Algorithms did not make these young men riot in Belfast. It simply told them they were not alone in their thinking |
I was back in Belfast last week for my birthday on June 9. My twin sister still lives here; I come home often from Sweden, where I work. This year, that date will be remembered for the wrong reasons.
That morning north Belfast was already reeling from the knife attack by a Sudanese man on Stephen Ogilvie. Within hours, the footage was everywhere. Then came the protests, then the riots, then the commentary - and it was the commentary I kept snagging on.
The first reflex was to blame Elon Musk’s and Nigel Farage’s feeds - the most respectable explanation, and the laziest. Social media is not the country. What we see online is not a representative sample of reality but a vocal and angry minority. The outrage that circulates there is often more symptom than cause. As researchers have found, people usually bring their grievances to social media rather than acquire them from it.
Besides, let’s be real: seasonal recreational rioting here is decades older than the smartphone. The algorithm did not make these young men riot, burn property and smash the windows of innocent immigrants. It simply told them they were not alone in their thinking.
Tom Collins: Let me tell you why Elon Musk is tweeting about Belfast
Aoife Moore: Where are the riots about child abuse and murders of women? It turns out there is an ‘acceptable level of violence’ in Northern Ireland - but only when our own do it
The second reflex was to call it fascism -........