Why did I stop having "debates" on social media

Some time ago I stopped having “debates” on social media because I noticed that they were affecting me emotionally when I realised that it was “impossible to make someone understand” my position and receive solid arguments in return, mea culpa, I was asking a lot from social media. However, this does not mean that I completely disconnected from interactions on social media, I only focus on what can be done in them, interact and spread information and dog memes. Always doggo memes.

Today’s picture is a bike on a road because … just because I really like bike rides, especially in cute parks..

What does it mean that I stopped having those discussions on social media? This means that I limit myself a lot or I stopped interacting with people with different opinions who were looking for someone just to fight, I stopped reacting positively or negatively to other people’s debates and in general I stopped getting involved in all these “debates and controversies” about complicated issues of the world because now I seriously believe that social media is not a place to have these debates, they are a platform to amplify and disseminate content with the feeling of being communication in both directions, but it does not work like that.

It was a very recurring theme in my life to feel that I had a “responsibility to defend my position” and that also fell into the idea of wanting to “educate others on issues that I understand better than them”, let’s talk about the humility that I handled in the discussions 🤦🏻‍♀️ . This led me many times to feel very frustrated because I believed that people simply did not understand me, did not care as much as I did or directly reacted in a very violent way with those “reactions” on Facebook.

And this is a significant problem because social media have that super power of creating the feeling of “anonymity” and of being “behind a screen” and not being in a face-to-face interaction, all of our limits definitely change and expand and it is very easy to fall into extremes such as those attacks of openly and intentionally mocking someone’s comment or being aggressive with language and at the other extreme being very open, loving or expressive and creating bonds and relationships that are based on a very small part of the life that social media is and that could hardly exist outside of it. And the problem with these extremes is that in real life we would not be able to reach any of those extremes, and toxic people on the internet are not capable of laughing in your face when you speak, nor are they going to insult or threaten you and relationships or friendships that occur virtually could not exist in the real world. Clearly there are exceptions to the rule and yes there are horrible people in the world and there are relationships that work, but I think it is clear that there are different limits inside and outside of social media.

So, this issue of the different boundaries began to affect me emotionally because it was very easy to get involved in a situation where I was talking to extremely aggressive strangers acting in packs and supporting each other, raising the level of the conversation and reaching those points of aggression where you ask yourself, how did I come to be fighting on any issue in a group of extremists/Trump supporters when I clearly can’t stand them, I understand that they are radical and violent and when they get together they are worse? or on other occasions I ended up saying to myself “what are you doing talking / fighting with this person who in real life is not able to look you in the face and in social media he “ha ha” all the serious posts about violence and is being openly aggressive with you AND ALSO DOESN’T SPEAK TO ME IN PERSON?” And that’s how I began to “realise” that there was no point in putting myself in that position and that those interactions on social media were affecting me emotionally and in real life and that maybe it was a good idea to distance myself and start minding my own business and stop getting where most likely I was not going to change absolutely anything.

Other very interesting points on this topic, I have been collecting them from posts by Mariana Matija, (big fan, please see her beautiful work on taking care of the planet we live on, everything is in Spanish) about the relationship we have with social media and how we misinterpret it and expect interactions from it that simply are not possible or make no sense. Regarding the debates, she mentions in this conversation (also in Spanish) key points such as that social media are platforms to amplify but are not massive media, in addition that they work in a context of immediacy and being viral and complex realities of the world cannot be simplified to be immediate and viral as we want them to be.

And these points led me to think that again that false feeling of communicating something or doing something is created when in reality it is not happening, this feeling of having a debate is a problem because the minimum standards to have a real debate are not being met and many times they end up only being meaningless violent interactions where nobody gained anything, in these interactions in social media many times we do not know who the person on the other side is, what their history and context are and what tools they have to defend their positions and that leads us to not recognising that it is another person, equally complex and with many things that we do not know, we are not opening a real space to communicate and really understand and process what we are reading, we are only participating in the dynamics of the popularity contest to “win the debate” and see who said the most poignant or most viralizable or more “intellectual” phrase and see who has the most likes on each comment and feel triumphant when the other person leaves the debate or renounces to remain involved in that interaction.

