Emily Bell In Conversation with Professor Mary Beard

but ladies and gentlemen welcome to the second event in Emily Belle's Humanitas professorship of media this year before I start I would like to say that we'd like to express our thanks to the vegan field Hoffman trust and the blue ethnic Family Foundation who are the organizations which fund this Humanitas series of of professorships and which enabled us to bring really interesting people like Emily and a lot of lots of people to Cambridge now this is the second event in Emily's professorship there is tomorrow in crash there will be a symposium in the afternoon to discuss some of the ideas she essayed in her lecture last night and if you'd like to come to that please do but it would help us if you if you registered on the site so that we know how many people to expect this evening we have a public conversation between two very distinguished and interesting women Emily Bell our current professor is former colleague of mine on the observer in The Guardian who having having masterminded I think is the correct phrase perhaps mistress minded the Guardians transition from an honorable but little-known liberal newspaper into a global media brand and but she then moved over to the to Columbia University journalism school the best journalism school in the United States to become the founding director of the Tao Center for digital journalism she was educated at the other place and born in born in in Norfolk and I leave you to wonder the implications of that now our second conversation was today it needs no introduction I think although I once said in introducing professor Arnold kettle many years ago that he was a household name and he never spoke to me again so I'm not going to that mistake with merry memories is a force of nature she is a professor of classics at the University here she's a fellow of Newnham College and a Royal Academy of Arts professor of ancient literature she's also as many of you will know the classics editor of The Times Literary Supplement and author of one of the best blogs in Britain at Dawn's life which appears in The Times as a regular column she's the author of numerous books and articles including Pompeii life of Roman town which won the Wolfson Prize for history and currently it's impossible to to go into heaven and escape without buying a copy of her new book as PQR and a massive and extremely impressive volume she's a fellow of the British Academy and a regular contributor to both radio and television a frequent media appearances and sometimes controversial public statements have led her to being described as Britain's best-known classicist I would prefer to describe her as Britain's best public intellectual when I'm chairing this session I when I asked for advice about how to do it and one of my wiser friends pointed me towards the directions that you find on boxes of fireworks we'd say light the touch paper and retire which is what I'm proposing to do but I want to kick off by by by putting a question to the two of them which is this one way of looking at the Internet is to say that it is a mirror to human nature it used to be said of the of the news of the world for example one of the slogans was all human life is here it wasn't truth and used the world it was only doggy vicars and bent policeman but in the case of the Internet all human life really is there and and the network provides us with an interesting reflection of that wide range of human nature and what we see in that mirror is often not flattering it's a very strain what the conclusion you draw from studying the behavior of people on the Internet is that human nature is very strange indeed and the people who experience that most I think our prominent and outspoken women and I'd like to start with that as a is that an accurate description of the net ladies what do you think Mary are you switched on starts working I mean I think that is one way of putting it and it gives me a certain kind of sympathy for the Internet actually because I mean I suppose one thing that the kind of run-ins I've had with it and with a particularly vicious trolling in some respect and I think it was extremely interesting learning experience for me and it showed me what a sheltered life I lived in you know in Cambridge and you know amongst like-minded people you know it showed me what people were really saying if he went into the yeah into the the bit of the bar you don't usually go into eleven o'clock on a Friday night I know I thought you know I didn't realize that honey they were blokes mostly who said that kind of stuff any long boats I mean if you depressed me I suppose I would have admitted that but I have I'd you know I think we're very tribal and we tend to talk to people that we know and who even if we disagree strongly with we we agree on some basic bits of I don't have many friends who think that women shouldn't go out to work all right if they do think that when I talk you to me they don't affect well say to your face and yeah so I found it quite interesting I thought you know haven't you know wake up theater a bit you know oh you know you've got to realise that that actually this world has got many more different shades for pinion road than you imagine and I'll just it one thing I mean for also just cuz I want to kind of get this in this a marker I think that's why in some ways uncounted slightly more sympathetic than some women are to the idea that people say rude insulting ill-advised things on the web or in whatever particular for media we're talking about because I think if you say all of human life is there it is and it's people being nasty people making mistakes you know and we're not going to have a world in which everybody somehow is really like themselves except when they get online they're polite you know that's never gonna happen no I think that's so I was responsible party and before according to some of our best journalist it's probably one of the most heinous decisions which was to open comments and to actually sort put our commentators you know into a discourse with the public and actually sort of that two things happen one of which was I think that we learned a lot because you you open the doors to as you say a society which is not people in Islington who really love you and a lot of our colonists were under the impression that the world was full of people in this agent who really loved them and that that so cheating struck me one of which was that you know when you hit certain hot-button issues and for instance if you're writing about sort of politics in the Israel and Palestine it was you know we we would never post those pieces at you know five o'clock and frightened I think it's the pup because it was like and somebody so it's like it's like lighting fire and then walking off but also the other thing was it made me think quite hard just about how we set the tone of public debate and sometimes I remember I remember being mauled in morning conference that aren't in by economists has had particularly sort of ferocious tuned fray in the comments beneath that piece and I said well this is not you know these people are not our readers they don't want it they think want to destroy us they say they they Rouge that is it and on the front of the Guardian that date we actually have like not even a headline but what they called masthead rise to the top um we've got a picture Boris Johnson who's not personally you know particularly swarm to but we'd say something like you know Boris home on and then use the series of sort of adjectives about him that you would certainly never have gone up since then said to to a person like so bully racist something something I don't watch what you said about that because you know just that sort of your we've just talking about how approachable you are as a person which allows and and that put your personality cats and carries with you into your broadcasting into online persona um and so you kind of do I would say you're inviting trolling but you invite certainly something gage Minh I think this there's a whole spectrum of responses that you have to this I mean I I wonder not how many people who write comment pieces imagining them as print comment pieces but they're online and so they're open to comment I wonder how many of those writers now have continued to engage with the commenters underneath the line because the begin of the thing that you you hear when you talk about when people moan about kind of under the under the line world yes loads of line below you'll hear lots of moves like oh I never read that you know one thing I know you know that but I never read was no I never people they say says although I never read it and you think well look actually there's a funny replication going on of the sort of the the power structures about who has a right to a voice that the internet somehow claimed it was going to undermine and so if what we get is a loads of you know nice Islington or Cambridge writers you know talking nice Cambridge Islington style and never reading the guys underneath it was a new indie you don't understand it's