Outrage Porn Leads to Outrage Impotence

You may or may not have heard the term "Outrage Porn." If it's a new one to you, here's the short version. Outrage porn refers to the use of outrage to drive content, especially on the internet. Headlines and articles pander to a sense of moral outrage over whatever is the latest thing. People click on the headlines, share, and comment. That's like gold to online media sites so they make the next story more outrageous. Kind of like pornography but instead of using lust they use outrage.

Outrage Inc.

In recent memory people have been outraged over the shooting of a gorilla to save a child, the questionable use of a private email server, the death of a child from an alligator attack, and probably something about body shaming (I'm guessing, I don't usually run in those circles).

The system works well. Media finds stories that strike a nerve. Is someone being a bad parent? Is a celebrity doing something wrong? Is a politician being a hypocrite? Is there someone that can be judged or shamed to allow the readers to feel morally superior?

Great! Write it up, slap on a click-bait headline, and watch the ad revenue roll in!

It's a business and your moral outrage is the commodity being monetized. In the same way that sex sells, by appealing directly to your lizard brain, bypassing your rational mind, and driving a response that you have before you're even aware that you're doing it. It's almost exactly like smelling popcorn when you walk into a movie theater. The sensory stimulus gets sent to your limbic system to see if it's something to eat, fear, or mate with. Popcorn smells like food so your brain tells you that it is and, without spending much time at all processing, your brain will often send signals to your mouth and stomach signalling hunger. You just want it. You don't think about it. You don't process whether or not you're actually hungry (at least on the first round).

Sex works the same way. You see an image and it triggers the parts of your brain that help you to find a mate. You experience lust. Your body starts to react before your brain can process much (at least on the first round). You just want it. You don't think about it.

Diminishing Returns

If you work in a movie theater there's a good chance that you're immune to the smell of popcorn. It might even be off putting to you. You've smelled it so many times that your limbic system doesn't really register it anymore, at least not with the desire for food. 

People who consume a lot of pornography can become impotent as a result of the desensitization. They feed sexual stimuli into their brains, like a drug, and with each round the stimuli has less and less effect. Stimulus is increased, more and/or different porn is consumed to get the same effect until that doesn't work. Then, eventually, there's no room left to increase the stimulus. Impotence results. 

Our limbic system is a survival tool. It keys in on what's different in the environment to search for threats and aids to survival, then it triggers rewards for doing things that lead to survival. Good job finding food for today; here's a hit of dopamine. Good job finding a mate; here's some endorphins and hormones. Good job getting away from that tiger; here's a flood of relief. When all of that works well we're automatically reminded, by our desire for those good neurotransmitters, what's good to eat, what leads to mating, and what alleviates fear. 

But most of us aren't on the brink of survival. Most of us have plenty of food and little reason to fear (finding a mate is still a universal human struggle). 

So we find ways to get those good neurotransmitters anyway. We eat fatty, salty, sweet food in excess because it feels good. We devour images of sexuality because it feels good. And very often we seek out fear because it feels good. 

The Joy of Fear

Wait, wait, I bet you're thinking, how can fear feel good? 

It's not the fear, exactly, but the good neurotransmitters that your brain releases after you've conquered fear. It's like going down a slide on the playground. Most of us had the moment (or moments) of frozen terror at the top of the slide. Staring down the long, metal expanse and seeing certain death. Weighing the the danger to life and limb in going down the slide. Trying to decide if every other kid that went down the slide was just lucky or if it's actually safe despite all of the warnings your brain is shouting at you. Then you go down the slide. You feel the wind in your face and the g-forces on your body. You arrive at the bottom unscathed. Your brain rewards you for surviving. Good job; here's some dopamine! 

If you're not an adrenaline junkie constantly seeking danger by jumping out of airplanes or surfing with sharks or playing with fire, you can still get some good neurotransmitters through fear. 

Fighting feels good. Not losing, not being injured, but fighting and feeling like you've won. Conquering another. You have vanquished a foe and lived to fight another day. We've made sport of this feeling, first through blood sports and then through organized sports. We can win. We can conquer the fear of loss, the fear of shame, the fear of unworthiness. 

Outrage is a form of fighting. We set the stakes, not as a physical contest, but as a mental and emotional battle. The survival of our sacred values is threatened so we fight, and when we win we feel those good neurotransmitters, at least for a while. 

The Impotence of Outrage

Just like with food or sex, we can become desensitized to fear. We can become accustomed to the good neurotransmitters the we feel when we've been outraged and so need more and more outrage to achieve the same level of good feelings. Eventually, if it goes on too long, we lose the ability to become outraged at all. 

Outrage can be a very good thing. It can help us to identify real threats to our values and to our society. It can lead us to make necessary and lasting changes in ourselves and in our communities. Outrage is an appropriate response just like lust and hunger are.

But we can't mate if we've become impotent, we hurt ourselves when we eat too much, and we can't affect change through outrage if we're numb to it. 

