Facebook and hate in the Isle of Man
- Image by Getty Images via Daylife
This morning I was dismayed, if not surprised, to see that C/net had picked up on the story about the Isle of Man’s KKK Facebook site.
The story had come to my attention a few days ago via the Island grapevine and then I saw news accounts of it from both the Isle of Man and the UK national media.
From Isle of Man Newspapers:
The 95 members of the group, entitled ‘Keep the Isle of Man White & Free from Foreigners’, included students from every Manx secondary school, but 33 appeared to be currently enrolled at Ballakermeen.
And,
A description of the group by its creator reads: ‘There are too many comovers (sic) (non-british) on the Island. They are taking all of the jobs, houses and most of all they are taking advantage of our ****ing Island….. join us and help clense (sic) the Isle of Man.’
Teachers at the school claim that the kids are not racist and were trying to be ironic. Now I don’t know any of the kids involved, but can see this as a plausible explanation.
The launch of the KKK site had followed quickly on the heels of another Facebook site which had caused a stir the previous week. This site was focused on the issue of allowing a new mosque to be built in the Isle of Man, and it was quickly populated with many hateful and racists comments. But watching the ‘crowd effect’ on the mosque site was fascinating.
In the space of a couple of days, the racist hate-mongers were drowned out by reasoned, informed and intelligent comment. People from all over the Island and further afield all chimed in with very reasonable discussion of the issue and what started as a something very negative turned into a profile that illustrates our enlightened and tolerant society.
I can’t help but think that this KKK site might have been a misguided attempt to lampoon the creators of the mosque site. But, as kids tend to do, they pushed it too far. The site was closed down and the rest, as they say, is history.
Still, I can’t help but wonder what would have happened if the site had been allowed to run a few days longer? Would the wisdom of the crowd have prevailed, once again? I think, that without a doubt, if the conversation had been left to flow naturally, our community would have displayed itself for what it truly is: tolerant and respectful.
Instead, the long tail legacy of this incident will forever leave the Isle of Man’s reputation tarnished.
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I disagree, the KKK page was a ridiculous example of kids pushing boundaries that shouldn’t be pushed. There are certain elements of society that should not be tackled unless you have the intellect to have a reasoned debate. I struggle to see that kids at high school have the full grasp of irony and its potential effects when poorly used. The Anti-Mosque page was equally uneducated and seemed an extension to the racist vitriol on ManxForums.
As a fellow “come over” I object to the continued resentment by some Manx people who seem to think that we “take all their jobs” and contribute little to nothing to *our* island. Many Manx are delightful people, but some (including one of my former colleagues) resent the influx of professionals and immigrants into the Manx economy. We are helping pay for their new hospital, prison, idiotic government policy (a certain £300,000 comes to mind, but that is an example of Manx going *to* the UK) and contributing massively to the island’s continued success as a finance hub.
As a come over, how many Manx can meet my own efforts to respect and adopt the Manx culture such as learning Manx, enjoying the Manx countryside and respecting and improving the beautiful environment? Oh, and working hard, paying my taxes to help support the economy.
A related post I’ll gratuitously plug:
http://programx.co.uk/blogs/live-to-work/archive/2007/04/19/a-message-from-a-manx-manc.aspx
Nathan, thanks for adding your voice here. However, the point of my post is to discuss the role of the community and crowd in social networks only. I am not making a comment on Isle of Man culture, attitudes or politics. Let’s keep the debate here to the role that social media plays.