a trap then we're back to where we started right and yet if you was iPhones up I tried I don't always I do try to read you had an atomic very large maybe do very dense and what what when they seem as if they're actually trying to argue with me rather than abused I will I will comment I will join the discussion and when they said something which is actually wrong when you say you know I just think look do read it again because I never said that's right and I think it's quite interesting that about I wouldn't say it's more than 50 percent but about 50 percent of these people have come off very heavy when you actually respond um they're absolutely taken aback so just I mean they were sounding off about being angry and your article whatever it was it was that prompt for that sounding off but they when they discover you're a person well there's a kind of you know reality check comes in and you know in many ways I think that there's sort of victims of extraordinary false claims for the democracy that online comment was going to bring you know and I think that's that's pretty clear no just in um you know below the like comments but I think it's very very clear in Twitter you know so Twitter allows you to talk to the Prime Minister you know no it does it allows you to be ignored by the Prime Minister's Twitter feed you were there no saying happy Rosh Hashanah you know any other religious festival that they can take up you know I don't even sound I once went through some of these David Cameron Ed Miliband was there Nick Clegg's little and it said um please do not expect replies if you actually really want to please do best writing a letter you know anything so here we are we have this there's a whole kind of set of disguises and barriers which you know no wonder people are angry right here armed aureus David I'm talking to you about having a lovely in a young people who gets ill wrong you know or whatever you know wishing you you know this very important time etc is not Dave not TAFE doing that it's not over it's something that's bit like Dave did 20 years ago I think that what's shiny face person I think they will one day be Prime Minister to you you know sometimes they get it wrong like Diane habits you know because it happens across the political spectrum that's right there's happens Twitter person doing it during up to minute one minute silence you know oh but but you say but you're using so you were using sort of social media I mean you were blocking before Twitter came on the scene soared up so Dom's life started 24 2001 at that's something did you find that it's all changed because I you know I love the way in the you know even in the books you include comments you know and you say that suffocation the somebody will point something out which is actually sort of helpful to you and sometimes I will respond in a way which is funny and sometimes they were responding away and as you say it completely alters the bounce of the book and they and they also altars altars but you know your tone is always conversation I think always conversation did you find that it altered sort of how you thought about your work digit did all kinds of weights I mean I've been extremely lucky and I I wish I knew why I'd be lucky and I think it is quite a lot to do with happenstance you know that I get this blog I when I start this blog I had never read a book I didn't know what a blog was and in fact in the times they were still called weblog they were I go to the web blog and I exactly made to do I was it was suggested be good idea and did what I was told and I thought it's what we were all hoping at that distinctive yeah I thought it was a very nasty form of journalism which I discovered it wasn't actually that is actually doing it on online meant that you could talk about the kinds of things that you could not talk about it with links I got to quite enjoy it but but whatever reason I the blog attracted a group of people who really entered into the spirit of it and enjoyed it and I've met some of them now because when when we published some of these blogs and we published the some of the comments we had a party and the because I thought I was just ripping off the comments let me ask them for permission but at least they might do is get a party so had a party so I met the people there of course discovered that the demographics you know well they were they were generally older than me generally all generally yes and I liked it when that happened yeah instantly what I going to read teach at University going in to read with people who are generally older the new is I and they're not actually dying lucky it's not a hospital that's a treat I really like that and very interestingly and I think there's something about this they were I thought a surprising number expats yes I thought what we've got here is we've got at that point we've got um an elderly demographic you've actually come into the to the internet age because they're living in the South of France their access to newspapers have become so they were a very particular little niche market not all of them but that was right-center and I've got so much out of it but I have to make sure I don't abuse it because if I'm you know on the hunt for something I was trying to find longer a whole load of ceramics made to look like Roman emperors I'd found someone I wanted some others so I post one on the web and by the time you know what I put the blog up and come back to it in two hours you know they were coming in it's like I think I know where another one is oh right so it doesn't be the blog for me has been an almost wholly positive right experience but it's a very suspected a particular niche because I I don't think that most online commenters in the world 70 year olds living outside can this but this I mean this is the exercise of site so one of the things I've I've Reggie talking about and you know that so I've been very interested in how diversity is reflected online so you do tend to find that sort of under represented people who are under represented in the mainstream media have been very active on social platforms so certainly some early Twitter was predominantly not necessarily sort of women who were using it but so it works re not there are many men using Twitter's as women that by the women for more active active um you know the black Twitter in the states a hashtag black Twitter is a huge thing and these these are voices which just didn't find an expression um in the mainstream you know there's a whole for st. John I'm not necessarily treating you in this because you're not angry but there's a whole community like old women who are in some way sort of working in similar spheres who have lots to say yeah you actually form the sort of community whereas I'm fairly sure all of us would now be on the cutting room floor of some newspaper or another and told that we have to move on and that's construction of a new new spheres is interesting because you know you you think when you how does that says you across this with the historic creation of public discourse and discussion because it has always been men who are in charge and they're still really in charge of the platform's I mean they're so yeah I mean that's I mean I think it's I'm quite interested in in what really the power of these apparently disempowered groups you know is on Twitter that goes back to the Cameron case but it's it's actually well okay so yeah let me you know us discontented late career female academics there's a lot less love we can feel a lot better because you know we follow each other on Twitter we can say God not terrible and and I'm not looking cheating a lot better I think that's that's you meet people think it was great to go on a train and we think you know you know I positively like that with it it really operates as a springboard for getting women's voices into the public sphere I'm a bit doubtful that it can't be hurting but I'm not you think that look it was a intersection B we had a we had a conference at the end of last year about germs and Silicon Valley because I mean part of somebody this week is really about how we're all being subsumed now and these much greater sort of power structures um all of which are so geographically pretty specific to the Pacific Northwest and Northern California in the States and all of which are actually culturally really specific so if you go walk around these companies they are not they don't tend to be filled with people like new nights you don't go into Twitter and suddenly think I am the youngest person in the room you know that it sort of they are generally speaking young men in their 20s they generally speaking from an engineering background and for them life has been pretty good and they're not blank sorry and they're not black no and they are not black and that but they're building products that we are using and that solution shake that and as you say so those sort of controls does it matter if we have you say so - so what's the leap that we have to make that takes is from the consumer and the sort of activist into actually sort of the realm of power