The Lazy Person’s Guide

Things you can do from your couch

The best part of the day for you is a moment when you can lay down on your couch in front of TV or laptop, stretch your legs out and finally stop thinking about the whole world? You feel that your couch is the best furniture i n your house? You can stay on it for several hours and you feel that you will never be bored of it? We understand that. Who doesn’t love this? But what about doing that together with another thing? Maybe you can use your free time spent on a couch in more active way and fight with a cyberbullying and hate speech?

Source: unsplash.com – Erik Mclean

It is possible! Here you can find some tips and ideas:

– get some more informations about hate speech and cyberbullying – the first action before combating any enemy is to get to know him more. Read some articles, essays and life stories of people who experienced hate speech. Do a research and find informations about number of people touched by this problem, in which countries it is spreaded the most, what are the target groups of hate speech, what is the influence of this kind of violence, what tragedies it can cause. Start being interested in this topic and become an expert in it. More you know about something, stronger you are.

– learn how to use social media – Facebook, Instagram, Twitter – there are many different types of social media which are used nowadays. Each of them has a various features and it’s used for different purposes. Its aim is to let people be more connected and make spreading the informations easier and faster. Unfortunately, some people use them to abuse, offend, threaten, encourage to hurt some specific groups, or even to kill their representatives. We must stop this! But to do that, we must know how to start and what are the options given us by the social media admins and moderators.

– report a post or comment which spreads the hate speech – this is one of the easiest and fastest ways to stop hate speech influence on the others. Each social media platform has a group of people working on its functionality and standards of use. After reporting anything what was posted by any user they will get a notification about that. Each example of reported „online violence” will be read and, according to the platform’s policy, deleted or kept. Don’t worry about that! Let them decide. Your job is not to leave it unattended and not to let the hate message to influence other people to start thinking in the same way like its author. Don’t scroll down! Take an action! Keep evidence of what you report (printscreens) and if given the opportunity, be specific about the incident that you find offensive and why.

– use social media to keep people informed about hate speech – it is wonderful when you know a lot about hate speech but it doesn’t help at all when you will do whole work only by yourself. Use social media to post interesting articles and websites related to combating hate speech. Each person who will read at least one short article about this topic is a new potential Hatebuster. Do not hesitate to post as much useful informations as you can. It can help you to find people who, like you, will start paying more attention to the things they find every day on Internet and be more attentive when it comes to cyberbullying and hate speech. Become a digital ambassador!

– discuss when you see abusive comment or post with its author – show him/her that you don’t agree with this point of view. Don’t use the same language which he/she did – be cultural but confident. Explain why this person shouldn’t spread this kind of messages online, what can it cause to the target group or person to whom it reffers, give some examples of the hate speech influence which you found, e.g. in some articles or people’s life stories, etc. You can openly say that it is not correct what this person thinks or says, that in your opinion every person deserves respect, everyone is equal and each opinion should be given using correct, cultural and proper words. Show to the readers that you know what you are talking about. Impress them with your knowledge. When it doesn’t help and, after sending your message, you became a victim of abusive comments summarise the whole conversation with funny GIF or picture related to the topic of hate speech which you can find here: https://no-hate-speech.de/de/kontern/fuer-gegen-alle-hate-speech/

Remember about using only those cultural and proper ones and know that sometimes good sense of humor can be a better medicine than million words.

– show your support to the victims of hate speech. Your actions don’t have to focus only on combating hate speakers and their messages but also on healing the wounds which they caused. One nice message sent to a person who can be in the worst moment of his life because of intense online violence which they experience can be a wonderful help for him and give him the thought that he is not alone. In your message you can show your support, explain that you don’t think in the same way like the author of hate-message. Ask about the cause of this situation, present your point of view, give some compliments and you will see that the only things you will get back are the words of thankfulness and appreciation. Maybe that person will share with you his life story and let you know more about himself? It can be beginning of real friendship between two of you.

Source: unsplash.com – Felipe Galvan

– Don’t forward and post on your social media messages that use offensive language or can be considered as hate speech or cyberbullying. Your objection means: one less copy of that message, 200 less likes for it and 50 less comments. It can cause that few houndreds less people will see it. Sometimes NOT DOING bad things can be also very helpful and show some kind of opposition from your side.

Those are some examples of the actions which you can do when spending your free time on a couch, laying down and relaxing with a phone in your hand or with a laptop on your laps. Being a good Hatebuster is not so difficult. There are thousands of options to become one! The only thing is to be proactive… even when you are not physically active.

Source: unsplash.com – Jon Tyson

Work in progress

Work in progress

Work in progress

Work in progress