Yik Yak – Yuck . . . Taking On a Social Media Menace

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This is a little story about something bad-but-ultimately-good that’s worth noticing – a simple little gem amid the cacophony of fear and war and moral failure and decline and decay that comprises most of our news media diet, day after day after day.  I hope it lifts you up like it lifted me.

A sour and ultimately threatening thread of social media banter recently unfolded on Yik Yak at Kenyon College where my daughter is a sophomore.  If you’re kind of old like me, you might not know what Yik Yak is.  Think of it as a kind of hyper-local Twitter, capturing posts only from those in the immediate geographic area, say within a radius of several miles.  Yik Yak is also 100% anonymous.  It was originally conceived, supposedly, to provide a forum for comedic observations within a community, observations that might venture into more edgy territory than would be normally be tolerated on other social media sites.  I’ve also heard it acts as a kind of “even bulletin board” mostly focused on sharing time and place of campus parties.

At Kenyon, edgy turned ugly in the form of a series of angry, hateful posts directed toward a women’s center on campus.  The authors of this vitriolic speech refused to engage in productive dialogue around the nature of their grievances, despite many attempts by the women they targeted, to do so.  This continued, and escalated into at least one threat of sexual violence.  Then the women’s center was broken in to, and materials for upcoming Take Back The Night activities on campus were stolen.

This activity was bad on its face; but it also seemed to strike at the heart of Kenyon’s identity as a place where differences are celebrated and supported, and mutual respect is assumed.

So how did this community of students, faculty and staff respond?  First, the President of the college posted a blog in which he condemned the activity as unacceptable and counter to the character and principles of the school.   He also provided historical context and other insights that lent heft to his stated positions.  But I think more importantly, he invited and encouraged the entire Kenyon community to stand up to this kind of destructive speech by publicly voicing  support for respectful speech via a newly formed, student-led Facebook page called #respectfuldifference.  The response has been overwhelming.  Student after student, alone, in pairs, in groups, athletic teams, male, female, fraternities, sororities, faculty, staff groups, and arts organizations — all of the diversity of Kenyon has risen up against this low-road hate speech to express allegiance to a higher calling. Here are a couple of examples, but you can see more by visiting the page yourself.

YikYak4YikYak3YikYak2

Now, as I was in the middle of writing this post, I learned of other episodes like this one that have taken place around the country and what colleges are doing to respond.  Rebecca Koenig provides a good review in the Chronicle of Higher Education, if you want some general background on the situation.  Ryan Chapin Match writes on the Huffington Post about the Kenyon experience alongside many others.   He argues, quite persuasively I would say, that colleges should ban Yik Yak from their campuses, likening it to “bathroom stalls without toilets.”  He asserts that there’s no legitimate purpose for such an anonymous forum.  I have to admit, I kind of agree.

But then, I kind of don’t agree.  Because college is, in a way, a final dress rehearsal for life.  It is a last stop for many young people to try on the practices of adulthood while still having the benefit of support and guidance from adults. I would love to ban Yik Yak from the entire planet.  But that’s not going to happen.  Like it or not, our kids are entering adulthood as the most over-exposed generation there has ever been, and I don’t see how that’s really going to change.  How will they know how to go about tackling the onslaught of social media ills, and other kinds of destructive social forces that are almost certainly going to darken their doors in future, if they’ve never encountered them before?

To me, there is real value for these students in practicing the art of owning their community, and learning to actively commit to forging a positive path of living.  It is an exercise in leadership and self-determination and in the essential, critical value of community.

These young people will soon be going out into the world, into their respective professional, personal, geographic and spiritual corners where they’ll be called upon to play a role in building each of those communities.  I think their tangle with Yik Yak will make a difference in that regard.  I think they now know something about themselves, about the nature and extent of their responsibility, about the power of community, and about what they are capable of effecting – that they perhaps didn’t know before.  And for those who were the targets of the attack, perhaps they now know a lot more about what it feels like to be supported by a broader community in a time of need.  Maybe this new knowledge is a good thing that will motivate them in the future, to take action when someone else is in the crosshairs.

Regardless, I am heartened by the way college communities like Kenyon are responding to the yuck in Yik Yak.   I think they’re an example for all of us.

Midterms Looming . . . Why Will/Won’t You Vote?

