Connections: new ways of working in the networked organization
Connections: new ways of working in the networked organization
E-empowerment: Empowerment by the Internet
Computers in Human Behavior
I, avatar: the culture and consequences of having a second life
I, avatar: the culture and consequences of having a second life
Abductive Cognition: The Epistemological and Eco-Cognitive Dimensions of Hypothetical Reasoning
Abductive Cognition: The Epistemological and Eco-Cognitive Dimensions of Hypothetical Reasoning
Cyberbullying: Bullying in the Digital Age
Cyberbullying: Bullying in the Digital Age
Perverting Activism: Cyberactivism and Its Potential Failures In Enhancing Democratic Institutions
International Journal of Technoethics
Facebook Has It: The Irresistible Violence of Social Cognition in the Age of Social Networking
International Journal of Technoethics
On Biometrics and Profiling: A Challenge for Privacy and Democracy?
International Journal of Technoethics
Proceedings of the Virtual Reality International Conference: Laval Virtual
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Cyber-bullying, and other issues related to violence being committed online in prosocial environments, are beginning to constitute an emergency worldwide. Institutions are particularly sensitive to the problem especially as far as teenagers are concerned inasmuch as, in cases of inter-teen episodes, the deterrent power of ordinary justice (i.e. threaten to sue) is not as effective as it is between adults. In order to develop the most suitable policies, institution should not be satisfied with statistics and sociological perspectives on the phenomenon, but rather seek a deep ethical understanding--also referring to the biological and evolutionary past of human beings. The aim of this paper is to show a way to fill this theoretical gap, offering some answers (and some questions too) that can illuminate future policy-oriented research and reflection. In order to do so, we will start by connecting our argument to evolutionary studies carried out in the past two decades, focusing on gossip as a tool for social assortment, thus endowed with a dual function: protect the group from free riders, intruders and bullies but also bully the deviant members. In the "Mediating gossip through social networks" section, we will see which aspects of gossip, vital for bullying, are co-opted by social network scenarios. A fundamental trait of human social life, that is the subdivision in smaller coalitions, or sub-groups, will be shown as missing in social networks (SN) dynamics--therefore constituting themselves as structurally violent. The "Why and how do social networks empower bullying?" section will deal with techno-ethical and epistemological concerns regarding how gossip, mediated by SN, manages to empower cyber-bullying. The "Self-gossip and self-mobbing in the light of the disruption of sub-moralities" section will characterize cyber-bullying as often sparked by self-gossip (soon degrading into self-mobbing) in a scenario where familiar sub-groups, which also mediate defense and mutual understanding, are disrupted. The "Discussion and conclusion" section will consist of a philosophical summary, divided in two parts: a pars destruens analyzing whether SN, in their actual configurations, are fit for being used by humans-like-us, and a pars construens examining the broad potential consequences of highly enforced regulation aimed at contrasting cyber-bullying.