This is a question I don’t want to ponder, and unfortunately I believe I know the answer. I wish I didn’t but I do. I’ve seen it in full effect since the election of Sen. Barack Obama two days ago and it is truly disheartening.
While we as a county have certainly opted for change and the racial lines seem to be blurring, this change is clearly an atrocity to some who will likely use the web and the “cloak of anonymity” I’ve mentioned many times before, to share their anger and spread their hate.
Among some of the content I’ve dealt with today were comments about black criminals getting off easy now because they will have backing “straight from the top,” watermelon seeds being planted at the White House, appointing “Reverend Ike” as Secretary of the Treasury, and Richard Pryor, Stevie Wonder and Aretha Franklin to other positions in his Cabinet. Not to mention all of the other stereotypical madness that is so easy to deliver via keyboard.
Am I writing this blog while emotional? Yes, and that could be good or bad. You decide. But as the Managing Editor of User-Generated Content at WRAL.com and GOLO.com, it is my job to develop guidelines for how we manage UGC and I deal with a great deal of it. So this is affecting my job. It’s affecting something I believe in.
So yes, I’m emotional but this is my blog and this is where I chose to vent today. So thank you for hearing me out.
Now, I will go home, reapply my thick skin before bed and come in tomorrow to live and work another day. There is no alternative, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
4 comments
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November 6, 2008 at 5:29 pm
Scott Moore
Angela, it’s disheartening to hear that the recent election is drawing out those Americans who choose to fear, disparage, or hate their own country’s men and women. It’s up to the rest of us who appreciate American in all it’s diversity to stand up and make it clear that this is not the norm.
Yes, free speech allows for us all to speak ignorantly on topics and it also allows others to correct us when we are in the wrong.
I hope that your communities are stepping up to support diversity as the norm and positively celebrate this historic moment. It’s what we do together that matters.
November 7, 2008 at 3:20 am
Nathan Clendenin
Before the election I got so many forwards on email about how Obama was the anti-christ, blah, blah, blah, and it wasn’t because Obama is black – it was about his charisma. Can’t we have a president we like for once without him being labelled anti-christ? I think Obama brings the needed hope to the Whitehouse that like it or not, everyone is looking for. Me personally, I don’t put my faith in politicians, but it can’t hurt for us to at least have some better speeches for the next four years!
November 7, 2008 at 10:15 am
Patrick
Hey Angela,
I sympathize, of course!
Truthfully, I think you’d be dealing with similar, though different steriotypes and topics of hate content had McCain been elected. I imagine you haven’t been allowing all of the nasty, inappropriate stuff people say about President Bush, so, I wouldn’t expect you to allow the nasty, inappropriate things people say or will say about President-Elect Obama. Politics is a very, very nasty thing – on both “sides” or “teams” and that’s the reason I stay out of it, for the most part. 
The internet just accentuates it.
I don’t allow political discussions on my communities since their focuses are entirely different and political discussions just tear people apart, even when well moderated. Being a news site, of course, you can’t exactly do that, I know.
Good luck.
Thanks,
Patrick
January 3, 2009 at 12:02 am
The troll and the “n-word” « Online Community Strategist
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