We all complain about how toxic social media has become, but very few of us actually try to change that culture by changing our own behavior. I’m not just talking about being “civil” — I’m talking about rewarding the discourse we want more of, and not spreading the poison. 1/

What gets rewarded on social media? For the most part: Loud, definitive, overly-simplified statements that leave little room for confusion but also leave little room for nuance. In other words, statements that don’t reflect reality but make us feel better in their certainty. 2/

Social media rewards sloganeering — ie, communicating and trying to persuade people by repeating catchy slogans and buzzwords, rather than taking the time to explain our ideas, having nuanced conversations, and actually trying to understand the world around us. 3/

Essentially, we’re claiming to have debates about really critical and incredibly complicated topics on mediums that force us to choose between being ignored or expressing our ideas in louder, blunter terms than we would ever use in face-to-face conversation. 4/

I have done an informal experiment over the past year or so, during which I tried (sometimes with more success than other times) to moderate my tone and leave room for ambiguity when I may have previously used more definitive or flashy language. The results were as expected. 5/

Using a more moderate tone means getting less engagement. And I am okay with that, mostly. I would rather express an idea fully and have it retweeted 50 or 100 times than post a string of buzzwords that goes viral but has little meaning. But this isn’t about my feels. 5/

The problem here is that we are choosing thought leaders based on how well they can play the social media game, not by the quality or uniqueness of their ideas nor how well they can support those ideas or how qualified they are to weigh in on a particular subject. 6/

Currently, of the most widely-shared coronavirus “experts” is actually a nutritional epidemiologist, not a virologist or infectious disease epidemiologist. One of the loudest voices on the effectiveness of masks is a sociologist. And few people even question it. 7/

I bring this up now because I want to encourage you to think about what kind of discourse will get us through this uniquely perilous time. Is it soundbites & sloganeering? Doubtful. That‘s more likely to play into the hands of charlatans like Trump. It’s part of the problem. 8/

I know the formula for going viral. Many people do. And that’s a problem, for many reasons. For one thing, when we frame complex issues in binary terms and buzzwords, it makes it far easier for bad actors to misrepresent our beliefs and reframe them for propaganda purposes. 9/

I should probably just go ahead & write this in an article, but I needed to say something because I think it’s *that* important. It’s also something we have control over. We can change this today — if we want to. So let’s stop following the algorithm, and start leading ourselves.

And I hope I conveyed this in my tweets, but I’m not removing myself from the problem. I know I‘ve contributed to it. We all have. But that doesn’t mean we can’t be part of the solution. In fact, I think our role in creating the problem compels us to take part in fixing it.