By Leesa Fenderson
The conversation usually begins with my hello and his hesitant response. They say the way to deal with a bully is to stand up to her. So when a colleague or even someone on the other side of a negotiation decides to don his bully attire in an email, I usually pick up the phone and place a call. If the email gangster is in-house I’ll arrange a face-to-face meeting. I find that my phone call or presence elicits an entirely different tone, no more bared teeth or growling in HTML. I don’t know why these people lose their vitriol and weightless aggression, but in these types of conflicts direct contact has been the panacea for the aggressive wounded ego. I suggest this tactic to young professionals I mentor and even executive level managers who have a tough time dealing with a pushy, abrasive, faceless bully.
However, when the bully is mob of Twitter followers or a faceless bigot in the comments section of an article covering a sensitive topic, the show up or call up is impossible. A few weeks ago a young women was violently attacked by an angry mob because she thought an entertainer’s lyrics to be offensive to women. Reading the account of her attack, in the article US Rapper Tyler The Creator unleashes a torrent of hate on Sydney activist made my stomach hurt. I don’t know what feeling was more prominent my disgust for Tyler and his fanatics or how awful I felt for the author, Talitha Stone. The attack on this young lady happened virtually. She was emotionally and technologically abused by this guy’s followers. When a mob forms it is usually a faceless mass with one mindset. It seems social media has increased the likelihood of the mob mentality. The anonymity that social media offers followers gives the mob/masses a different less physical but equally abusive avenue for assault. The abusers threatened violence in the form of rape and beatings against this young lady who dared to have an opinion that differed from theirs. Disturbing is the idea of violence, particularly rape, as entertainment or retaliation.
I was particularly alarmed, although unfortunately not surprised, by the response to a wedding story published on Essence.com, Bridal Bliss: Jai and Rebecca. For a bride and groom I imagine some excitement and trepidation in carefully choosing the best images to evidence their love. However, when Jai and Rebecca, decided to put their love on a forum for all the world to see, choosing the images with the best lighting should have been their only concern. I looked at this image of love with delight and the hope I have for all people who embark on this journey. I scrolled down to the comments and the scathing remarks of faceless angry voyeurs awaited me, such as “you two are already dead,” as well as words of encouragement, love, and voices in defense. Yet, why should love be defended, same sex or otherwise? Who are you a member of a faceless, cowardly mass, to judge how a person chooses to love? Further, there are many things that I find disagreeable on the internet, but never once have felt so emboldened as to don a bully mask and threaten violence using QWERTY as a weapon. I am sure the couple thought that this showing would bring out the best and the worst in people. It did.
