Is internet shaming a good way to combat racism and bigotry?

[Miller]

@sleestak

This whole discussion reminds me of a guy named Eddie. I worked with Eddie and he is a loud and obnoxious kind of guy, though it works for him and people like him a lot.

One day at work Eddie went off about a contractor, called him a fag and used some other insults. He did this in front of me and some other people including g a coworker who happened to be gay. The next day I went to Eddie’s office and told Eddie that one of the people that heard his rant was gay. I didn’t identify the person but let him know it wasn’t cool.

Eddie said ‘No shit? Man, I am sorry.’ Eddie then tracked down each person who was there and apologized for using the slurs. The gay person happened to be a very good friend of mine, besides being a coworker. Eddie thought very highly of this person. When Eddie apologized, my friend told Eddie that he is gay. Eddie did his damnedest to make the situation whole because Eddie thinks the world of my friend.

I could have gone to H.R. My friend could have gone to H.R. Instead, Eddie learned a lesson and stopped using slurs like fag.

The outcome was the best one possible.

That’s a heartwarming story, and an excellent example of the wisdom of assuming the best about another person when you, personally, have absolutely nothing on the line. Eddie going, “Oh, shit, I didn’t know someone here was gay. I have to find out who, so I can apologize!” is the best case scenario. The worst case, scenario, of course, is, him going, “Oh, shit, I didn’t know someone here was gay. I have to find out who, so I can kick their fucking teeth in!” Either way, though, it’s not going to hurt you, is it?

Here’s how that story worked out for my ex. He was gay (duh) and trans, and in the process of coming out as trans at work. He got a new manager, and some of the things this manager would say in casual conversation raised a couple of warning signs for my ex, but she seemed nice, and he wasn’t sure, and wouldn’t it be terrible to make trouble for this person over nothing? So he didn’t go to HR.

There’s a pretty involved story, here, and I don’t want to get into it, not least for privacy concerns, but the punchline is my boyfriend being told, by his manager, “You have to consider what’s more important: your career, or your transition.” (FWIW, his corporate health policy specifically covered gender confirmation surgery - it was one of the major reasons he took the job.) At that point he goes to HR, but his manager had already had about two years to sabotage his career. He’d already narrowly avoided being fired for “performance issues” by his boss going on maternity leave, and not personally writing his next performance review (which, oddly enough, turned out to be glowing). HR wouldn’t act, because they couldn’t tell if it was genuine harassment, or a disgruntled employee lashing out at his boss. (It didn’t help that the representative assigned to the case was wildly stupid.) He ended up writing an email directly to the CEO, begging to be transferred to another department to get out of the situation. Which, amazingly enough, worked. But he nearly lost his entire career because he gave someone “the benefit of the doubt,” instead of immediately going to HR when someone said something bigoted.

[Martini_Enfield]

@DSeid

Do the general principles on what is appropriate when that I have attempted to articulate make sense to you? Would you modify them at all in the abstract?

Not really, I’m afraid, but I’m also running low on caffeine. My view is the default situation should be that online shaming is not OK as a general rule, with exceptions for prominent harassers/people calling for genocide/dodgy politicians or public servants obviously doing the wrong thing.

I treat people the way I’d like to be treated and that means not calling them out out in a personally identifiable way on the internet for doing/saying something/having an opinion I don’t like - because the shoe could very easily be on the other foot.

In short: I honestly believe the world would be a better place and most people would be a lot happer if we learned to shut the fuck up and mind our own business as a general principle.