Calls for Twitter to clamp down on so-called “trolls” sending abusive hate messages via the social networking site intensified yesterday after a string of high-profile attacks on famous names including the diver Tom Daley. Coronation Street’s Shobna Gulati, and the Conservative MP Louise Mensch. Even the father of Daley’s internet abuser said the company needed to take action to stop the disturbing practice.
The hard of thinking are out in force once more. While I eschew Twitter, regarding it as a waste of pixels, others like to use it. Some like to use it to inflame, incense and generally be abusive. This is annoying, but that is all it is; annoying. Twitter, as with other platforms, gives users the option of blocking these people. If they step beyond the boundaries of making unpleasant comments online and start to become threatening in real life, then they have, indeed, committed crimes that require police attention. Until then, the police should have better things to be doing – and it is not up to the owners of the medium to police the comments people make any more than it is up to the Post Office to detect and stop poison pen letters.
The BBC Olympics presenter Gary Lineker revealed shortly afterwards that he felt “physically sick” after a Twitter troll mocked his son George over his childhood battle with leukaemia.
So block him. When you put your life in the public sphere, you attract the attention of these twats. It comes with the territory. But the likes of Twitter allow you to stop them at the pass. The tools are there, use them and stop whingeing to the rest of us and stop expecting others to do the job for you.
There’s an awful lot of people out there who need to grow thicker skins – or just grow up.
And last Thursday the Blue Peter host Helen Skelton decided to quit Twitter completely because of the abuse she was receiving.
That’s another solution, of course.
Norman Messer, the father of the teen arrested after insulting Daley, said yesterday that Twitter should have shut down his son Reece’s account a long time ago. Mr Messer, 58, said his son suffers from an extreme form of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. “It’s not just Daley. He’s abused everyone on Twitter.”
I just love this. “Extreme hyperactivity disorder”. Something that those of us from a previous generation recognise as a euphemism for bad behaviour that was never corrected by his parents. Mr Messer should not be looking to Twitter to deal with his son being an obnoxious tit, he should be looking rather closer to home…
Yesterday, a senior police officer said new laws were not needed to govern Twitter. Chief Constable Stuart Hyde of Cumbria Police, who speaks on e-crime for the Association of Chief Police Officers, said it was right for officers to intervene where people’s lives were being made a misery by Twitter trolls. He insisted it was important for forces to take a “common sense” approach.
Good Lord! Almost a voice of reason. Unless or until these trolls cross the boundary beyond making nasty comments online, that common sense approach is to tell the complainant to use the tools available to them to block the trolls and to come back only if the abuse becomes something more serious – which, frankly, for the most part it doesn’t.
From the Mail:
His son, he says, suffers from ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) but has long refused to take medication for it. As a result, since the age of ten he has had a history of purposefully causing offence to all and sundry to get attention.
(my italics)
It could, of course, be the Mail’s own interpretation, but this sounds to me as if someone has misunderstood the term ‘attention deficit’ to mean that, rather than an inability to concentrate, the boy is suffering from a perceived lack of attention paid to him.
Attention-seeking is definitely not the same thing as AD; if this misconception is widespread, it helps explain why some parents are using the diagnosis as an excuse for their failure to provide the structured framework of boundaries that children with ADHD need if they are to learn self-discipline and control.
If I remember correctly one comment said the other medicine for ADHD was a good spanking.
What is the correlation between the rise of ADHD and the stopping of spanking of disobedient children?
It simply amazes me how people can think that beating children can make them learn the lessons of respect and non-violence. Would you beat the lady in Tesco if you disagree about a price? No ~ then accord your kids at least the same respect you pay random strangers.
Regarding spanking, my kids gave me the same answer I gave my dad when asked…
DaveE.
The non-initiation of violence is central to my political philosophy, (that doesn’t mean you can’t strongly defend yourself when attacked of course). So I can’t really see how I could teach my son that trying to solve your problems with violence is wrong and immoral if I were to use violence to do so.
