Paul Goble
Staunton,
August 16 – In many countries, posts on social media have the effect of
intensifying disputes over various issues. In Kazakhstan now, Saule Isbayeva
says, many participants in the Kazakh segment of Facebook are increasingly upset
by posts attacking their ethnic group even as they increasingly attack or at
least do not oppose attacks on others.
There is
a danger, the Kazakh analyst says, that “sooner or later,” these disputes “will
go beyond the limits of the Internet and then it will become much more
difficult to struggle against them.” The question now is what should be done to
limit that danger (camonitor.kz/31502-feysbuk-kak-pole-boya-stoit-li-vmeshivatsya-v-setevye-mezhnacionalnye-razborki.html).
Serik
Beysembayev, an analyst at Astana’s Institute for International Economics and
Politics, says that what is going on is the growth of “online thinking,” which
occurs when Facebook users become attached to “group stereotypes” and thus find
it easier to engage in controversy than to reach any agreement with those who
disagree with them.
People
who seem to be irreconcilable online can often reach accord if they meet face
to face, but that doesn’t happen often enough.
As a result, “today, social networks recall a global arena of battle.
Conflicts arise everywhere and for the most varied reasons. The defense of ethnic
identity is only one of them.”
Online
conflicts are “especially high in those countries where the Internet and social
networks are only beginning to experience massive development and the level of
information culture among citizens remains low,” the analyst says. That is the
case in Kazakhstan with Facebook.
Last
year, Beysembayev continues, he took part in a project which studied hate
speech in the Kazakh segment of that part of social media. “It turned out,” he says,
“that such language was provoked above all by ethnic and religious stereotypes”
and that the resulting controversies led to “’the normalization’” and
acceptance of “toxic” judgments.
The
country needs to be concerned about this, but he suggests that adopting new
laws will not solve the problem. Instead, activists need to promote new “rules
of public communication” that will gradually spread through users of social
media.
Maksim Kramarenko, a specialist at Kazakhstan’s
Institute for Eurasian Policy, argues that “social networks reflect the
attitudes which exist in society.” And therefore, what one sees on Facebook is
a reflection, albeit sometimes distorted, of what in fact exists. The country
must thus address these broader problems rather than dealing only with social
media.
Unlike in many other countries, he
continues, “astroturfing – artificially created public opinion” – is not yet a
major problem in Kazakhstan. But Kazakhs will be making a serious mistake if
they think they can change attitudes by changing what is on social media alone.
They must address the broader issues those media are taking up.
He points to the dangers inherent in
historical discussions. When specialists revise their judgments about the past
and place the blame on Moscow for this or that policy affecting Kazakhstan,
many Kazakhs read that as justifying hostility to ethnic Russians who had
nothing to do with those policies. That
is something scholars and officials must counter.
And historian Nurtay Mustafayev says
that there are some things that can be done so that Facebook and other social media
networks won’t exacerbate problems. He calls for ending anonymity on the web.
Those who take part in discussions should be required to give their names.
Otherwise they will feel freer to say more extreme things.
But at the same time, he suggests,
it is important not to overreact to what is on Facebook. “The issue of inter-ethnic relations is
hardly the most popular” on that branch of social media. Most people posting
there are posting about other things and that too must be kept in mind.
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