Mass shootings have horrified and outraged the nation on what feels like a regular basis. Violence by police against minorities seems to be epidemic and systemic. Yet change seems glacially slow. Mass shootings keep happening. People of color keep being hurt by law enforcement. The tensions rise, the outrage builds, and for some it boils over into even more violence. 

And so it goes. 

Resensitizing

For someone who has become desensitized through overuse of pornography the impotence can feel permanent, but it's not. Through a long process of avoiding sexual stimulus a person can become resensitized. The same thing can happen with food, changing cravings and rewiring the reward system in the brain. But it takes time and effort. Most of all it takes conscious thought. 

The appeals to our limbic system are so powerful because they can effectively bypass our thoughts. The responses are automatic, almost. 

Your brain immediately gets ready to respond. Your mouth waters at the scent of popcorn, your blood flows at the sight of sexual images, your heart races at the hint of danger. But then you get to choose what's next. 

You get to choose to buy the popcorn or not. 

You get to choose to pursue sex or not. 

You get to choose to follow your fear or not. 

It's not an easy choice. If you've become desensitized, you might not even be able to choose every time. The cascade of neurotransmitters and neural pathways flows along like a mighty river. Sometimes all you can do is be tossed along and hold onto a branch to keep your head above water. But when you've cleared the rapids, you can reassess, paddle toward the shore, make a plan for next time. 

Outrage can be a good thing. We need it to help us deal with the massive, systemic problems around race and violence in our country. Please stop wasting your outrage on celebrities and politicians and gossip and parents who are trying their best (or not).

How to be a Billy Goat: Respect

Respect for other people, their ideas, and their opinions is an indispensable part of being a billy goat.

If you're wondering why you should be a billy goat you can read about it here:

• Prologue
• Introduction
• Step 1: Listen

Find out what it Means to Me

Before we get too far into the conversation about treating people with respect, we need to take a moment to define the term for this context. In some contexts respect can refer to what someone earns. Like how much you respect me for my beard-growing skills or how much I respect you for sharing this post with all of your friends. 

That's good respect and should be cultivated, but that's not what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about the difference between treating someone in a dehumanizing manner and treating them with a basic level of human dignity. 

When the internet was just a baby, in those long-past days before YouTube came to be, I had downloaded dozens of videos of Star Wars Kid. If you don't remember or you weren't around, a 14-year-old Canadian, Ghyslain Raza, had a video he made privately, pretending to be Darth Maul from Star Wars, was posted online without his permission. I laughed at that video (and various edits of it) a lot. 

I reduced a young man to something less than human in my mind. I didn't show him any respect. 

Ghyslain spent years in therapy, years being bullied, years being told he was worthless and should commit suicide. Thankfully he's been able to put the experience behind him and is working to move on with his life. But that hasn't been the case for everyone. 

Give Respect to Get Respect

If you consider yourself to be inherently worthy of respect, not having to earn it, but just deserving to be treated with human dignity because you are human, then you ought to extend that courtesy to everyone else. 

Yes, everyone. 

Yes, even them. 

If you haven't earned your basic human dignity then no one else has earned theirs. Even people you disagree with. Even people who commit crimes. Even people who don't respect you in return.*

You don't have to like everyone. You don't have to be everyone's friend. You don't have to agree with everyone. But, if you think that you deserve to be treated with basic dignity and respect, then so does everyone else. 

Unfortunately, not many people on the internet think this way. There are a lot of double standards going on where people get angry when they are defamed while turning around and defaming others without a second thought. 

Dismissing people as idiots (or fill in your favorite insult here) because you disagree with their ideas, or because you think their ideas are not well reasoned, or because you think their ideas are not well researched, is dehumanizing them. It is treating them as less than human because of their ideas or actions.** 

If you do that, then why would they respond to you any differently? 

But, if you show respect, even when no respect is being shown to you, you will start to erode the culture of disrespect of dehumanization. I'm not trying to tell you it will be easy. We're into this dysfunction pretty deeply. It will take a lot of us a long time working to counteract it. But the alternative is that we do nothing and let the conversations continue to devolve. 

Basic Respect

So, what does this look like? 

First, you don't have to take disrespect. If someone is insulting you, belittling you, or attacking you, respectfully call them on it. If someone continues to do so, block them and report them. The very first step in respect is respecting yourself (I know that sounds super cheesy, but it's the truth). Figure out how you want to be treated and then learn to treat others that way. 

Second, don't call people names. I know, we were all supposed to have learned this in grade school. It's not a difficult concept, but it is one that we seem to have forgotten. If you try to engage in conversations on the internet, you will be called names. You will be personally insulted. You might even be threatened or bullied. 

Don't respond in kind. Don't call names. Don't return personal insults. That's your fear response talking; that's your lizard brain. You aren't actually in danger. You don't need to choose between fighting or fleeing. Take a moment (or a day depending on how riled up you are) and calm down. 

Third, don't talk down to people. It's one thing to not call people idiots; it's quite another to not treat them like idiots. You've come to your conclusions about life, the world, and the way things ought to be through years of thought, learning, and shaping through your experiences and community. So has everyone else. Just because they've come to different conclusions doesn't mean they're wrong or stupid and telling them they're stupid will, pretty much automatically, mean you don't get to be a part of their community to help shape their thoughts in the future. 