For example; tax is coercive theft, nothing more, in pseudo-legitimate clothes. It is violently enforced and for this reason (and others) I oppose it conceptually. But how would such a position square with my beating the boy if he transgressed in some way? Of course it could not. He’s young so you sometimes have to explain stuff a few times and I may suggest the naughty corner or loss of ice-cream ration for the day or whatever, but mostly, he’s learned to listen and I fancy his comprehension is up as a result.
I simply could not beat him nor would I tolerate others doing so.
I generally agree with you.
OK, the naughty corner/stair/whatever. Then you get back “Or?”
There comes a last resort point, not one I like to reach but at the end of the day, if you can’t enforce a punishment it becomes no punishment.
No ice cream ration? Don’t tell me your kids haven’t learned to steal. In todays society that’s next to impossible, Hell, even in my youth a little petty theft was done. Not proud of, condoning, nor making excuses, it was just done, usually the sweet counter at Woolies.
I and most of my childhood friends grew out of it.
DaveE.
Well he is three and by quirk of fate I have a 700mm fridge with a seal that it takes great strength to open, so physical security takes care of that one for a few years yet!
Physical admonition is not (or shouldn’t be) violence. There is a world of difference.
I personally strongly believe in the use of physical punishment, if administered in a sensible and measured way. I have four children, all now adults. Throughout their lifetimes, I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I have had to raise my hand to any of them. But the possibility was always there. They are all (I am told) a credit to me. They are polite, honest, good natured and intelligent. Three of them have kids of their own, and they are bringing them up much as I did. And their kids, in turn, are a credit to them. Well behaved (within reason – they are kids, after all
), polite and well mannered.
There is nothing wrong with physical punishment. But it must be dispensed dispassionately and fairly.
Exactly.
To put it another way, it is the nuclear option, a last resort, hopefully never applied.
DaveE.
Calling the hitting of kid admonition not violence does not change its intrinsic nature.
Going back to an earlier scenario, if I hit the old lady in Tesco in a sensible and measured way to solve a dispute is it okay? Clearly not.
I’m not condemning you and I recall being on the receiving end of a few slaps from the old lady over the years so it’s not a guarantee or a predictor. But the few kids I see being punished in such a way by their parents are often hit by angry and out of control parents (again in no way suggesting you were such).
SAT, there are two basic problems with your allegorical old lady in Tesco.
1). She is not your child.
2). It is not your personal responsibility to ensure that she knows what is and what isn’t appropriate behaviour.
Ergo, whereas it is not your place to chastise an adult working in Tesco with whom you disagree, it is your place to ensure that your children grow up knowing the difference between right and wrong.
I certainly agree with you that beating kids to within an inch of their lives in a fit of anger is wrong. Not only is it wrong, it is also counter-productive insofar as it is likely to inculcate a tendency to unwarranted violence in the child’s nature. There is also the aspect of diminishing returns, in that the beatings become less of a deterrent and more something to be endured.
So you treat your kids as your equals. Like those mothers who go shopping with their daughters as if they were their “friends”. And give them stern moral lectures about how they’re letting themselves down – from the age of two.
Don’t you think kids were less screwed up when parents were tougher?
Not as an equal, he is three so that would be absurd. I’m not sure what you are saying with the lectures comment? But I do demand and mostly get high standards from him.
Example ~ after a swim he likes a long shower. Often longer than time permits. So if he declines to come out of the shower, I don’t drag or hit him, I just explain why we need to leave, say the shower has to be turned off in one minute and then turn if off. Initially tantrums ensued, but I calmly explain (no emotional mirroring with toddlers, this is the road to hell) again whey we have to leave. If he still declines, I just turn the shower off. He can be a stubborn and determined chap sometimes but you can only stand so long in a shower that is off before realising that it’s pointless and time to dry off.
For me it is better to come to an understanding of this on his own than to be hit.
What exactly are you asking? Spanking, (a physical discipline tool), as opposed to beating, (striking one in anger with the desired result of inflicting harm) is a very good tool for teaching respect. If one is spanked for sassing ones parents, one learns not to do so, which can carry over into not sassing, say, the police officer who stops you, and who, if you argue or “sass” them, might just go upside your head with a stick. This not sassing ones parents, or the police, shows respect. Your inclusion of non-violence in your post shows that you are, in fact, a coward, one who wants someone else, (the state) to do all your disciplining for you, so that you never have to act. Never.