because I'm a great believer in representation I think you have done huge amounts by being on the telly engaging with people on issues like age and feminism in a popular context which actually hasn't happened years and years and years I mean you know I saw some young women the other day so imagine I'm 50 now there hasn't been a female president it's the United States that's a big shock to the 18 year old me that yeah I mean I think the difficulty is from the outside I mean I had that characterization speak wonderfully view what I might find if I went to Twitter eight I think you should take you to Twitter HQ and it'll be interesting after political experiment it's the question really isn't it of how I mean there's the power of the company forming the ways in which we can talk yes actually with other forms of institutional power ring which presumably at some level they join on yes and that's work you know it's hard to know if wait they join up but the basic power structure of the waste let's say as being young looking white male not necessarily young I'm looking white a man is replicated at each point of control over social media and that that's where I feel I'm I goes back to um you know understanding the sort of anger of people who whose only voice appears to be social media and you know I think however many Twitter followers or you know being able to put things out in their Facebook page or whatever but you know they're not stupid you know they know that actually they're not where the power lies right okay we can all point to no individual instances of something going viral on Twitter that either does or doesn't make a difference usually they don't make a difference it's someone's cat doing something stupid it sense not a jot see the you know the world political change right it's not very occasionally there you know there aren't you you couldn't be too negative to say that the that social media and I'm sure if we looked at the Arab Spring we'd find a bit of this they're probably not as much as we thought the social media revolution but all the same ultimately this is like I think I would think that this is only a superficial a democratizing its I mean I think that this is such an interesting and sensual question so again I have students who have come from the Middle East who owe their facility first of all I have great as some saying last night that has my first lecture of the year is to the incoming class of 250 students at Columbia Journalism school and we have a school now which is 40% international and whilst we're all real hands and say oh you know there's too much nonsense on web you know journalism is dying it's awful wasn't it so much better when you just got your New Yorker once a week and the times arrived designed for you point but that was also much better and actually for half of my students their experience is those hasn't changed their lives politically it's changed our outcomes and I first life of the year I say so how many people have snapchat here and they're very reluctant to raise their hands also those about 15 and for the hands up moment oh come on who has snatched out on their fame you know people so I says you have to put snapchat of Fame and they were absent and one of them actually said excuse me um I did not come to Columbia University to be taught how she uses naturals and I said well unfortunately you are in my car so welcome to Columbia and at the end of the lecture that a young chap came up to me who was from Saudi Arabia and he said can I just show you something and he had a snapchat channel on which he has 15,000 followers and had been using it to report bits of the conflicts on the board with Yemen and he said I'm now being asked by CNN to train their correspondents in the area to use this and so sometimes I think we have that sort of meta mary centric as we call it also Western view of abundance where and we're not at when none exists it's suddenly this again empowering yeah but the our Springs you say is a classic case of okay so that was great social real one that was great that was great and I'm now and and we build but but this is I mean this is really sort of come down comes down to the who decides right because we now have Isis who are using the same tools and a completely different way and there's lots of paradoxes in here because it would also be true you know if I could I could talk to talk about how you know in the end your Twitter campaign thinking let's think of the West here and doing it mostly different at school isn't actually you know this this isn't this isn't bringing the power on the other hand it will be disempowering not to be part of this you know right so so there's a kind of paradox but that so it's push it's pushing you into much more kind of complicated decisions about where you find the space to talk and yeah in the end you know that however horrible you know you know some of these guys were in wherever they sat in their basements with their laptops really vile about me but you know um live on the worst occasion it came off dry was on question time and actually it is the case that their you know their point of view if you look at those big TV are supposedly opinion-forming places know the way in which they form opinion might be grossly exaggerated and I think that's probably true but they sit down at 10:30 on a Thursday night it's still the same old people talking at them on the telly in which and although you know there's a whole way in which you know everybody is sitting I hope quite interesting me I think you know tweeting about God because things she just said there isn't it is allowing much more cross household communication about that in the end if you say look at one level it's only one marker of power influence yeah you is on BBC radio and to tell you it's not the people mostly not the people who were running Twitter campaigns right no there are we know also there are exceptions to that make good things on my mom's net right schwoz let's so none of these things are absolutely Universal I'm certain that it's there's a huge feeling of frustration that you think you've got you think you took into the world ah but you're not it's the same ol people talking to the world may be different say I'm not sure that Twitter's Arab Spring if it was Twitter could be put down to great success but don't know I certainly know though again so you know it's interesting that of these as somebody who's a student of Middle East and I could have met Demick who stood up in these symposia it's not so to me which is absolutely trace it said that maybe also our perception of how revolutions happen so yours cuz you know about these things but our perceptions of how revolutions happen are also distorted that they don't actually sort of if there isn't a great uprising and the next day there's regime change and then everybody lives happily ever after these can be and against when you look at something like black lives matter in the States and what happened in the last year in Ferguson and in Baltimore and even on streets in New York you know the civil rights movement in America took sort of between abolition you know in the late sixties I mean that's at us you know you're talking about hundred years of people you know make a protracted struggle and I think then you've you caught between as you say the ease of discourse making you think that change is going to be used in the same way without absolute respect but also the perspective that change is often incremental and this may be can be may be contributing to it but we don't answer much yeah but we don't know but the point being that the power brokers are still principally the same yeah and you follow your friends and so right certainly on Twitter you you can easily get a sense that you're in a much bigger group than you are yes and this polarity of discourse as well what would we do so to marry you've got some experience of thinking about how ancient civilizations created different ways of thinking about discourse and democracy etc so if you were I would love it I would love it if you were in fact a chief executive of Facebook or indeed Twitter if what are the kind of things that because I do you think that these companies haven't really thought about what scaling discourse means and and so this is of course in this binary of openness up shut it down what are the sort of lessons we can take from history and say think about this when you're designing your next set of products oh it's not I think that's quite a few from from my bit of history you know I don't know what it looks like ok yeah we were to talk about the early modern pamphlet revolution I don't know how that would feel I think my bit of history would give them some quite important counter examples because um you can walk through the streets of Pompeii and you can see I suppose what the ancient equivalent of social media loads loads of repeating see our town in which is whatever the level of literacy is communicating to itself in you know not much more than a hundred and forty characters friendly in most stretches that are up there and you see it being