House of the Rising Sun: Moderating Social Media
Telegram CEO arrested in France over social media content moderation, or lack thereof. But let’s talk about moderating our usage and helping our kids navigate social media.
Author’s note: I wrote this piece initially during the last week of August. I kept drafting, revising, and editing until today when I posted it. All that to say this was something I was working on before the Apalachee High School shooting in Georgia this week. This was relevant today, yesterday, this week, last week, and tomorrow.
Good end of August to all those who celebrate the destruction of summer! And good beginning of September to all those putting on their Halloween costumes or checking the colors of the leaves. As always, I’ve been doing more reading than I can hope to write about. A lot has been happening and some of it is depressing or annoying. Some of it is aggravating. And in that vein, I’ve been slowly setting up some roadblocks on social media and such to limit the amount of rage inducing stuff I come in contact with regularly. I’m not ignoring the world around me, but I am choosing to engage with it on my time. Something we all have to do from time to time for our mental health. Too much of a negative thing is harmful. It’s destructive even. It’s how someone can go from mild-mannered to mass murderer because of some wild conspiracy theory they found online and absorbed to the point they felt murder was the only option.
And to that end, let’s talk briefly today about social media content moderation as we sometimes do here. But I think I want to take a different approach today as I originally wanted to hyper focus on the news that chat and social media app Telegram’s CEO Pavel Durov was arrested by French authorities this past week. To quote the Wall Street Journal:
“French judicial authorities brought preliminary charges against Telegram founder Pavel Durov for a host of crimes, including complicity in distributing child pornography, illegal drugs and hacking software on the messaging app… (t)he authorities also charged Durov with refusing to cooperate with investigations into illegal activity on Telegram. Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau cited “an almost complete absence of response from Telegram to judicial demands.”
First off, a little background for myself with Telegram. I actually got on Telegram years ago, possibly within the first year it launched, I’m not sure, and I got my wife on it as well. We used it a lot for years as our main form of communication as a family. Eventually, we added our son to it as well. When we were on it, I enjoyed it, and loved its features. I had always hoped it would continue to grow in popularity. But, then it started having more and more problems with a lack of content moderation. And actually, I suspect it always did have those lack of policies, but as the platform grew out and added more social features such as huge group chats and public facing channels, it became a bit of a social network and not just a private messaging app. Far-right folks with extreme views that would get them banned from other platforms started setting up shop on Telegram along with porn bots and, of course, child pornography which always happens when a platform takes a hands-off approach to content moderation.
I always harp on that point, and I suppose I always will, but a hands-off approach to social media content moderation is an invitation to child exploitation and child sex trafficking.
Knowing what was happening to Telegram in the background, I decided it was time for our family to get off Telegram a few years ago. I had a teenage son and that was my number one priority in that decision.
If you are a parent and are reading this, listen up, we cannot be lazy when it comes to technology. When I was a kid the joke was that our parents were so inept with technology that they couldn’t hook up a VCR, and it is true I did setup VCRs and Nintendos on the regular as a kid, because parents were generally naive of this technology. But not knowing today’s technology, or keeping up on the news concerning the apps your kids are using, may result in your kids getting targeted by predators or hit with unsolicited dick pictures, and so on and so forth. Or that they will be targeted with extremist views that can radicalize someone to the point they commit domestic terrorist acts.
It doesn’t mean that we take it too far, that we restrict them from using apps or technology altogether, or that we develop a general hatred of the apps they use. My god, my peers and older absolutely responded with sheer hate when TikTok came on the scene. Just because your kid likes something doesn't mean there’s something wrong with it.
But, we do have to teach them how to take care of themselves online. I’m fortunate in that my son comes to us immediately if he receives a text or call from a number he doesn’t recognize. He just hands the phone over and informs me he doesn’t know who it’s from and we figure it out. Usually, it’s spam and we block it, and I hand it back. But I love that he trusts us to have his back if something suspicious comes across his phone.
And that’s really the key, especially as our kids develop into teenagers, building trust. And that isn’t something you demand or enforce. It doesn’t magically exist because we are their parents. It comes from years of showing through our behavior that we have their backs and can be trusted. If we can do that, than as teenagers they won’t feel the need to distrust us.
“House of the Rising Sun” by The Animals.
This month’s song is from The Animals. It’s a golden oldie and called “House of the Rising Sun.” I was having difficulty finding a song for this newsletter, but then I started listening to this song and realized the idea of gambling is relevant here. When we allow our kids onto social media platforms that don’t moderate or moderate little, we are taking a gamble with our children. Please don’t gamble with your kids.
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