Finally, demand that the people who agree with you treat the people who disagree with you respectfully. Online conversations can often become one person advocating for their side while the friends of the person with whom they disagree pile on. If your friends are piling on, make sure that they do it with respect. Defend the basic human dignity of everyone and you will start to create a climate where conversations can actually happen. 

Next up: the value of opinions (hint it's about the same as the value of Shrute Bucks). 

*There are, absolutely, consequences for actions. There is, absolutely, a type of respect that is earned through actions and can be damaged or lost. I'm not talking about that type of respect. I'm talking about the basic level of dignity and rights that we all think we should be treated with. If you don't think that you should be treated with a basic level of dignity and respect, we can have that conversation separately. 

**The dehumanization process can go the other direction where people are treated as more than human. Our cult of celebrity and wealth tends to treat those with fame and power as something other than human and also not worthy of the same respect. Celebrities are expected to perform, to entertain, to be always on. If you are worthy of privacy and consideration because you're a human being, then celebrities are too. 

How to be a Billy Goat: Listen

"Listening to the Birds" Winslow Homer

One of the most difficult things about being a billy goat on the internet is patience. The internet is a place filled with instant information, instant emotions, and instant feedback. The speed of the internet is as fast as oral communication, but without the richness of body language and vocal tone.

Slowing down and listening, not only to what people are posting online, but to why they are posting things, will help to improve the level of discourse.

Fight, Flight, or Dialogue

In many ways your brain works from the inside out. At the core of your brain is a part called the amygdala that we have in common with nearly every brain-having animal on the planet. It's such a primal region of the brain that it is often colloquially known as the "lizard brain."* 

Your lizard brain wants to keep you alive. That's pretty much it (it also wants to help you pass on your genes, but that's part of keeping the species alive). Whenever your sense get information they filter through your brain, it looks for something new and different, and checks to see if anything on a survival level is going on. The lizard brain checks to see if anything is threatening your survival, if there's anything to eat, or any reason to try to procreate. 

It's what happens next that's important. 

What should happen next is we run the lizard brain response back through the rational parts of our mind. That's why we don't usually attack people on the street, why we don't leap across the counter at the restaurant and take the food, and why we can be monogamous when we choose to. The lizard brain is working to keep us alive, but the rest of our brain is working to determine how we live. 

Because our lizard brain is looking for things that are different and things that are primal, we usually respond most strongly to those things. We repost things that outrage us, things that terrify us, things that make us want to either fight or flee. 

Neither of those responses is conducive to conversation. 

Brain Spaces

Your brain learns to respond differently when you're doing different things. When you hear an explosion in November, your brain will likely trigger a fight or flight response. But when you hear one in early July you're going to be far less afraid. For me, if I see a spider across the room while I'm fully clothed and have shoes on my feet, I can notice it and move on with my life. But if I'm stumbling around, barefoot and in my pajamas and I happen across a spider right in front of me I will, in all likelihood, scream like a child. 

Our brains shift gears and determine what gets sent down to the lizard brain for a survival check. The more we feel safe and at ease, the more likely we are have something trigger our survival check. If you're out, crossing the street during the day cars coming at you are normal and expected. Your lizard brain trusts the rest of your brain to figure it out and keep you alive. 

One of the major issues with online communication is that our brain space is often in the home-safe zone rather than in the out-in-public zone. If I go downtown on a busy day I expect to see and hear things I don't agree with. I note them and then, usually, ignore them. But when I'm at home I expect to be safe. My lizard brain expects the stimuli to be of the food and sleep variety. 

Because of the internet and smartphones we have the stimuli of a busy day downtown in the palm of our hand as we're stumbling around in our PJs before going to sleep. Our poor lizard brains don't know what to do. 

Slow Down, You Move too Fast

It's a discipline to be able to see things online that are outrageous or terrifying and to do nothing.** That's the first step in having great dialogue online, however. Do nothing. Wait. Listen. 

When your heart rate spike because you see something offensive, when your fingers twitch with the need to respond in anger or fear, when the arguments against a person line up in your brain ready to be deployed, that's the time to stop. Feed the response of your lizard brain back into your rational mind. 

What are your afraid of? What are you angry about? Why did this post trigger your lizard brain to respond? 

What fears and angers do you think drove the person who posted it? Why do they feel so threatened? 

Sit with those questions until your heart rate returns to normal. Sit with them until your fingers stop trying to compose a heated reply on their own. Listen to what your rational brain is trying to tell you and listen to what drove the person to post what they did in the first place (not what they actually posted, but the underlying threat they felt). 

Next up we'll talk about how to engage people. 

*This is an incredible simplification of the concepts going on. If you want to know more about the "lizard brain" do some research on the limbic system. 

**As an aside, this is a very similar process to seeing pornography online and choosing to not respond from the lizard brain. It takes conscious, practiced effort to resist the pull of instinctual responses.