almost entirely male and you see it being strongly sexually insulting you see it in that case being anonymous and then you think you know so you think when I look at that I think is that like social media now or is it quite different right male and anima sunjin forty characters and I think it's a knifeless and the people of people would the one thing I don't want to get out of social media I don't want us all to be polite right and I think yeah I you know I work in an intellectual like a more academic field where things that would you know be close to helping people arrested and put in the Nick I'll happily written on wolves and I think it's it's quite a salutary message there but otherwise it itches you know you'd say you know what is it that would enable us to have a set of social media that didn't that will reach it you know what we know what would we need it to have it different and at that point is very hot to know because no it didn't didn't know fall to these young men into itself no twenty-something they're just doing what young men have always done in controlling the world no it's just a ever come they have a better alibi now but babies do grow because the social media you know isn't it is in some sense as a substitute for a why democratization I think mocking what would you do could could I just send just in trajectory said following that up and Emily when you were making decisions about commenting yeah on the Guardian side yeah and there must have been an argument and I think there was an argument about whether or not you should allow anonymous commenting or whether you should ensure that people if they want to comment they had to own their comments as aware with their own names and the decision was made not to require people to use their real names that's right and I was a great proponent of anonymity because I felt that first of all part of journalism is all about protecting your sources now there was an argument with in journalism that says you should allow you should you shouldn't have anonymous sources you shouldn't allow people to be quoted anonymously that you should always tie tie their tie their names I mean two things first of all quite a lot of the comments that we would get and IIIi would say that these were more than the comments that causes problem but quite a lot of the comments that we would get would be from people who were talking from a point of view personal experience about something which was clearly not something that they would ever want tied to their real name you know they don't want discussions about their sexuality they don't want discussions about their mental health they don't want discussions about workplace bullying they don't want discussions about their families they don't want any of that tied to and I don't forget this is actually pre social media in a way so what we found was that in some of our communities and not necessarily you know the comments histories as a really big kind of you know political debates of the day but somewhere buried in the sort of the family you know kind of pages thread you would actually get the most extraordinary conversations from people who didn't have an outlet you know and and I I think that sort of this idea of giving voice to the powerless we've seen with Facebook that if you request nobody huh and this is the other thing nobody has one identity you know Mary and I and you we have one I don't see what we're here I'll have another identity once what mother I will have another identity it's sort of you know when I'm talking to my kids I have another identity I'm talking to my friends and they're all sort of more or less linked but there are bits of my life where I wouldn't want I'm not going to have a conversation with my students but I wouldn't necessarily have with my husband and I think that's finalized of innocence quite internalized that justification you know and I think it's a very strong justification nevertheless when I'm in a conversation online and I'm Mary beard I'm talking with scary called like I don't feel that this is a conversation which is a conversation of equilibrium right I think so you know who I am I don't know yes and you got a silly little name which is actually both a protection or but it's also an affront to me because I'm sitting here and I'm I'm good to say I'm Mary beard and I'm happy to engage with you but you're not doing me so I think the bit that I I was always sort of slightly at variance on this I just wouldn't have engaged I just don't engage it's like okay so so there's a point at which I think if you don't want to be reasonable and you're not going to tell me who you are I'm not I'm just not going to talk to you it's like it's like it's like why would you wouldn't do that in there and and I pick it I sort of think but but I think the bit that I got wrong probably when we were designing this is just that as you say actually what you're doing is you're asking people say you know it's you know you're on the telly and we were talking about this earlier that you know actually part of the requirement in a way of your job now as a journalist or as a broadcaster sometimes even as an academic is that you get out there and talk to people so it's nice to see I think I think how to use social media more adversity have classes for your academics I think it does I think I've had something going around saying using social media to get your research out where I don't do it for God's sake just do the stuff yes I can say just open a twist renounce and start tracing I mean but this is interesting because again you know come view or an early adopter I was nearly adopter in a way I think that's all the early face you about it I mean when I find the students which is absolutely fascinating for journalism students is that many of them debt they were all using social media none of them using it professionally lots and lots and lots of them for instance don't use Twitter because they've suddenly understood that something that you push out there you have no control over so you know it's like it's like when you when you write a story when you say something on television these days it is like pulling a pin on a grenade and rolling it sort of with your eyes shut really because you don't know whether it's going to hit the target you don't know if it's in London this will be a girl go over the edge and sort of you know not explode um and sometimes it's going to create you end up in a pool petrol and and you can't you know everything you push out there has potentially the equal reach to something on the front page of New York Times something I wanted a program something on 6 o'clock news and it's that I think scares people from engaging or being out there and I wonder whether again we've made the sort of it's a bit like sort of you know by journalist going on and on about sort of like the terrible's are bear pit that social media is it's generous of may people fight a little scarce and when my students go out there and they actually start using profession they are quite suppose that really nobody is looking at allsafe most people are quite nice on Twitter actually quite nice fit yes if about it I've probably had a rough time than many people but still the balance comes out as more people are really nice actually and they comment responsibly they occasionally make stupid mistakes yes or they misunderstand and 140 characters is not very good for getting nuance across that's not very good it's not fit it's not very good for getting Yount across and it's so when you said I mean again when you said people make mistakes the other thing which is interesting is the permanence of it you know it's just sort of so one of the one of the if you like kind of intellectual struggles I've had thinking about this is what do we do with the archive because there's a journalist you want the archive preserving and actually as an individual you don't really want the archive surfing you want to be able to say so when so you know anonymous comments say for instance non-anonymous commenting is something now which will be tied to your you know if you had your real identity it's tied to you sort of something that you said when you were 16 might still be tied to you when you're 36 and this whole idea of having everything about yourself following you around forever and findable and discoverable is a new concept it was you know we have actually lived with that we'll learn to take it with the pinch of salt it deserts it I think I would be nice I think you know right now you know you know what happens you know people um you know people are going for jobs you know that the interview panel do this and discovers you know of all the stupid photograph they took when they were 16 you know I make it oh you know is that the kind of person we want working for our company well sooner or later things will just go with it there's something you know a secret about everybody will will actually start now to pay no more attention to that than if we've been given right um the poor job applicants 16 year old diary you know I I think I think time will help us just