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I will vote because of Mr. Weyl, my 6th grade social studies teacher.

I think about that sometimes, when I consider the sorry state of U.S. voter participation, particularly among youth.  The upcoming midterm election is an opportunity to hire some new help where help is sorely needed, yet we can expect fewer than half the eligible voters to show up at the polls, if history is any indication.

Why will/won’t you vote, and what do you think would lead to more people voting . . . for you, for your kids, for all of us?

Our founding fathers went to quite some trouble to construct a framework for governing based on the radical idea that our collective voices should rule, not the singular voice of an all-powerful king (or selective voices of a privileged few).  Yet sadly, in our taken-for-granted democracy, turnout hovers around 60% in presidential races and just over 40% in off-year elections.  This kind of participation is unimpressive, and while it may have worked in the past, it doesn’t meet the democratic demands of our time.  In the current context, our half-present effort fails to compete with the influential megaphones of those who have the most money and the most extreme views, those “who can hire armies of lobbyists and lawyers” as Elizabeth Warren likes to say.

Let’s face it.  We are flabby and stale when it comes to this most fundamental pillar of democracy.

Even more discouraging are voting rates among youth.  Their participation has generally declined over time, falling from just over 50% in 1964 to 38% in 2012.  Thirty-eight percent!  That’s sad and enormously troubling.

Elections should be about the future, and the future belongs to young people.  They have the most at stake from the decisions our representatives are making on issues like planetary warming, war, education, jobs . . . and so much more.  Yet they seem to be the least engaged. Why? And what can be done about it?

For one solution, I return to Mr. Weyl.

Mr. Weyl, my 6th grade teacher, was a bit of a renegade. He did a lot of things that would almost certainly get him fired today.  He did them out of passion for his beliefs, which he permitted us to know, as part of an overall self-presentation that was transparent and honest, complete with opinions, emotions, and very human flaws.  As a result, Mr. Weyl lives vividly in my memory. I recall his rabid love of baseball (encouraging all of us to do as he did, and skip school to attend opening day at Red Wing Stadium, the minor league park in Rochester, New York, where incidentally, I got to see the likes of Boog Powell, Bobby Grich and Brooks Robinson).  He was passionately against the Viet Nam War, boldly circulating photos of the My Lai massacre in a kind of silent meditation followed by solemn discussion on the subject.  He favored Frazier over Ali, and he was a diehard Democrat.  Yes, we knew this too, about Mr. Weyl.

Another thing that got Mr. Weyl’s ire up, was voting.  I remember one time when he shared his thoughts on this sacred right.  Serious and focused, he drove his message home with penetrating conviction: “Failing to vote is something that, quite frankly — (dramatic pause) — makes me sick . . . to . . . my . . . stomach.”  He  impressed upon our little impressionable minds that voting was really not an option . . . it was a duty entrusted to us by virtue of our good fortune to have been born into a fully functioning, modern democracy; a privilege not afforded to large swaths of the world’s population.

For me, this worked.  Since the 1980 election when I was first eligible to vote, I have been a voting citizen, mainly because I didn’t want to let Mr. Weyl down.  Over time, other motivations emerged, not least my desire to set an example for my children.  Dragging them to the polls, and sharing a little of Mr. Weyl’s religion became a tradition with me, carried out in hopes that I could influence them as Mr. Weyl had influenced me.

So one solution to our voting problems can be found in a much more active role for teachers, parents and mentors.  More robust and intentional teaching of civic responsibility, and more adult passion around the subject, could go a long way toward motivating young people to vote.

Who are the young people whom you could influence?  How might we also take this responsibility to our youth, as an opportunity to renew our own motivation to vote more regularly and more thoughtfully?

Democracy doesn’t just happen on its own, like a law of physics.  It is formed, fed, and sustained by the intentional acts of humans.  I hope we can begin to act differently.   Our democracy needs all of us if it is to survive, as our founders intended. Come November, many more voices, especially young voices, need to be heard.

Let me say that more directly:  No excuses . . . get out and vote!  (And convince a young person you know to do the same)

 

Resources:

High School Voter Registration Training Manual from the League of Women Voters

Links to online voter registration information:

Rock the Vote

U.S. Election Assistance Commission

U.S. Vote Foundation

The New Feminism?

