Social Due Process and Social Media
Our Social Media Focus
The Social Due Process Project focuses on fostering social due process for more responsible social media use.
Reasons Why Social Due Process is Violated on Social Media
With the rise of social media, society has seen an increase in violations of Social Due Process. Social media provides a unique opportunity for anyone to instantly and globally violate the privacy of others, and bully, harass, defame, dox, or otherwise cybersmear them.
Methods Used to Violate Social Due Process on Social Media
Cancel culture (social vigilante justice), illegal and legal defamation, doxing, cybersmearing, bullying, violations of privacy, revenge porn.
Social media allows people to post inappropriate things about others, including statements (sometimes true, fair, and accurate; sometimes not true, fair, and accurate), private pictures and videos, private screenshots of texts and messages.
Harassing posts by classmates and others have made bullying more instantaneous and global. High schools have struggled to manage the rise of online pages that serve to bully, shame, and harass students, especially female and LGTBQ students.
People who have consensually shared intimate pictures with others they trusted have seen their private pictures shared publicly through texts, snapchat, Twitter/X, and other social media apps.
Texts and other private messages have been screenshotted and shared, often without the full context of the conversations.
Non-consensual audio and video recordings have been taken in bathrooms, locker rooms, classrooms, and bedrooms.
People have taken videos of sexual interactions with partners without consent and then later shared them.
Consequences of Violating Social Due Process on Social Media
Violations of Social Due Process
can result in a variety of negative consequences, including:
(1) angry mobs that ignore whether what is said reflects truth, fairness, and accuracy. Those mobs then target victims who have no fair or adequate way to defend themselves; and/or
(2) people cheering on and participating in the humiliation of others.
For the targets of these violations, we see:
- Increases in anxiety and depression - there are many likely causes to the sudden rise in anxiety and depression, especially among teenagers and those in their 20s. Females have seen especially large increases in mental health challenges since the rise of social media. In addition to issues like fear of missing out, objectification and the use of picture filters, one such cause is likely cyber smearing or the threat of cyber smearing, and the consequential humiliation.
- Suicide - suicide ideation, anxiety, and depression have often preceded actual suicide. Rates of suicide have drastically risen with the growth of and misuse of social media.
- Disproportionate punishments by social lynching - Some people would likely argue that alleged (or actual) perpetrators of injustice and harm, or in some cases perceived injustice or harm, “deserve whatever they get.” But through social media, and with the emotional nature of mobs, especially online mobs, proportionate justice is rarely fairly distributed. Punishment without considerations of truth, due process, and privacy cannot be fair and reasonable.
- Destroyed businesses, lives, careers, reputations, etc. - As an example of disproportionate punishment, people’s businesses, lives, and careers have been destroyed without any consideration of truth and social due process. Examples include people who've been fired from their jobs, seen their businesses destroyed, or faced threats of harm or actual physical harm, even when the allegations is of a family member posted something some found to be objectionable.
- Humiliation - In the case of unethical sharing of intimate pictures and messages (e.g., revenge porn), some argue that people, especially women, who participate in sexting and sharing of pictures and video, also get what they deserve. Humiliation and other gross violations of privacy cannot be justified by the self-righteous judgments of others, especially when those who make the posts generally do so out of vengeance (e.g., revenge porn), to abuse their power in humiliating others, or because they have not been taught to properly appreciate ethical use of social media. Private messages and pictures should not be shared.
- Distrust - people are likely increasingly less willing to share their painful or embarrassing experiences, whether their own behavior or those of others, for fear that someone can immediately humiliate them by sharing it online. Friends may be less willing to share their experiences with sexual abuse, sexual assault, domestic violence, etc., when their friends, after a fight or disagreement (or general falling out), can humiliate them with an online post. We should want people to trust and share more, not less.
- Increased social isolation - sometimes friends, family, or coworkers disown people without providing social due process, including not properly providing the accused or humiliated person an opportunity to provide the truth or defend themselves. This creates a vicious cycle of mental and emotional health struggles, continued fear of or experienced violations of social due process, and consequential continued isolation.
*visit back for more resources detailing these negative consequences, as well as resources to combat them.