get a bit sensible yes conventions we have great that if we have faith in humanities to its that we create our own conventions and again societies really many communities and I mean I do I feel in a very different generation from some young people now but only only very recent that people have grown up thinking actually internalizing some conventions about social media nobody else was ever taught about this school I remember at school no we spent a whole lesson learning how to write a telegram you know how are you gonna get it to save as much money it was no different really from Twitter or me you know now they're all these kind of old how to write tweets I thought there's no different than me learning how to write a telegram you know even don't you know you sense people's ideas is still very fluid even about email you know it's good you know any writes a letter cuz we were all taught it we put the address at the top right could put deer so yeah and you learn when to put your sincerely on your safely and then you have your students saying hi Mary and you think well they put crawler you know it's very hard to get right it's hard to guess it right smiley face it I let's send smiley faces back to students or sometimes sad faces and occasionally disappointed or puzzled faces put in emails but they say the right answer sorry rather like the passive-aggressive kiss bottom of an email where somebody sends you some terrible sort of like could you just do this appalling piece of administration mister you're really really and there you go I'm really sorry I must've missed this somehow I'll get onto it right away very small kiss right at the bottom which see and you imagine that they open it they go yes that is worse than the an Toby sorry I've I'm terribly sorry mr. your supervision numbers you know I was you know I don't know what came I wasn't feeling very well you know love Cressida kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss you think okay no don't say you know thanks means kisses when you have missed your submission yeah that's right I should I've been also a socratis back to all students I think actually I'm rather confident about British education system English teachers I'm sure out there now there are people who are learning how to write just a simple email a simple email to your professor when you have missed their cars yes and it's probably best not to say I wasn't feeling very well that's neither am i right I never feel whenever I see students I feel slightly poorly say it's actually that's not sure they're enjoying them tonight um but the other side actually there so just sort of what one thing which is that I think really interesting it's very relevant to universities at the moment is particularly sort of you know I think an issue in the states and increasingly here which is the sort of no platforming so so one of the things I wonder about the effect of sanitization of discourse oh one thing that is you say what you don't want to do is you don't want people to just be polite everywhere and one of the things that I worry about when I look at the the kind of thinking that's going into how should Facebook sort of keep you know conversation society Ephesus it's almost like the everything is awesome world and then you have you know sort of Twitter saying okay we're really going to start flexing your muscles on trust and safety and it sort of sometimes can play into you know real-life spaces where you know in universities people are saying well you know we have a right to be protected from offense which is a very new and and difficult I think line to the go she ate I don't I don't know sort of weather and to me but some of that feels as though it comes from the sort of the moderation culture when it come on it comes with combinations in that kind of moderation culture and also a whole generation that's be built but brought up with safety being a mantra in a way that yes wasn't right to us that you know yeah that's about whether you're safe on school trip you know whether you know how many people are allowed in the boat you know okay I think health and safety can be knocked too far you know you know I don't yes people falling off ladders or people drowning you know because nobody cared about health and safety but it's there's a discourse of safety which yes you know it's very very odd I think yeah to be someone who feels quite old over such a an older generation who is really keen on risk you know the whole world's turned upside down right that and and I always thought and I of course there are difficult boundaries here also difficult boundaries and anybody who thinks that they can draw an easy one between free speech and hate speech yes that's the problem isn't it yes it is no simple answer well that's what I think that the world of ideas is our most dangerous and worrisome and are we comfortable sometimes place and so jolly well should be and you know you don't I I wouldn't say that anybody has a right to offend anybody else but conversely I wouldn't say that anyone has a right not to be offended right and I think that that's as you say so drawing the lines between what is hate speech what makes people feel unsafe in their own homes or on their own streets and words are powerful you don't words are powerful but but drawing a line between that and the an inability to discuss ideas which you don't like or make you're uncomfortable I think it's interestingly in the states at the moment one of the things which is sort of apparently indexing high when people talk to Republican voters about why their favorite and Donald Trump is because he is you know the the thing that sort of it crops up there's a poll a couple of days ago saying that it's people that are very sort of a particularly certain demographic a very upset about the political correctness in some ways I'm a sort of a fan of political correctness because I think it Flags how we make progress as society that actually kind of you know and and it tends to be the powerful oppressing the weaker or minorities with with with speech and and and diminishment and insults but clearly you know the older white men who are mostly voting for Donald Trump do you feel disempowered as somebody said well you you know you've had a black president for eight years and you might be about to get a woman president for eight years which if you're a Texan male aged 60 on the right of the GOP is your idea from that's a nightmare and that's presumably part of the appeal of both nigel Faraj and Boris Johnson but we I mean the other side it seems as though that's it's not a bad thing that these people are never gonna get elected may not be a bad thing that they're there so long as I'm not elected I mean I think that's right I think there are many different roles to fulfill in a in a productive political society we don't have forests as prime minister he was a good thing to have there but I think we often tend to forget when we're thinking about this we tend to forget what was hugely controversial element was again now when Nick Griffin went on question time and you know the whole stuff about how you shouldn't have you know the BNP should not be represented in British mainstream media no actually he was shown up and his party was shown up to have nothing intelligent design and in a sense it finished the BMP was the beginning at the end of the BNP you know and the idea of you know no platforming Nick Griffin and letting him go on you know being that kind of bogeyman in the corner actually he was shown to be not only nasty which he probably was but he was particularly shown to be vacuous unfortunate while we're hoping same thing will play out with Donald Trump in the States but it hasn't hasn't worked so far she was really good I was gonna say and I'd like to open this up now - to - to you we've got two mics if you'd like to say something it doesn't have to be a question it could be an opinionated comment and but please wait for it for it for a microphone to get to you well the microphones going up there I just want to ask you so long as kind of a thumbs-up thumbs-down basis you know you've been at you've been in an a female public intellectual you know who's had and increasingly Hydrofarm in your 50s I guess is that right do you think that I mean do you feel that things are getting better for women I you know say is I think as you get older you you feel I feel what I feel more feminist rage now than I probably did when I was 25 not a fair bit then I think it's possible to feel more feminist rage similar dreamiest me to think that things are getting better no no I mean anybody who I've been in this university and over the last what hasn't just over 14 years I mean you know you know when I was an undergraduate 12% of wit of the students were women right I mean it was a man's world you know you'd go into classes still and people would say oh you have two ladies here you know and actually they weren't the worst offenders because those that were kind of quite overtly sexist were quite easy to deal with it right ones that were sexist in their heads yes yes you know the