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A Conversation with my Daughter about Beyoncé, Sexuality and Feminism

Me:  Hey Erin — I finally watched Beyoncé’s performance at the Video Music Awards (VMAs).  You were right about it being an amazing performance.  Her talent is undeniable.  I have to say though, I’m just not buying the “Beyoncé as feminist icon” thing because to me, she doesn’t do young girls any favors with that sort of high-octane, explicitly sexualized display.

Erin:  I would argue that she does do young girls favors by showing that she is allowed to express her sexuality toward her husband through her music. Beyoncé’s performance was acceptable because it was in the context of her marriage with Jay-Z as opposed to Miley Cyrus singing “Blurred Lines” last year, a song about date rape. Beyoncé’s new album just reiterates that women are allowed to be sexual and shouldn’t be put down for that.

Me:  I agree that it is appropriate and wonderful that she is expressing her sexuality in the context of her marriage.  But you are an adoring fan who has listened to all of her lyrics and interviews on the subject, so you know her intent.  I’m pretty sure the average person, especially the average guy, watching her thrust and shake on stage is not thinking to himself:  “Oh, what a beautiful marriage Beyoncé has.” I’m pretty sure.  So I think the effect of her actions is to fuel an already raging fire in our culture in which women are disproportionately objectified and sexualized while other (arguably more important) aspects are undervalued (like intellect, creativity, sense of humor, etc.).  As you know this was conveyed so well in the documentary Miss Representation and I think she is contributing to the problem.

Erin:  I think you should think about what you imply by suggesting she change her performances based on the male audience. That in and of itself goes against everything feminism stands for. Her changing the sexuality in her performance for the sake of male interpretation is no different than a girl being told to wear a longer dress at school in order not to “distract” the boys. I also would say that while I agree that Miss Representation and The Representation Project send very important messages about female representation in the media and the importance of education for women, I would also argue that those are not the only ways to be a feminist. There is more than one way to be a feminist and one of those (a major one for young girls, her primary audience) is positive sexual representations of women. It’s important for young girls to have a role model who can walk the line between sexualized and empowered.

Me:  You make some cogent arguments and I do agree – girls should not have to dress or act particular ways based on boys’ potential reactions.  That’s the way it should be, but we have to deal with the world as it is, not as we wish it to be.

When I came of age in the 1960s and 1970s, the modern women’s movement was first finding its voice.  One of the central pillars of that movement was the quest for women to be seen as something other than just a sexual object.  I was in 5th grade when the girls in my school got the right to wear pants instead of dresses; and when I was in business school in the 1980’s guys in my class used to pass notes about the breast sizes of their female classmates; and we just read about the degrading remarks of male U.S. Senators directed toward Kirsten Gillibrand, more of the same “woman as object” mentality.

I think these troubling attitudes are formed in many ways by sexual imagery and media messages that are awash in our culture, feeding the beast of female objectification and contributing to the epidemic of sexual assault we see in our military and on our college campuses.  I just wish Beyoncé would choose to use her unique position of being a powerful woman, to send a different kind of message.

Women like Amy Poehler, Tina Fey or Mindy Kaling do that.  They are smart, funny, accomplished, hard working . . .  and sexy . . . without screaming “sex” from the rafters or being overly sexually explicit.  Theirs is an example I hope you will find most instructive because it speaks to you as a whole, multi-dimensional person, not just a sexual one . . . which is the message of feminism to me.

Erin:  I am in complete agreement that feminism is something that requires female representation that is beyond just sexuality but I just don’t think it’s fair to say that she is “feeding the beast” of female objectification. You and I experience feminism differently because of our different generations but I’ll tell you that for my generation, the idea of female sexualization is frowned upon. I don’t mean in the media where women are constantly sexualized because it’s clear that there are plenty of people approving of that sexualization but I mean in just daily life. Being in high school I know that girls are constantly labeled by guys and by each other as sluts for showing any degree of sexuality, when guys who show the same kind of sexuality get no criticism. That is the audience that Beyoncé appeals to.

Don’t get me wrong I completely agree that it is critical that women are put into more leadership positions and are more respected in the professional world in general. I’m just saying that Beyoncé is a feminist icon because she offers something that the women you mentioned (Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, and Mindy Kaling) have not been known for and that is her confidence and comfort in her sexuality. I think that message is something that is needed in the world today. Feminism is evolving into more than just the promotion of women in the work world. It has become evident that there are so many more issues that women and girls face today that have yet to be addressed and I strongly believe that Beyoncé is beginning to address one that has gone unnoticed for far too long.

