Wisdom of the Mob: How Social Media Distorts Our National Discourse

 

Opinion 

At the height of the Dutch Golden age, the Tulip flower, originally imported from Turkey, became a luxury plant found in most gardens of affluent Dutch individuals. Other than its association with a certain exoticism, no one really knew why it was cool to have one, only that it was cool to have one. 

The Tulip flower eventually bloomed from a status symbol to a must-have investment. Something comparable to a plot of land in Abuja for our times. Or, more aptly, a Crypto currency: akin to Tapswap, but without the quasi-ritualistic tapping involved. Tulipmania, as it has since been dubbed, swept through Holland. The business of buying, selling, cultivating and speculating on Tulips (Tulip bulbs specifically), came to be quite lucrative. 

Eventually, the bubble burst and the price of Tulip crashed. This may simply have been because people got bored speculating on the value of an exotic plant. Or perhaps they suddenly realized that, exotic or not, Tulip was just another flowering plant all along, and because flowering plants are not as useful as houses, they ideally ought not to cost roughly the same.

It is easy now to look at those people and laugh. But that is because this is hindsight, and things have a habit of being clearer in hindsight. For example, in hindsight, bathing in salt really should not provide immunity against Ebola, but judging by the number of people who bathed in salt during the Ebola outbreak of 2014, it may not have been so clear then. 

Any keen observer of the human condition will quickly note that believing in what people in high places call “gobbledygook” is part of the human package. Some believe it conferred an evolutionary advantage on prehistoric humans: afterall, it was, and still is, probably safer to run immediately when told a lion is upon, than to wait and question the messenger about his “sources” and “evidence”, no matter his past relationship with truth. Then again, human beings did not invent social media then. But we have now, and as such, we must look at things a little differently.

Social media was supposedly invented with the noble intention of facilitating the sharing of information and ideas between people over the internet. However, as with most things in life, intention could not cope with the vexing demands of reality. What was supposed to be a tool for the democratization of information has instead turned into a tool for the mass exploitation of humanity’s fundamental inability to adequately discern truth from lies at an industrial scale. 

It is readily apparent why this is so. Meta, by far the largest social media company in the world, with apps such as Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, recently posted its second quarter 2024 revenue at about $39.1 billion. Around 98% of that revenue, or $38.3 billion, was generated through advertisement. Meta is not alone in this as virtually all major social media companies generate revenue primarily through advertisement. 

Basically, in order to generate revenue, a social media company has to keep your attention. To keep your attention, it needs to show you stuff, or content as we know it. Success in this regard is how many times a particular content is viewed, commented on, or shared - usually measured in what are referred to as engagement metrics. Success is thus not measured in high minded metrics such as, truthfulness, verifiability, or instructiveness, but in virality. To attract advertisement, social media companies parade these engagement metrics as tangible evidence that users are indeed active on their respective platforms, and as such, the platform may be worth advertising on. Simply, because of the need for advertisement money, a social media company is incentivized to feed users as much content as possible, at the least cost possible, in order to keep and sell users’ attention to advertisers. 

Moreover, because unlike traditional media, social media companies outsource the creation of content to their users, called “content creators”, for a share of their revenue, these companies often bear only tangential legal or reputational responsibility for whatever falsehood or gobbledygook they feed their users. Likewise, because content creators are rewarded by the amount of engagement they generate, their primary incentive is to produce high engagement content, with quality only as a byproduct. 

There is, of course, the more sinister possibility that, actually, gobbledygook may drive higher engagement. Consider that psychologically, it is far easier and less mentally demanding for a user to engage with a post that does not challenge them to think deeper about their beliefs, reevaluate their assumptions in light of better evidence, or try and understand a different person's viewpoint. Psychologists call this tendency to seek out and focus on information that already conforms with our existing beliefs confirmation bias. Hence, once a content creator is able to identify his target audience, all he needs to do is feed them as much content that confirms their beliefs as possible, safe in the knowledge that they will always come back for more. 