liberal yes they were the worst you know you know women should be I'm doing all that women should have a totally different relationship with power yes which is the same same time so even if they thought they were very pleased that you were there they were still a little bit curious about why you thought it was okay whenever they use the word ambitious of a woman it was not a compliment no not a compliment hey so I just had a really kind of quick very observation which may manifest itself as a question and I certainly hope well so I was just curious what we were saying about Nyjah faraj Donald Trump and what you're saying my kind of impression of the Nick Griffin question Tommy no I'm very far from so I can you know I'm very far from expressing any sympathy for Nick Griffin but I think that kind of reinforces what I might be about saying in case of like I said that I mean my impression was he was not exactly given a fair hearing in the sense that you know everyone knew what he was gonna say was kind of bollocks and there was a great chance for their three other people to gang up on him and sort of have a laugh and to show that they weren't racist and you know and he but you know I agree it could be demolished him but to me what it showed was kind of the strength of the BNP being mainstreamed to boo to kind of be able to quite safe to dismiss them and gain popularity points for being so and the difference between him and Nigel Faraj of us and you know really quite reprehensible you know policies and opinions - is that Nigel Farage kind of taps into a sort of annoying set 2pcs correctness without quite managing to step in and say something - boo and he even Donald Trump you know I mean I wouldn't say it doesn't say extremely politically incorrect things but he steers clear of saying you know something overtly very very overtly racist oh I'm not sure what I think saying that Mexicans are rapists and villains and she's gonna put every time somebody survey on he's gonna put another 10 feet on the wall is may he's been very selectively racist but he has been sort of as it were the ultimate race it's bully by picking on you know particularly is sort of a minority group that he feels he can get other by Noren minorities to back him up in in in picking on I mean he has been to me he's been like a living embodiment of the producers he's been saying the more and more and more outrageous things in the hope he doesn't actually to give up his rather nice lifestyle and start being president which in America is a really shitty job really shitty job but I think he has been I think he and I think that's what shocked the sort of the political establishment but also sort of made the media kind of and again so chic so all of this being conducted through social media really he's had this constant runnings that with fear what feeling sort of the debates but it's a very interesting exercise in when somebody just says something which is completely wrong all the time not like provably demonstrably lying so when he said after 9/11 people there were thousands of Muslims in the streets of Newark New Jersey celebrating well first of all there are thousands of Muslims and streets from New Jersey anyway secondly they absolutely weren't celebrating thirdly even the head police said this is made of and people didn't care people like I don't really care if this and he said I don't you know I can you can say what you like I know what I heard yes or anodyne form it comes over you know to go to Boris you know Boris's complete fabrications about regulations it is one of those you know the you know EU regulation says that no child under 8 can blow up a balloon you know it's you know it's actually it's a rather anodyne version when you compare that to you know celebrating the streets of New Jersey but yes it's on a spectrum but it's also so it gives you a problem as journalist which is do you cover things which are not treat which you know are not true because it's free speech and this is persons a candidate and should you be giving it coverage should you be giving this coverage or should you be thinking this is actually factually incorrect what we're doing this week we're contributing to and and it has led to sort of media being completely paralyzed in the states between we just need to report what a counter that says versus saying actually some of this is not just contestable it's completely wrong can I go back to Griffin because I think I mean in some ways like I mean I see your point I could I could do the argument I think like you're going which is that you know what what we had was not a debate we had the British liberal establishment of whatever its political color ganging up on a supposed outsider and I think that's true in the end I I find myself not particularly bothered by it I mean you know I don't you know in my heart of hearts a lot sad that that happened Jeanette Griffin now I and I think I can see I can see the logic and I can see there would be cases instances where it would actually be much more damaging and I think possibly if you were Nigel Faraj what you would say is that it was the British establishments refusal to hear these things that have left is partly and some of the messes that we're now in but you know but in the end I'm not gonna have a sleepless night although you know I'm glad he went on there and I'm glad he was shown to be an idiot so I just wanted to say I mean I'm certainly am NOT meaning just fine if you know weep over Nick Griffin's media FA expressed any sympathy for anything he said I suppose really really wouldn't be so careful yeah what I really wanted to get to is just I kind of feel like you if you step on something to boo certainly in UK media then it can be an absolute I mean David Starkey say you know it can absolutely blacken your name but if you manage to just ho the right line of saying something that's just a horrific and tap into a sort of general discontent and come across as plain speaking and down the pub then you get lots of popular support that seems for people who are who almost would want to say the worst stuff but would you know but we're tack we would you know endorsed whatever kind of Commons boo which I mean is there a useful to be there is for saying them and it's a bit kind of negative to say well you know I mean maybe we only avoid saying some you know maybe many be only avoid saying something's because it is just to be rather than because they actually think them but it seems to me that you know like on the one side you you know you you get to a pedo diff you say some things and the other provided you kind of say things which implied that people would like to say the horrific things that you're on their side you actually get a popularity boost I don't know if that's mean Twitter I think Ted so Title II again is you know something we learn through performance I mean one of the things about Trump is he's a performer and so tonally he this sort of bombastic pantomime presence which gives the impression which i think is probably tied to the truth that he really doesn't care people find enormously appealing well they don't like us or politicians who feel that they really care about their own power that sort of makes them isn't what in a way sort of filled with we cannot legally but also you know sort of Trump Kurt I mean the the interesting thing is just how it shifted the I mean this is what I do again struggle with it which is that he shifted the bounds of acceptable debate definitely further bright or something like immigration which wasn't really being sort of it wasn't really front and center of the debate and it allowed for a sort of an extremity of language to enter the debate and you could say well that's a really good thing I don't think that sort of some of things that being said would be at all beneficial to America if they were then implemented somehow if there were policies that were implemented but instead but it's a kind of the interesting thing it's just sounds like the bounds of our acceptability is a really interesting issue hello thank you very much Richard Danbury I've got an anecdote and a point the anecdote is a griphon Anik day and and it's I used to work on news night and I I think was one of the first people to good him on national TV and we had enormous Hanged about whether to put him on national TV and we got a lot of we've got a lot of criticism afterwards for doing so our justification for doing so was to give him an opportunity of making a fool of himself and to prepare a very coruscating interview and surprisingly did very well and we weren't able to land as many punches as we want so that leads to the point which is sometimes the the in the answer too too too dangerous speech sometimes the idea that there should be counter speech and more speech sometimes that that's actually dangerous and it doesn't work and as a journalist it gives you an acute difficulty which is what you're saying Emily of whether to cover it or not and and the second observation was that I think there are distinctions in in this question about where the balance of speech and