海角大神

It was a simple tweet, with just a hint of edge. After police used tear gas and rubber bullets against Black Lives Matter protesters in Berkeley, Calif., on Dec. 6, Kaya Oakes, an author and lecturer who teaches writing at the University of California, Berkeley, posted a note offering students injured in the protest extra time to finish an assignment.

鈥淚f any of my #Berkeley students were teargassed, batoned, or shot w/rubber bullets last night, you can have an extension on your essay,鈥� Ms. Oakes tweeted.听

The tweet was tongue-in-cheek, according to Oakes, but it was also a show of support for what she thought was a largely peaceful protest that police met with undue force. But after conservative pundit Michelle Malkin鈥檚 Twitchy blog picked up Oakes鈥檚 tweet, it took on a life of its own. Over the course of the next two days, Oakes鈥檚 tweet showed up on the blog of Megyn Kelly at Fox News, the Fox and Friends鈥� Facebook page, and a local CBS affiliate.

鈥淚t was 24 to 36 hours of just constantly blocking people on Facebook and Twitter,鈥� Oakes says of the deluge of online messages. 鈥淎nd I was getting e-mails, hundreds of e-mails 鈥� just the usual ... 鈥榶ou鈥檙e an idiot.鈥� Then it started getting into, 鈥楿C Berkeley should fire you, you鈥檙e encouraging students to be vandals.鈥� That kind of stuff.鈥�

While Oakes never feared for her safety, she did feel overwhelmed and vulnerable 鈥� especially when a white-supremacist website picked up the story, complete with pictures of her that the group found online. Today, five months later, she still worries about bloggers dredging up the incident if she were ever to apply for another job.

Oakes鈥檚 experience is part of the sharp-elbowed new reality of the Social Media Age. Across the Internet, even relatively innocent tweets or Tumblr posts can now draw hostile comments and opinions from other social media users, quickly degenerating into a raging cyberstorm.

Cloaked in a virtual anonymity 鈥� whether real or just naively perceived 鈥� hosts of individual users will unleash torrents of vile and abusive taunts, especially toward women. Many of these users would probably never behave in such an antisocial way in the 鈥渞eal鈥� world. Yet when amplified by the global digital megaphones now at the tips of nearly every modern finger, many do worse, including threatening rape or other violence or even death.

Online shaming and attacks are hardly a recent problem, but in the past few months a number of high-profile incidents have magnified the issue. Former Major League pitcher Curt Schilling (@gehrig38 on Twitter) sent out a tweet in February congratulating his daughter for getting accepted into college to play softball 鈥� a simple proud father moment 鈥� only to have people attack her online with sexually graphic taunts and threats.听

Then actress and University of Kentucky superfan Ashley Judd (@ashleyjudd) was flooded with what she called a 鈥渢sunami of gender-based violence and misogyny鈥� after tweeting her fervid support for the Wildcats basketball team during the playoffs in March. In an online maelstrom known as 鈥淕amergate,鈥� feminist critics of the male-dominated video game culture have been harassed by thousands of people on Twitter and other social media outlets in an attempt to ruin their reputations and careers.

And it鈥檚 not simply a matter of sticks and stones and names that never hurt. Among the panoply of 鈥渢rolls鈥� who lurk on social media, many relentlessly 鈥渄ox鈥� their targets: discovering and posting personally identifiable information about people like their addresses, Social Security numbers, or embarrassing financial documents. Others engage in 鈥渞evenge porn,鈥� in which angry ex-spouses and ex-boyfriends and girlfriends post intimate private videos or pictures to shame and humiliate their former partners.听

All this, in turn, is spawning a virulent backlash. Online groups 鈥� digital vigilantes 鈥� are uncovering the anonymous people behind many of the taunts and 鈥渙uting鈥� them, often leading to the abusers being fired from their jobs. In other cases, public figures like Mr. Schilling and Ms. Judd have begun to fight back vigorously, while many states are trying to reboot the parameters of online behavior by outlawing various forms of cyberharassment.

Amid the flurry of attacks and counterattacks, the question is whether Twitter and other elements of the Wild West Web can be tamed, or better designed to foster civil, democratic conversation, without undermining the unfettered freedom the Internet provides.

Indeed, as more people move online, the long-evolved conventions of spoken language and the rituals of public civility are being challenged as never before. Digital platforms like Twitter, Yik Yak, and YouTube, with their instant global reach and borderless cross-cultural forums, are blurring the lines between public discourse and private conversation. The nature of human communication is changing in ways not seen since Gutenberg.

