook account. I have no interest in having my personal and professional life linked, especially by prospective employers.
I am okay with having to provide a real email address, standardizing on a single pseudonym for each commenter (to cut back puppetry), and draconian comment policies.
I’m a shy person IRL. Okay, maybe “reserved” is a better word – there are maybe two people who know everything there is to know about me. I’m cautious of what I tell other people because I will invariably get shit for it (once I accidentally told my dad I was for the public option. Wow! That didn’t end well.) Co-workers and bosses know the least about my personal life and opinions, and I’d like to keep it that way. My Facebook is really, really dull.
So I am all about anonymity. If my boss called me into their office and called me out on something I wrote online, I would own it, because I never say anything on the internets that I don’t mean. But I would rather avoid the conversation. My boss making fun of me for playing video games (oh, I hated that job) is not a situation I’d like to repeat.
But being extremely opinionated online is starting to trickle over into my real life – I’ve been saying what I think way more often, and while it causes the usual amount of bullshit, I’m able to take it better because having a support system of snarky brilliant fellow-anons all over the place makes me more confident.
I agree with a lot of the sentiments already expressed here – in particular the idea of having some kind of pseudonimity.
My harpy name is linked somewhat to my name. And it’s a nick that others have occassionally taken to calling me. So if someone was to yell out “Mackey” in my material world, I would definately look up and about. But in saying that, Mackey is a common enough name, and my name will bring up lots of others who share a similar first and last name.
In saying that, from my personal perspective, I wouldn’t have a lot of issues with what I have said online, and it would have at some point been said face to face to others.
In this way people that eavesdrop/overhear conversations I have with others and want to start stalking are no different to internet trolls. I have had the unfortunate experience of having a meat world stalker take issue what I have said and tried to track me down.
My thinking is that if similar rules to real life apply to online, I think most people won’t be trolls. So long as, similar to real life, I have an opportunity to change my ideas over time or not as the case may be, develop friendships/skills/interests, etc then I think things would be ok.
I wouldn’t comment if I had to use my real name. I was in a long term abusive relationship that ended about 15 years ago. That person is still out there and I don’t want her to find me.
I’m all for pseudonymity, but not too much anonymity. I use one of three nicknames all over the web.
As you might guess by my never commenting here I am a lurker. Not because I don’t have anything to say, but because I have some social anxiety issues. While I haven’t had any firsthand experience with stalking, and my family know all about my strong opinions, people are terrifying to me and I do not want just anyone to find out what my real name is. The thought just scares me to death, I’ve avoided social networking sites so completely that I panic when I see I need to sign up to Facebook to do something.
So yes, for all the reasons already mentioned, and this one added, I think real names everywhere is not really the best decision. I’d never comment anywhere anymore, for starters.
[...] The Harpies on commenters [...]
I comment under my real name, but I always have for most of my life.
I’ve been recently made aware that there is a great deal of white privilege that goes along with that. As a white person, what I write online (in commentas well as on the 3 blogs I run) won’t be held against me as a representation of my entire race.
If someone hunts me down and harrasses me because of what I say online and I contact the police about it, they will believe me and take it very seriously. Because I’m white.
I don’t have to guard my already limited econmic opportunities out of fear that the doors won’t be shut on me entirely because a white person in charge of hiring found a post I wrote calling out racism. In fact, since I’m white, I may be congratulated for it.
I actually used to write comments under my first and last name, but they started to be pop up on Google a little too visibly even for my rather openly militant tastes. The web is becoming a much tighter presence in the world. We expect people to give up more and more right to their own information, and look sideways at them when they express reservations.
I think the responsibility mostly lies with the moderators. People are gonna be dicks. I never comment at some place that requires too much info from me or an actuall ccount registration to say anything.
I guess I’m weird like that, but I ought to be able to wander by a post on a topic I’m interested in and holler out that I agree without having to turn my head and cough first.
@Lincoln – thanks for your post.. it has caused me to have a rethink about my position..