banning speech lives in obviously in America and in the UK we're very much more and in Europe very much more relaxed about banning speech particularly hate speech and in America they're much more phlegmatic about it so I think there are cultural differences which of course the internet aligns also I mean the interesting thing about America is it thinks it's actually the home of free speech in the First Amendment is a very wonderful thing America is enormous ly conservative culture you know and it's I have to keep reminding myself it's founded by Puritans because they don't like they don't like to drink at lunchtime don't really prove any walls making they really wish that I spent more time in the gym you know they are not they are kind of they are not people who and and discourse is incredibly self-centered nobody swears in America like if you if we fat up here and said it's ridiculous it would be on the front page of almost on the front page of the New York Times tomorrow I mean yeah in that say so there are you know there are kind of a freedom of speech is is manifest in all sorts of ways and the First Amendment is one protection but there are things you know you I think in some way sort of Europe you hear much more frank and free discussion you tend to hear polarized speech in America and it tends to come from things like evangelical preachers and it's very sort of declarative but in normal day to day conversation people that self censor in a way that they don't I would say that they've my experience has been that they don't hear and it's a very it's an interesting thing because then working out what it means to control no we are one things about social media is it is imposing the American Standard free speech on the rest of the world you know it's like some of the central terms of use for Facebook or Twitter become really the default standards of speech for everywhere but it it's also the case that the slogan of freedom of speech and it's become the slogan of the the Twitter abusers and insulters you know if you say someone writes you know I think that your vagina smells of cabbage whatever you know as they do um you say I think it'd be good idea to take that down it obviously you you use a very moderate form of phrasing which of course as they spot instantly gives you the moral high ground to innovate they've said your vagina smells and cabbage you say I think it'd be a very good idea if you took that sweet down and already there's a - between different systems here but what will then come back I've got the right you know you trying to flip my feet in the speech I have rights my opinions I've got a right to my opinion I've got a right and it is particularly in larger than 40 characters it is very hard to say you know that this is not something you know there is no universal right to freedom of speech we know that there never have been you know price you know yes you know you do not have a right to you know never mind modern issues of a racism etc you don't have a right to say let's all go off until you know X Y s it's like you do not have a right to incite yes and and yet the declaratory medium of of most platforms of social media mean that freedom of speech is something that that is constantly appeal to an extremely uninteresting way or very damaging yes now I think that's right and I think actually what's interesting about the First Amendment is you're now seeing for instance companies in America using free sort of the First Amendment to say some particularly sort of I'll think doing well this is speech we should be protected as speakers a company can be a speaker and I think that sort of you know the read drawings how we redraw this it is really fascinating it is fascinating that Mark Zuckerberg will say you should not be allowed to advocate gonna let people advertise guns which we all do it on Facebook that's you know kind of a that's that's a ban we can all get behind um we're not going to allow people to pay post hate speech about refugees in Germany okay fair enough you'll say oh you know all agree with that I'm not going to allow our Isis to have accounts or people to support Isis to discuss it that's also fine but there will be a point at which those edge cases become uncomfortable for us it could be well I'm not gonna allow people to criticize Facebook this is my and if it's the default public sphere so that's the thing that bothers me in a way yeah it is it's also I mean there's there's all kind of wider set of issues in which you know unfashionable as it might be you know there are some conflicts and tensions within any culture that is probably useful for the culture not always to examine you know yes silence not picking the saw can be the right thing to do know rather than constantly to believe that getting to the bottom of this I'm having the argument about it is we just need something you see I think that's great I think it's a very good British way of thinking about it which is that there's a lot to be said for being really quiet yeah and just having a stiff upper lip not sharing your feelings the smaller subjects my husband is well how does it vary British is always saying I think actually bottling it up is massively underrated that's right I think that's I would you know I'm not very good at bottling it up but I know it's a virtue that I'm too much I aspire know I know it's gonna say I'm terrible and I'm a great expounder he's great bottler it's like it's one of the great strengths of our marriage is in fact that he's just like yesterday that's yes you're right they were all crazy yes that's right but it's holding it's all in Damon talk about it and selective blindness is what most cultures restaurant occasionally it's very good to unseat that selective blindness because it turns out we've been blind to things we would rather not be blind to but it's not necessarily bad not to see everything education ought to have a role in this just that so just as you were tortured Vice telegram um try to still think there's what I'd love to have in that lesson if I have to tell you what the telegram what the theme was you're so exactly the kind of academic girl school I went to because the telegram we had to write was one offering us a scholarship at Cambridge oh goodness me you know the replication of culture wasn't that wonderful one scholarship Cambridge wire to accept that's social conditioning amazing isn't it it's amazing like learning Latin Thank You Norah Nina John um I'm not surprised at all that freedom of speech just come up a lot this evening at the talk and I think very rightly but um you brought this point up yesterday Emily and rather than focus on the freedom of speech what comes to mind for me about the dangers for example for social media and journalism and freitas free speech is the immediacy of speech that now we have a culture where people don't even think before they post things and Emily gave the example yesterday about somebody posted to photograph her footage of one of the yes yes I thought somebody yes somebody had a guy called Georgie Muir who was an engineer who has a flat which was around the corner from the Charlie Hebdo offices actually filmed the two government shootings the policeman dead on the pavement and posted it to Facebook and there's a saying yesterday the problem was that he wanted to change his mind about it for reasons of all sorts of reasons and he wasn't allowed to because of course by that time it had gone and it was everywhere and there was no deletion and retrieval and as a journalist again actually I didn't say that slight but there's a journalist that's very difficult because part of you thinks it's a really important piece of our you know piece of news video and then piece of archival video and should he actually have right to say I don't want anyone else to see that now I think yeah it's it kind of there is a balance there about public interest versus ability to but your point about speeds I think I mean so Janet this is following on exposed quite nicely from the point you just raised about learning how to write a telegram and in terms of what people should be taught now like learning how to what the appropriate thing is to tweet or what the appropriate thing is to put on a particular platform but I think you know in that realm of Education important point would be reflection step back what are the consequences of this and I take your point Mary about the norms of society stepping in and everyone saying oh well you know we all heard those crazy photographs but sometimes it's not so frivolous I mean sometimes people say things when they're a teenager Deafness said my share that you know after a you know a second a second moment I would feel without stupid that was City but could so easily be taken out of context you know I agree but I don't see any effective form of policing other than us actually coming together to see that what somebody said 20 years ago is just not going to count and I mean I think you know Emma's example is the important one but actually when most people put something in linearised on social media it is not going