Me:  Well, since this is my blog, I was going to reserve the last word for me, but you’ve expressed your views so well I think you should close it out.

Thank you for your willingness to have this discussion with me, your Mom (perhaps the last person you might want to discuss this sort of thing with) — and for doing it so sincerely and thoughtfully.  There is much more I want to hear and more I want to say, so I’ll see you at the dinner table!  In the meantime, you’ve given me a lot to think about.  I hope you feel the same.

Erin: Definitely feel the same.

 

The Dreaded College Drop Off

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As I watch friends and family heading out to drop off their first child at college, I am reminded of our experience doing the same, almost exactly one year ago.  I have no advice for any of you.  In my experience, it sucks.  Or, as a rather taciturn friend of ours put it, after we asked how it had gone for him (knowing we would soon be doing the same):  “It’s horrible.  It was one of the worst days of my life.  No one prepares you for this.”

It’s true, no one does.  I think that’s partly because neither party wants to have the conversation (who wants to relive the pain of that separation and who wants to anticipate it?) It’s also because each family experiences that separation in their own way.  Together with our children, we form a unique chemistry that is all our own.  No one else will experience the feelings, carry out the behaviors, or interpret the events that attend a college drop off in exactly the same way.  You just have to do it your way, and travel the path that you were meant to travel.

For us (me, my husband and our two daughters), the actual drop off wasn’t traumatic or hysterical or anything like that.  It was clear throughout our ride to Ohio (where my oldest daughter was heading to attend Kenyon College) that we were all trying very hard not to focus on what was about to happen.  Everything was happy and busy and exciting (if you know what I mean).  But the raw sorrow was there, just beneath the surface, ready to erupt with the slightest prompt (Exhibit A:  I am tearing up now just thinking about it).

It hit me hardest when all of the parents were gathered together in the auditorium to receive information and sage advice from the school’s administrators.  There was nothing to do but look around and know you were sitting in a room full of traumatized adults trying to pretend otherwise.  A single horrible thought just kept knocking at my brain’s door trying to come in:  Our family will never be the same again.  This is permanent.  Our precious little unit is forever changed.

(Don’t worry . . . this has a happy ending).

We were lucky.  Our daughter led the way in helping us get through the immediate ripping off of the Band-Aid.  She was all happy and together, joyfully hugged us, said goodbye, and headed off on her way with seeming confidence and glory (what she actually felt I’m not sure I’ll ever know). As a result, we didn’t feel the need to drive around the corner and park on a local street so we could ball our eyes out (as the college personnel had suggested we were free to do).  We spent the rest of the car ride, as I recall, doing what we could to distract ourselves from what just happened.

It hit me again in the hotel room where we stayed on our way home.  Waking in the morning, and witnessing so clearly, so concretely, that our younger daughter didn’t have her lifelong companion to pal around with as she normally would, somehow set me off more than my own sadness did. The missing piece was just too obvious and it ripped at my heart.

Okay, fast forward to one year later.  Our daughter is off to school again, eager to reconnect with friends and return to what seems to me to be, her new home.  Does this idea make me sad?  No, not really.  This idea makes me feel exceptionally gratified and proud, much the way I felt after I got over dropping her off for her first day of Kindergarten, or High School, or summer camp.  Each of these rites of passage are both deeply painful, and deeply satisfying.  But the pain part is acute, while the satisfaction is sweet and lasting, because with each of these transitions our children reveal to us a new version of themselves that we could not really have imagined prior to then. The college transition is perhaps more profound, but it’s of the same ilk, and produces many of the same kinds of feelings.

I look at my daughter now and I say — she is launched.  There is simply nothing more rewarding than that.  Now I get the joy of watching her rocket ship take off and carry her wherever it is she is going to go.

So I have no advice for all of you who are perhaps suffering through the college drop off as we speak.  Just know that you will be rewarded with quite a jar of goodies waiting for you once you get to the other side.

Technology Does A Lot For Us . . . What’s It Doing To Us?