鈥淚 think we are reaching a tipping point,鈥� says Danielle Citron, professor of law at the University of Maryland and author of 鈥淗ate Crimes in Cyberspace.鈥� 鈥淚鈥檝e been working on this issue since 2007, and it has taken seven years working on people鈥檚 consciousness 鈥� I think now we鈥檙e finally seeing it as a real problem.鈥�

鈥� 听 听 鈥� 听 听 鈥⑻�

Zoe Quinn, a body-pierced Millennial听who develops video games and writes interactive online fiction, barely remembers the person she used to be before she became the central figure in Gamergate and its online vortex of vitriol. It is an incident that has helped bring the issue of online harassment to the attention of lawmakers as much as any other.听

鈥淲hen thousands of faceless strangers have set their sights on you, every aspect of your life is bombarded and prodded until who you were before is gone, and your life becomes almost unrecognizable,鈥� Ms. Quinn told a congressional briefing in April. 鈥淭he girl I used to be used to sit down and check her e-mail at work and get the occasional fan letter, business correspondence, and spam e-mail. These days it鈥檚 death threats and graphic fantasies about raping me, often accompanied with my home address and proof that the sender has everything they would need to carry through on it.鈥�

In 2013, Quinn co-developed a popular interactive game called Depression Quest, in which players direct the fictional story of a character attempting to manage his or her illness in a series of everyday events. But last August, after an ex-boyfriend posted a rant about Quinn, accusing her of being unfaithful and sleeping with a journalist to obtain good press for her online game, a virtual culture war about feminism and the treatment of women in the video game industry began to rage.

The boyfriend鈥檚 claim was unsubstantiated, but for some reason it resonated, echoing throughout the online gaming subculture, long accused of being misogynistic and fiercely protective of the overly sexualized and violent images of women in many video games. And in a frenzy all too familiar, the mostly anonymous online crowd pounced with a torrent of abuse and threats.

鈥淲e need to punish her.... Next time she shows up at a con/press conference/whatever, we move,鈥� one user posted on the site 4chan, an image-based bulletin board in which anonymous users discuss various topics. 鈥淲e鈥檒l outnumber everyone, nobody will suspect us because we鈥檒l be everywhere. We don鈥檛 move to kill, but give her a crippling injury that鈥檚 never going to fully heal....鈥�

For months, Quinn endured a nightmare of similar invective. She was doxed 鈥� her home address, phone number, and other personal information disseminated across the Internet. Chat rooms and bulletin boards were filled with posts instructing users how to hack her e-mail and harass and stalk her, and nude photos were widely posted in an attempt to ruin her career.

Quinn left her home, stayed with friends for weeks, and lamented that she could no longer feel safe at gaming conferences. Even as Quinn told her story at the congressional hearing 鈥� organized by Rep. Katherine Clark (D) of Massachusetts, the National Task Force to End Sexual and Domestic Violence, and other organizations 鈥� the #gamergate hashtag on Twitter was abuzz with the familiar vitriol.听

Gamergate is just one example of online discourse run amok. Indeed, 4 out of 10 online users have experienced some form of online harassment, and nearly 1 out of every 5 of all Internet users has experienced severe forms of abuse, including physical threats, stalking, and sustained harassment, according to a Pew Research Center study last year.听

Why is all this happening?听

鈥� 听 听 鈥� 听 听 鈥⑻�

Nearly two and a half millenniums ago, Plato, the ur-philosopher of Western politics and culture, did a thought experiment featuring the mythical 鈥渞ing of Gyges.鈥� It was a kind of imagined technological marvel that could magically make a person invisible to others.

Plato鈥檚 question about unfettered human nature, posed in the context of designing the parameters of an ideal society, wondered: Would a citizen wearing the ring and wielding a cloak of anonymity choose to be responsible and maintain ideals of moral behavior? The answer in today鈥檚 fast-evolving Digital Age seems disturbingly clear: Probably not.

While the reasons behind the rise of incivility online are complex, the simple explanation is that modern technology offers people cover to express some of the worst impulses in human nature. The same powers of anonymous expression that provide the freedom to voice an idea or opinion or 鈥渓ike鈥� in the world also enable anonymous responses.听

Aggression, tribalism, self-interest, and even cruelty for the sake of cruelty have existed since the beginning of civilization, and in many ways civilized societies have evolved precisely to rein in these types of traits, scholars say. Some behaviors are constrained by civil authorities enforcing laws, others through evolved social graces.听

But the nature of communication has now fundamentally changed as connections are mediated through the glow of electronic screens.听

In 鈥渞eal鈥� life, if a person overheard a father congratulating his daughter for getting into college, he would most likely never think of making a crass quip about assaulting her 鈥� at least not without expecting a violent response. The person might make such a quip in private or among a group of rowdy friends, but 鈥渨e tend not to be rude and vulgar to people who are present to us, precisely because in face-to-face communication we are conscious of our own vulnerability,鈥� says Gordon Coonfield, director of graduate studies in communication at Villanova University in Philadelphia.听

Online, however, human beings are virtually set free from social conventions rooted in mutual vulnerability. 鈥淥ne way of reading the ring of Gyges is, even the ancients understood that one way our behavior can be corrupted is when we鈥檙e given the opportunity to do bad things without public scrutiny,鈥� says Evan Selinger, professor of philosophy at the Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, N.Y.