viral and it is not you know so you know for most of us we're not going to be in that notice and we you know I I think it's absolutely inevitable you know what people say can be of advised what people can anything that you do quickly can always be of advice mill advise when you do it slowly but is easier to be an adviser wouldn't your quick and there have been no I can't imagine that anybody who's on Twitter in this room I can't think of several tweets that they've done late at night possibly after was like the nature developer which they saw the big morning off finger lutz delete when and we have to find a way of managing that seems to me but also drawing a distinction I think that actually we would not care to be bad at this it's a bit early but we're not going to be bad between a really stupid thing to say when you're dissonant or when you didn't think and actually a campaign of vitriol and hatred yes yes yes I think that now I think that's absolutely right but the I mean when when I'm teaching journalism students now I say when I was bein able no it's your age which I do like to point out was not 100 years ago I am only 15 no 150 when I get into you know the tools of my trade were a telephone that actually was kind of get went into the ground that curly wire attached to it and that if you wanted to research everything you had to go down into the bowels of the building in which you worked and somebody would give you a folder which contains a cut up of bits of the newspaper that you were probably with your own stories on which will be your research and then if you wanted to find anything else out about it you guys have to go to a library or to the company's house and you have to ring up like 20 people a day to get any level oh thank you so actually now you have all of those yes but you also used to make mistakes about using as well made wrong judgment one of my students said how did you ever publish anything what and how was it ever bright and I said well hey we didn't publish very much and be actually it was quite often wrong and I said now you have all of these fantastic tools my job is to teach you to think critically at speed about what it means to be publishing in a social sphere and what it means to be a journalist in particular what that sort of you know kind of what what what batcat what my identity carries with it and how does that feed into your reporting how does it sort of feed into how you relate your stories to the rest of the world and it is a lot about I think reflection is a really good way of putting it the problems configure differently but they're not they're not in essence qualitatively different I mean it it will always been debates about um what kind of war picture in my lifetime there's always been debates about what kind of war photograph you have a song cover you know Don McCullen you know and on and that it's it feels different yes it's so quick and it feels different when it you know win and since you know that it's gone too it's been retweeted you know five thousand times but yes that's nice does it feel different but the the basic moral dilemmas are not different no I think that's up so that I think that's absolutely right and I think that but we have to keep soft we we never stop I think one of our one of the mistakes that we're all prone to a little bit is thinking well we've had that - Benjo need to have it again it's just that the reeducation is ongoing you know every generation has to you know sit in their class and do the equivalent whatever it is writing a telegram and you know you have to learn all these and we you know it is you know it's a work in progress well it's sorted out you know and what we just decide to be blind about what we decide to be insulting about you know there isn't there it just ain't no right answer I know and I think they know what we hate not having white officers an oasis one of the Condors the anxieties that I feel caught between on the one hand between you know this that Complete Idiot's you so what it's my right to speed I've got freedom of speech to say this and the others who say I want a safe space you know and after that two sides of a spectrum in which how we position ourselves to finish very quickly on that this I completely take the point about education definitely providing a role to address that and in terms of you know having to place it you know I definitely take the point that you know there are definitely problems but to kind of step back and take this position that well that's just the way it is that's the intranet just retains everything and everyone will access everything I feel like we're feeding in to that culture that you brought up family about these are the norms from Silicon Valley this is the freedom of speech North American culture whereas you know in Europe there has been some pushing back in recent years like the right forgotten with Google like everybody you know in Silicon Valley so that one coming but but it does represent you know this other pushback other norms like not just education and gradual incremental changes in the community but more immediate pushes back against that kind of embrace so I think one of the things about this is that America is Joe and I don't mean this salting way to my American colleagues and friends and but until you live there for a period of time and they something Mary's lived there for a while as well you don't realize really what being in a cat that genuinely capitalist society means and anarchic know the market is right in American the market is right and the government is wrong and that's the sort of the default position of society that and they thought more was about it you know they really did so so whereas I think your point about you two things we've had far more sort of conflict in and we've had it among people who live very close together than America has had and so there's been a necessity sort of political necessity for it and but also you know that in terms of how Silicon Valley go about thinking about these things right until now and we're talking about four or five of the biggest companies not just in America but in the world now that the you know and some of those companies going to a trillion dollars in some valuation that's the sort of that there's a compass that there's a you know that there was a meme that says I was just so carry on getting bigger and bigger and bigger um but it hasn't been a business problem so actually what's interesting about Twitter is that you know kind of that so very you know the robustness of the all the other sort of the the the kind of the type of discourses it's built up has become problematic because because the troll Factory means that it's costing it money that advertisers don't really want to stand next to the stuff that's on Twitter partly because some of the stuff on Twitter's is news and nobody wants tan x/2 news this is my journalism is is is kind of uh neck anomic and now it's a business problem there's much more discussion about what can we what can we actually do about it and I think that that's why it's a Europe is is the most progressive place just in terms of thinking about how policy feeds into this because we would always include that in the debate whereas in America it's like the market will fix it and what the market doesn't fix actually is culture and community often it's that you do need interventions and you know that there hasn't been mechanism now I think we'll see a different different type of conversation interventions are usually in the interests of the prominent Twitter that's right yes yes okay yes you know the deep up those that we don't seem well don't have the access to yes yes I got when I got trolled what did I do you know actually it was before Twitter was good I you know I got in touch with woman's her that's you know that and that was a very privileged thing Joe is very sensible thing yet who in my position but it was also yeah precisely the point that I was trying to make but I both was differentially the victim but I had all kinds of cultural and social and political resources which in some way in some ways actually social media have amplified that so there's another issue which says you know if you disappear off Twitter and much more Twitter than Facebook but I think it's increasingly going to be the case with Facebook as well that you disappear from public life in a way that wouldn't have been the case before that it becomes the sort of the filter for people to get into mainstream don't can I suggest at that point that we all disappeared from public life center area and I want to thank you both very much for this conversation and I'd like to say that for anybody who's interested in following up the policy and other implications with this there is a symposium tomorrow and the afternoon in crash and you'd be very welcome to come thank you all for coming and thank you

Channel: CRASSH Cambridge

Views: 9,320

Rating: 4.6086955 out of 5

Keywords: CRASSH, Humanitas, Mary Beard, Emily Bell

Id: yDYf3e2ZjrQ

Length: 82min 17sec (4937 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 10 2016