Until they come for you.
It is not cowardly not to want to hit your own kids. This attempt to verbally differentiate between forms of hitting your kids is futile, it’s all just violence.
I absolutely do not want (nor would I tolerate) anyone hitting him. Anyone who tried to do so would very very swiftly find out that the non-initiation of force does not mean the rejection of said force.
Sir, we will not get anywhere by insulting one another. I do not want the state to hit him for a number of reasons and as a voluntaryist I do not want a state at all so the proposition you put forward falls.
He’s a coward because he won’t use violence against a child?
Yeah, it takes real bravery to knock around a three year old
I doubt the threat of official intervention over smacking has made much difference in the sort of families where ADHD is likely to surface in mitigation for a crime.
In any case, I’m dubious about this diagnosis, since the father describes the boy as ‘perfectly normal until the age of 10′; hyperactivity is typically clearly noticeable by the age of 3.
Because the indicators of ADHD can be poor behaviour in school and a lack of cooperation, it’s become a useful ‘catch-all’ diagnosis for all kinds of disruptive behaviour, muddying the waters for those who really do have the condition.
In my experience, teenagers with ADHD are usually cooperative about taking their medication (controversial, I know, but I’ve seen it work wonders with exam preparation and resulting success); even if they aren’t concerned about their exam results, they understand that it makes it easier for them to fit in with their friends and be accepted if their behaviour falls within normal parameters.
I would say the boy in question does have serious behavioural problems in which the fact that his father was prepared to wash his hands of his parental responsibility and leave the boy alone in a (liberally) state-funded bedsit to dream up ways of making mischief may be, as Longrider concludes, a significant factor.
My experience is that the parents behaviour isn’t much better than the kids.
DaveE.
The father apparently has 11 children. Lack of impulse control may well be genetic…
Actually Julia, I complain to my neighbour about the kids climbing the fence then over the wall to the street.
He says he’ll have words, then, next thing I know, he’s started a fire in his back garden, collected a pallet off the street, thrown it over my wall, climbed over the wall, thrown said pallet over the fence, climbed the fence and pulled the top of one of the laths loose.
God give me friggin’ strength!
Exactly, Ivan.
Macheath is spot on – I’d be astonished if this kid has a genuine, diagnosed-by-NHS cases of ADHD. It doesnt fit.
It simply amazes me how people can think that beating children can make them learn the lessons of respect and non-violence
It doesn’t. It’s not intended to. It teaches them that actions have consequences. If, big if, you can teach that and never physically touch him then great, but otherwise sooner or later some-one will come along and kick the hell out of the obnoxious little so and so. Whether you tolerate it or not.
My son is not obnoxious. He is in fact pretty bright, charming and polite. Even at three I’ve taught him about property rights and not inititating force. I didn’t need to hit him to do so as the ability to reason and make elementary moral choices seems to me to trump refraining from certain action for fear of being hit.
Anyone trying the course of action you predict would learn that the non-initiation of force does not preclude the use of said force nor extremely vigorous self-defence on his part, nor vengance on mine.
How on earth did we get onto corporal punishment from people deciding that Twitter should police everyone’s conversations?
Not sure, but I’m fancying a post on ‘Cats covering the subject in a bit more detail.
Ah…
Just as well I’m relaxed about people going off topic, eh?
Mea culpa, LR; indulging in some equestrianism on one of my habitual hobby-horses seems to have kicked the whole thing off – sorry!
(FWIW, I thoroughly agree with what you said in the post – Daley gave this unpleasant individual exactly what he was after.)
It’s no big deal. Sometimes these discussions go off at an unexpected tangent.
There was a longstanding ‘urban myth’ about how the proles waste police time with such things as Tracy complaining to Police that “My boyfriend called me a slag on Facebook and I wannim busted yeah”.
Seems that myth has become reality since the law seems to require the police to investigate such manifistations of “hate crime”.