Finally, consider that, for the average content creator, creating an original, competently produced, and perhaps insightful and well researched content, can be prohibitively expensive, with only marginal gains in return, if they are lucky. Therefore, economically speaking, it may be more productive for a content creator to just post a video of himself slandering whichever unpopular politician happens to be in the public’s cross hairs, than say, booking a flight to Ibadan, and hiring a tour guide, to share fascinating insights about the Olumo Rock; especially since slandering a politician is guaranteed to generate user engagement. The former only requires a N500 data subscription plus basic secondary school education, while the latter requires, lets say, a bit more effort.

What we have then, as a result of all these perverse incentives, is a system seemingly designed to feed us things that are only good for one thing: keeping our attention for as long as possible. The result is a slow build up of our collective immunity to falsehood, tolerance for nonsense, and a pernicious coarsening of public discourse. Because of the immense amount of rubbish we encounter daily, the lines between truth and falsehood are becoming increasingly blurred, as well as the lines between trivial matters and those of significance. 

Recent events bear this out. For example, given the sheer number of Nigerians who lose their lives daily to mindless violence, one would think that a better use of our collective time and imagination would be towards figuring out how best to solve the chronic insecurity within our borders. Instead, we were for a while, based on a deeply misleading and cynical post, bickering over whether the government had signed a treaty legalizing homosexuality. Or who cares about the Almajiri problem when someone has just posted a video showing how a deceased popular singer may or may not have been drugged by his supposed rivals: surely, this has to be the IGP’s priority.

Some politicians and public figures, to their credit, have taken notice and are ruthlessly exploiting this moment to their advantage. 

The recent collective national hysteria over the Dangote refinery shows how easily social media can be deployed to distort economic realities. For example, it should be fairly obvious to any entrepreneur that, when setting up a new manufacturing business, whether a petroleum refinery or a sugarcane processing factory, one thing you should definitely not expect is for suppliers of raw materials to simply offer you discounts willy-nilly. Nor should you, in the same breath, expect them to alter their functioning business models just to favor your business. The reasons they won't do these things are that, first, we live in a democracy, and second, they also have businesses to run: they have shareholders to answer to, workers to pay, and accounts to balance. Despite what years of flirtation with socialism by the Nigerian intelligentsia might have imprinted on you, it is always worth remembering that markets determine prices, and as entitled as you may feel, no one is really obliged to make you rich. As such, to get what you want, you usually need to offer incentives to your would-be business partners, make concessions, and negotiate something beneficial to all parties. 

But, as the Dangote Group has very effectively demonstrated, there is another way to go about it, where you can short-circuit the whole process. With social media, you can cleverly share half truths about your situation, cynically deploy political innuendo against your perceived “enemies”, who by the way conveniently happen to be the people’s enemy, and whip up a social media mob to do your bidding. You’ll do that safely in the knowledge that once your message hits an emotional nerve and goes viral, it is unlikely anyone will really have the time to scrutinize your claims; an angry social media mob is no match for all the fact-checkers in the world.

All this, dear reader, is to say that, to prosper as a nation, it may be wiser to not allow our national agenda be dictated by a cacophony of voices from social media. The course of our national discourse should not be determined by a pack of terminally online gormless blatherers, whose only notable distinctions are that they own smartphones, and have demonstrated an ability to connect those phones to the internet. As if the name “content creator” was not fatuous enough, they have lately taken to calling themselves “Influencers”.

To escape their stultifying grip, we must first acknowledge that there is a difference between the real world, where most people live and work, and the pastiched reality of social media. This distinction can help us further realize that, whatever we see in this pretend social media reality, there is a good chance that it, just like the reality it resides in, is fake. This naturally means we must develop a healthy amount of skepticism towards social media content. If a post seems designed to pander to our basest instincts, or to confirm our natural biases, it’s because it probably was, and may warrant double checking. It may also be worth remembering that just because an opinion is trending online, it doesn’t mean it’s correct or true: in thinking otherwise lies damnation. 

Most importantly, perhaps, is for journalists to finally appreciate what it takes to be one. Prioritizing speed over accuracy in reporting is not only irresponsible at this moment, but downright treacherous. What's more, sharing and reposting other people’s stories and opinions without verification doesn’t count as journalism. The Latin name for it is rumor mongering, and try as one might, old wives are just better at it.

Hussain Muhammad writes from Abuja and can be reached via email at hussain.bcx@gmail.com.