In certain environments, numerous experiments show, even the most moral of human beings are susceptible to behaving badly. 鈥淲hether it鈥檚 anonymity, the capacity to dehumanize others, or the lack of authority 鈥� these features bring out the worst in us,鈥� Mr. Selinger says, citing the idea of the 鈥淟ucifer Effect鈥� by the famous scholar Philip Zimbardo and his prison experiments, in which subjects created environments straight out of 鈥淟ord of the Flies.鈥�

But another reason for the uncivil comments may be that in the Digital Age, at least so far, what happens online is somehow seen as less real, and therefore less serious. 鈥淭here鈥檚 this attitude, even among police officers and judges, that 1s and 0s can鈥檛 hurt anyone and that victims can just turn their computers off and ignore them...,鈥� says Ms. Citron at the University of Maryland. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 why it鈥檚 not easy to get courts to appreciate the increased vulnerability that people experience when their privacy is violated.鈥�

听鈥� 听 听 鈥� 听 听 鈥�

Yet this is slowly beginning to change. In the past year, state legislators have begun to recalibrate some laws against various forms of harassment to adjust to the Digital Age, and law enforcement officials have slowly begun to take cybercrimes more seriously. At least 14 states have criminalized posting nude images online without a person鈥檚 consent, and another 25 states are considering similar strictures. California has led these efforts, and its attorney general, Kamala Harris, has been the most aggressive law enforcement officer in the nation combating the phenomenon of 鈥渞evenge porn鈥� and such online harassment.听

Earlier this year, her office prosecuted Kevin Bollaert, operator of 鈥渞evenge porn鈥� website UGotPosted.com. Mr. Bollaert also ran another separate website that charged these women as much as $350 to have their private images removed from his revenge site. It was one of the first major convictions of its kind; in April, a San Diego judge sentenced Bollaert to 18 years in prison for identity theft and extortion.

Yet a host of challenges stand in the way of greater policing of digital offenses. 鈥淲hen a victim goes to state or local police, you鈥檝e got a huge problem,鈥� says Citron. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e really terrific at street crime. It鈥檚 what they do well. But when they鈥檙e confronted with online harassment, it鈥檚 technology they don鈥檛 know well. They don鈥檛 have training, they lack digital expertise, and what you don鈥檛 know well, you don鈥檛 want to deal with. That鈥檚 just human nature.鈥�

Identifying suspects can be difficult. Internet service providers have to be served with a warrant, the identities of suspects at a computer have to be identified, and if they are out of state, extradition requests have to be filed. 鈥淰ictims are often told just turn your computer off, go buy a gun. This is a civil matter, go to the Feds; everybody wants to push the problem to somebody else,鈥� Citron says.

Still, a crackdown on clear-cut crimes is just one part 鈥� and perhaps the easier part 鈥� of trying to bring greater order and civility to cyberspace. For private businesses like Twitter, now a central node in the democratic dissemination of news and opinion, rough and offensive 鈥� and constitutionally protected 鈥� speech is becoming a problem, too.听

鈥淲e鈥檙e going to start kicking these people off right and left and making sure that when they issue their ridiculous attacks, nobody hears them,鈥� Twitter chief executive officer Dick Costolo told his employees in February. 鈥淓verybody on the leadership team knows this is vital.鈥� 听

Unlike many other social media platforms, Twitter has especially championed anonymous free speech, and for years many people have praised its transformative role in movements like the Arab Spring. In its early years, Twitter only banned impersonating other people and spam. But now the trolls have become so legion that they represent a financial threat to the company: Growth in its 300 million user base has stagnated, and high-profile celebrities and political leaders have fled the platform as they鈥檝e been abused by other tweeters.