And regarding the immediacy of social media, this only makes communication and the objective of a debate even more difficult because they are not a space designed to take the time to think, organise ideas and share them efficiently, many times it is just a bombardment of opinions and half-built arguments that turn the interaction into a contest of who talks harder, faster and has more “likes” for each comment and that it was not actually a debate, nor did you get anyone to change their mind and the golden star you won for all the Likes in comments are useless in the real world and also give you the impression that you did something (but you didn’t).

In this context of bombarding a conversation with half-hearted opinions and arguments, the problem of wanting to over-simplify all the topics, of wanting everything to be intact, in vignettes and hopefully with viralizable phrases and beautiful backgrounds to share in the stories, also filters through. But the reality of the world is very complex, very very very very very complex and it cannot be understood with pretty phrases on Instagram and it cannot be understood by watching 15-second challenges on Tik-tok, nor can it be understood by having popularity contests on Facebook , nor can it be understood by reading a thread on Twitter. Understanding some realities of the world is a process that never ends because knowledge continues to advance, societies continue to evolve and our own understanding also advances and evolves over time. So most likely just receiving information from social networks is not going to help you fully understand a reality of the world and that is okay as long as you understand that reality.

This does not mean that you cannot learn something in those quick social media posts, nor am I denying that they are a useful tool for disseminating information and that it can be (I think it always is) the entrance door to many complex issues in the world and this is very valuable because it is a first step to inform us about issues that are not part of our daily lives and that are very valuable and relevant, however it must be clear that it is precisely that, a simplified and superficial vision that is quite useful to expand our perspective of the world and it is very valuable to continue with the process if you want to, however I also understand that it is valid not to want or not to be able to continue delving into complex problems of the world and it is valid to simply have the simplified version of some issues and move on.

I already deviated from the topic but I did not want this to become an ode of hate to social media because it is not, I understand that it has positive aspects such as being the entrance door to many possibilities. Going back to the debates and my relationship with social media, what do I do with social media and when I want to seriously communicate with someone about a topic that is debatable and profound? Well, I look for people to speak “on inbox” and we can have conversations for weeks or months where there is time to process the information and organise ideas because the exercise of answering with the intention of understand the idea generates a productive environment for a debate or a discussion and also gives us time to have a life outside of social networks and thus respond when we have time or desire to do so, or have a call in which we listen seriously or simply take it out of the digital world and speak in person.

This does not mean that I only talk about serious and profound things all the time or that I talk a lot with people, on the contrary I really like stable relationships with my WhatsApp meme and sticker providers with whom I do not talk about anything and I like a lot of daydreaming with my friends and imagining ventures and blogging topics and projects and trips that we’re never going to do because not everything in life is transcendental and I don’t have soooo many friends to be talking to someone all the time.

There are several conclusions on this subject and the first I think is that if we align the expectations we have about interactions in a social media, about what they can really do, what they are for and we take into account the limitations they have, we will be able to realise that there are spaces in which it is simply not worth focusing our energy and arguments, also that it does not make much sense to get involved in popularity contests, especially when they become toxic, and that winning a debate that did not exist and was useless in reality is not winning anything and you just wasted your time and surely someone on the other side of the screen may believe that you are an idiot and you have no way to prove them wrong because social media are not a space to do it.

I would also love if you can keep the idea that our relationship with social media can be as harmful or as beneficial as we decide, this is another long and interesting topic that we will talk about at some point, but we can make them the entrance to topics that interest us, they can help us improve our vision of the world, about ourselves, and if you follow someone who does beautiful things and is inspiring and insightful, also to improve whatever you want. Note that this works both ways, if you only follow accounts that share “banter” that are actually xenophobic, racist or sexist jokes, or accounts that focus a lot on physical appearance, diet culture and impossible beauty standards, well those are also entrance doors.

I hope this reflection helps you think about whether or not it is worth getting into a debate the next time you found them in a Facebook group and that if you want to get involved anyway, think about the limitations of social media and try to act accordingly, on the other side there is (almost) always another person, with feelings, context and complexities, do not do anything that you would not do in person and be responsible for your actions, remember that we all make social networks a pleasant or unpleasant place.

I also hope you can start a conversation on this topic with a friend or family member, and if you have more ideas or would like to join my exclusive club of conversations that last weeks or months and we respond only when we can and want because there are very intense topics to think about, my inbox is always open to you. And now you can subscribe to the newsletter to receive the posts in your inbox with notes from the editor.

See you next time.

Annie