Technology Today

The Manifest Destiny of the 21st Century

7/13/2015

You know, I really love technology. I have since I was a kid. I spent my days, after sports practices or rehearsals, in front of a computer testing my admittedly minimal knowledge with games and programs. I love the fact that technology is now the new frontier. The Manifest Destiny of the 21st century, if you will. With this relatively new territory comes a lot of great advances for civilization, but it also comes with a few challenges. I could talk for days about things like net neutrality, the lack of diversity, cybersecurity scandals, or how society devalues public spending for new discoveries. Instead I want to hit on this notion of free speech so often thrown around on the internet.

Oh the internet, it’s a truly wonderful place where anyone can say or do something that they’re passionate about. That type of freedom has been completely unheard of in history until the early 90s when our modern internet was born. I love going on websites and looking up information pertinent to my interests. I like keeping in touch with family and friends through social media. I like spending what little free time I do have playing a game where I can employ strategy and skill. People from around the world like doing those same things. On the internet there is no difference between a social justice blogger on Tumblr and the webmaster of a Flat Earth believer forum. There’s something beautiful about the capabilities this openness allows. At the same time it can be utterly terrifying.

There are places on the world wide web that describe, promote, and celebrate some of humanity’s ugliest qualities. The Ku Klux Klan has every bit of freedom to say what they want to say on the internet. Spreading their racist ideologies around the United States and abroad has allowed for a dramatic rise in Klansman chapters and members. For years places like Reddit, 4chan/8chan, and YouTube have seen some of the most hateful, degrading, and appalling rhetoric in both comments and posts. The rise of trolling throughout shared connection spaces (the internet, gaming, video chatting) has lead to multiple cases of suicide. There are so many dark spaces in the freedom of the internet and it doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon.

So what do we do? How do we cope with the vitriol spewed from the Darknet while preserving the freedom and goodness that comes from the majority of the internet. Simply, there is no way to combat it. It’s the old age tale of Good vs Evil. Even if we were to somehow limit the nastiness of things like “revenge porn” (posting NSFW photos of someone without their permission), artists having their work stolen, and cyberbullying the internet will always find a way for that kind of ugliness to express itself. In my opinion, the best way to combat the Darknet is to preach the good qualities of the internet, and ultimately humanity. By over exposing the internet’s users to ideas like feminism, environmentalism, and socialism we’ve seen a rapid change in society. Over time we will become a better people because of the freedom of the internet. A freedom that, despite it’s potential for ugliness, is inherently good and must be maintained.