In April the company announced a revised user agreement and new behind-the-scenes algorithms. Previously, Twitter would only kick out users who issued 鈥渄irect, specific threats of violence against others.鈥� Now it will go after those who issue 鈥渢hreats of violence against others or promote violence against others.鈥�

Through an automated system that identifies abusive tweets, the company will begin forcing some users to delete certain tweets before they can log on again. It will also issue a kind of 鈥渢imeout鈥� for abusive users, temporarily suspending their tweeting privileges. One limitation of all this is that automated algorithms are never 100 percent accurate, and some users may be wrongly punished. Trying to place curbs on offensive language also produces tough trade-offs for a democratic society.听

鈥淗ow can you assure anonymity for a political dissident or corporate whistle-blower without also offering cover for a terrorist?鈥� asks Aram Sinnreich, a social media ethicist at Rutgers University鈥檚 School of Communication and Information in New Brunswick, N.J. 鈥淗ow can you distinguish algorithmically between a nude photo that鈥檚 revenge porn, and a nude photo that鈥檚 a work of art? There鈥檚 no way for a machine to make these judgments, and no one has enough money to hire human beings to make these judgments.鈥� 听

听鈥� 听 听 鈥� 听 听 鈥�

The other way to curb听the problem is to let the Internet police itself 鈥� an appropriately hands-off approach for unfettered technology. The era of trolls has already given rise to a new kind of aggressive public scrutiny: the advent of 鈥渃yber mobs鈥� and crowdsourced vigilantism. In some cases, experts say, the vigilantes are performing a valuable service. They are identifying people behind some of the anonymous attacks and shaming them online, helping to clean up the incivility on the Internet.听

But in other cases, the vigilantes are becoming more of a censuring mob, meting out their own form of justice for comments they don鈥檛 like. How do you distinguish between what鈥檚 edgy and what鈥檚 abusive?听

During the holiday season in 2013, Justine Sacco, the former communications director of IAC, a major Internet media company, infamously tweeted 鈥淕oing to Africa. Hope I don鈥檛 get AIDS. Just kidding. I鈥檓 white!鈥� just before boarding a plane to Cape Town, South Africa, to visit her family.听

Ms. Sacco鈥檚 quick quip 鈥� part of an acerbic, ironic sensibility on display in a number of her other tweets 鈥� was meant to be her own quirky kind of social commentary.听

But as she slept during the 11-hour flight, Twitter exploded with outrage, and her post was retweeted countless times. A hashtag even evolved, #HasJustineLandedYet, trending around the world as a cyber mob waited eagerly for the communications executive to get her comeuppance.听

Sacco鈥檚 employers at IAC were forced to release a statement while she was in the air: 鈥淭his is an outrageous, offensive comment. Employee in question currently unreachable on a flight.鈥� They later fired her for the tweet.

鈥淥nly an insane person would think that white people don鈥檛 get AIDS,鈥� Sacco told British author Jon Ronson, whose 2015 book, 鈥淪o You鈥檝e Been Publicly Shamed,鈥� explores a number of similar online incidents.听

鈥淟iving in America,鈥� she added, 鈥減uts us in a bit of a bubble when it comes to what is going on in the third world. I was making fun of that bubble.鈥�

A former chief executive officer of an Arizona-based medical device manufacturer, Adam Mark Smith, made a mean YouTube video at a Chick-fil-A drive-through, harassing an employee to make a political point about the fast-food restaurant鈥檚 opposition to same-sex marriage. He endured vociferous public shaming on social media, lost his job and his house, and now is receiving food stamps.听

鈥淭here are ethical ways to do a public shaming, of course,鈥� says Jeremy Littau, professor of media sociology at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa. 鈥淏ut the decentralized nature of the Internet means that you lose control of what your followers do, and when that movement becomes a mob, the loose organizing online gives rise to endless rage, where no apology or remorse is enough, and then we lose interest and move to the next outrage while people have their lives devastated. It鈥檚 a thorny issue; it doesn鈥檛 excuse the original poster鈥檚 bad behavior, but it raises questions about whether we are creating a cycle of Internet rage.鈥�

In the end, of course, it would be easier if everyone would temper their comments and treat people with some dignity and respect. Or maybe they could just learn something from 13-year-old
听Mo鈥檔e Davis.

Earlier this year, the Little League female pitching phenom was trolled on Twitter by a baseball player at Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania. The college player had quipped: 鈥淒isney is making a movie about Mo鈥檔e Davis? WHAT A JOKE. That sl-t got rocked by Nevada,鈥� referring to the team that beat Davis鈥檚 squad in the Little League World Series. After an online firestorm, the college first baseman was kicked off the team.

Mo鈥檔e, who has a 70 m.p.h. fastball, e-mailed Bloomsburg and asked the school to reinstate the player. 鈥淓veryone deserves a second chance,鈥� she told ESPN. 鈥淚 know he didn鈥檛 mean it in that type of way. I know people get tired of seeing me on TV. But sometimes you got to think about what you鈥檙e doing before you do it. It hurt on my part, but he hurt even more. If it was me, I would want to take that back. I know how hard he鈥檚 worked. Why not give him a second chance?鈥�

Joshua Eaton contributed to this report from Boston.听