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You know that feeling when you are rolling over the apex of a terrifying roller coaster hill and heading into the free fall?   As it plummets at ferocious speed, you have no input, no say in the matter.  You just have to go along for the ride.  You may or may not like it.  It makes no difference. You have to adapt, in an instant.

That’s the best metaphor I can come up with for how I feel about the technological change that’s sweeping us along through our little piece of the ride through human history.  Past technologies that were radical in their impact (e.g., wheel, steam engine, printing press), spread through humanity much more slowly, thus permitting us, the human animal, time to adapt (as we were designed to do through millennia of evolutionary biology).  But now for the first time in human history, we are living through some kind of flash-adaptation experiment over which we have, what feels like, no control.

This difference is profound.  Let me first state clearly:  I value highly the many virtues of our advancing technology.  But the gains are mostly obvious, while the losses can be harder to see.  I want to talk about two of those losses, two ways in which technology is robbing us of essential aspects of our humanity:  a) Time to think and feel, and b) Human in-the-flesh interaction.  I could write a thesis on either of these subjects, but for now, I’ll share just a few observations.

We are a sped up culture that’s getting faster every day. This pace is fueled by our technology and by capitalism.  Processing speed, ever-accelerating, drives everything.  Most importantly, it drives our financial markets.  And of course, once they’ve got the disease, we all catch it pretty quickly.  We are all along for the ride.

We want, and are expected to deliver things, instantly.  Much of the world of work has morphed into a rapid-fire do-fest, at the expense of thoughtful analysis.  Our kids, raised on a steady diet of digital devices, have shortened attention spans and act increasingly on impulse.  If we wonder about something, there’s no hypothesizing or thinking or exploring or discussing . . . just google it and get the answer, instantly.

It’s like we’re devolving into Pavlov’s dogs . . . all stimulus-response, all send and receive, with no cerebral cortex interceding to process or reflect; no time to think or feel or connect deeply.  This, ironically, at a time when the problems we face are exceedingly complex (calling for deeper thought), and when our alienation from one another is ever more evident (calling for deeper feelings and connections).

I get that technology is revolutionizing access to information that we need to solve problems, but we still need minds that have been nurtured and trained in the art of thinking, and we still need the time to do the thinking, in order to put all that great information to proper use.  And we still need time in our daily lives to appreciate and cultivate ideas, aesthetics, art, music, friendship, and all of those low-tech slow-poke things that make life worth living.  Our speed-demon pace threatens all of that.

I wonder what this profound change will mean for us on many levels, especially its long term implications.  My favorite thought experiment on this subject is contemplating how the Cuban Missile Crisis would have unfolded if it happened in today’s act now environment.  It’s not a comfy thought.

Our technology is also eating away at meaningful in-person human interaction.  My mother argues that it all started to go south with the television, which in its own subtle way, began pulling people apart.  Before that, people spent their limited free time visiting with neighbors, playing or working outside, or listening to the radio.  But television, with its mesmerizing screen (there it is, the original sin), slowly drew people in from out of doors, away from others and toward a more individualized, even isolating experience.

Today we have screens on steroids, their seductive and addictive qualities capturing our attention at every turn, even when we are with other people.  Let’s face it, we barely notice each other anymore.  We don’t listen carefully or focus for any sustained period on our fellow human beings.  As our phone-companions seek to cater to our personalized whims and needs, we journey deeper and deeper into our own private bubbles of existence and drift further and further from any larger sense of community and all that comes with that.

In a matter of a decade or two, we have drastically eroded the human experience of eye contact, informal and spontaneous conversation, awareness of other people, and human interaction in general.  What do you think this will mean for us?

I know our technology carries enormous efficiencies and tremendous opportunities to broaden knowledge and to make connections with others that break down traditional geographical and other barriers.  And the fact that you are only able to read this blog because of technology, is an irony that is not lost on me.

But I just wonder what this insidious change does to our overall human development, to our sense of empathy and emotional connection to our fellow human beings? I wonder how fulfilling life will be if the stuff of human interaction is predominantly mediated through a machine? And I wonder how well we’ll be able to solve problems, appreciate beauty, and feel things deeply if our lives are operating at warp speed?

Am I just becoming some old fogey who can’t deal with the latest advance?  Or is there something here we need to recognize and wrestle with before it wrestles us to the ground?