The Problem
As we all know by now, social media is deeply ingrained into almost everybody’s life. Children, teens, adults, and elders are all constantly logging in, scrolling, and spending hours in a virtual world. This “virtual world” has many positive and many negative attributes that it carries with itself. On one hand you can connect to old friends, meet new people, learn about things you might never know, and stay up to date with worldly issues. But on the other hand, it is easy to lose yourself in this world, get addicted to social media, become depressed or anxious, and lose track of your personal morals and beliefs.
The topic that I would like to focus on is community in social media apps and websites. If you ask anybody about one of their favorite things about going online, they might tell you that it feels like they can find anything that they want online. No matter what you are into, there is a group online dedicated to it, with a group of people that are just as passionate as you might be about any particular topic. This is truly amazing and it gives many people a sense of community that they might not otherwise experience. However, I would like to look at the downsides of these online communities.
Now I see nothing wrong with a simple community of people that like some sort of niche topic. Some examples of this could be tennis fanatics, people that love cooking Asian food, fans of a specific sub-genre of music, or a community that loves a certain television show. These are usually great places and the users of them harbor a wealth of knowledge on their respective topics. The darker side of these internet communities is when the topics they’re built around get into more dangerous territories. Some examples of these topics are politics, religion, hate, and any other topic that might create strong, controversial opinions.
You might join an online community dedicated to a certain government official because you support their policies and political stance. This could be on any platform and you could visit it as often or as little as you wanted. The problem here is if this is the only place you go to when you want to hear and talk about anything related to politics. This is an issue because you will only encounter opinions and news that you will agree with. This creates a sort of online echo chamber. It can also create a hive mind dynamic. All of the sudden you start to adopt radical political and social beliefs because that is what is being liked, shared, and reposted in this community. You might not agree with it initially, but the more time you spend in this community and the more normalized it becomes, the more likely you are to adopt it.
Adding Context
Now obviously, this example I gave is very extreme and doesn’t happen in every community. But it is something that I hear about far too often. Personally, when I look for political content (or anything with strong opinions attached to it), I try to find the most unbiased source that I can. Nowadays that can be a very hard thing to do, especially when it seems like everybody has some sort of agenda that they need to push on you.
Even in some of the online communities I am a part of, it is clear that these sort of echo chambers can happen anywhere. For example, I am a big music fan and listen to a lot of hip-hop. I frequent an online forum dedicated to fans of hip-hop, where new and old music is regularly posted and discussed. It is crazy how fast a hive mindset can form in this community. A new album can come out and depending on if it is liked or not, people will downvote and shame people who do not feel the same way as they do about the said album. This makes it very hard to find opposing opinions and real discussion. Instead the forum will turn into a metaphorical “circle-jerk”, a place where people encourage and congratulate each other on sharing the same opinion. So even if the album is overrated or actually not that bad, the hive mindset dictates what your opinion should be on that album or artist. Now this might not seem too important in the grand scheme of things but consider how this could happen in communities that are dedicated to politics, religion, and other sensitive topics.
The Tech
This sort of toxic community can exist on any platform, but the one I am the most familiar with is Reddit. Reddit is a website and app that hosts communities, called subreddits, that are dedicated to almost anything that you can think of. These communities are made up of users who can post links, text, or images. These posts can then be up-voted or down-voted by the other members of the community.
Reddit, in itself, is a great website that gives the platform to its users to generate their own content. However, it is the users and communities that also make Reddit such a bad place sometimes. The worst parts of Reddit are the subreddits dedicated to explicit and controversial topics, the hive mentality within the subreddits, and the lack of outside information (if you are not actively looking for it). For my redesign, I want to focus on the subreddits. The whole point of the website is that you can create a community dedicated to a specific topic, so I obviously don’t want to change that. What I do want to change is the echo chamber effect that can occur inside these subreddits. Some very controversial subreddits didn’t start out that way, but eventually evolved into places where toxicity and hate fester.
Values and Morals
People need community, but online communities are not always beneficial because you don’t get any outside opinions. In the real world you meet many people, all with diverse opinions and values, and this helps to shape you and the values that you hold. It also helps create empathy, something that you’d have a hard time finding in the cold-hearted comment sections online. In my redesign of Reddit, I want to bring more diverse outlooks and opinions to subreddits. Instead of being downvoted into an oblivion if you present an alternative opinion, I feel you should be given a chance to speak your mind and defend your stance.
Another thing that can be bad about Reddit is the extra toxic communities that are a part of it. Although I do believe in free speech, subreddits that promote hate, racism, sexism, violence, and other extremes should not be given a platform. Reddit has gotten a lot better at banning subreddits like this over the past few years, but they are still abundant. It is important for the internet to not be censored, but morally some things should not be allowed.
My Redesign
I want to redesign subreddits and the community aspects of Reddit. Like I have said before, subreddits that act as an echo chamber where the same content and thoughts are reposted and upvoted over and over is a problem. The hive mind can become dangerous or toxic if no outside opinions are introduced. To solve this, I would require certain, important posts (determined by the mods) to have different links to varying opinions, regardless of the position of that subreddit. For example, President Trump passes a new controversial bill, there should be links to a republican/right-wing article and a democratic/left-wing article about the same topic. Ideally, users should look to post unbiased articles. Obviously, we wouldn’t want this on every post, on every subreddit because not every topic needs so much attention, variation, or outside opinion.
Another thing I would change would be the front page of the website. Currently you can choose for the front page to be either whatever is the most popular on Reddit at the current moment or to only show what’s popular from the subreddits you have subscribed to. First off, I would default the home page to not show only your subscriptions. Rather, the front page would be based off of keywords in the subreddits you are subscribed to. Not only will this help you find other subreddits that are dedicated to similar topics you like, it also shows you many different opinions from different communities about the same topic. This way instead of being in an echo chamber of the same opinions, you are exposed to a bit of diversity and can formulate your own opinions and values.
The final thing I would change is the voting system. Currently, on most subreddits, if you post a varying opinion you will be downvoted to the point where your comment disappears. This is bad because it’s the hive mind shutting out any outside perspective. I suggest that all posts and comments have a grace period where they can only be upvoted. During this time, people can read the opposing opinions, comment on them, and upvote them if they feel that they provide a good argument or point of view. Obviously, any blatantly offensive or troll posts can be removed by moderators. After the grace period is up the downvote option will be presented and the users will determine whether the post or comment is deserving. Honestly, I don’t feel the downvote button is that necessary at all, but it is such an integral part of Reddit that it wouldn’t feel the same without it.
Conclusion
My redesign for Reddit would be changing how the front page, subreddits, and voting works. I believe that this is necessary because in the closed subreddit communities there isn’t much room for any outsider perspectives and opinions. This can lead to online echo chambers, a hive mentality, and “circle-jerk” dynamics. In communities, this can create toxic behavior. Some examples of this behavior can include downvoting opposing ideas, promoting hateful, offensive, or controversial mindsets, and simply spreading misinformation because it is what the community will agree with. When you enclose yourself within a community like this and don’t expose yourself to outside information, it is easy to quickly adopt whatever is popular inside the community instead of thinking for yourself. Hopefully my ideas for the redesign of Reddit can fix these issues and make Reddit a better, less toxic place overall.
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