For the next two months, we are turning off the comment function on all editorials, columns and letters in the opinion section.
Why?
Ferguson.
Last Sunday, we challenged our region to have the serious discussion on race that it has been avoiding for decades. Such difficult discussions are made more challenging when, just to present a thoughtful point of view, you have to endure vile and racist comments, shouting and personal attacks.
People are also reading…
If you’ve watched many of the talking heads on cable television try to discuss the killings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, you know what we’re talking about. Unfortunately, sometimes comments on newspaper stories and columns have a similar effect.
In fact, it has a name: “The nasty effect.”
That’s what University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers Dominique Brossard and Dietram Scheufele dubbed the negative effect certain comments can have on a reader’s understanding.
In their study, published last year, researchers concluded that “Much in the same way that watching uncivil politicians argue on television causes polarization among individuals, impolite and incensed blog comments can polarize online users.” In some cases, negative blog comments actually changed readers’ perception of what they read, not just their opinions about it.
Ever since newspapers started putting stories on the Internet, there has been a vigorous debate within the industry about the effect of reader comments. The Post-Dispatch has made efforts to improve the level of discussion in comment sections, but there are wins and losses.
There are positive moments, such as when readers last week left touching tributes in comments about sports columnist Bryan Burwell after he lost his battle with cancer. But there are other instances where comments deteriorate into racist remarks or demeaning discussion that has nothing to do with the original story or editorial or column.
Recently, the news service Reuters decided to get rid of comments on its stories. The online startup Vox doesn’t allow commenting.
We intend to use our opinion pages to help the St. Louis region have a meaningful discussion about race. So we are going to turn off the comments in the editorial section for a while, and see what we learn from it. (Comment will continue on news articles). Comments might return to the opinion pages. Or we might find that without them, the discussion — through letters, social media conversations and online chats, rises to a higher level.
That’s the goal.
There will still be plenty of ways to share your thoughts with us, and, in fact, we’ll be more likely to see them and take them seriously through other venues. As always, you can send us letters to letters@post-dispatch.com. You can email Editorial Page Editor Tony Messenger at tmessenger@post-dispatch.com or find him on Twitter at @tonymess. Our editorial page Twitter account is @PDEditorial.
We post all of our editorials and much of our other content on our Facebook page at Facebook.com/PDPlatform, and you can talk to us there.
Also, starting this week, we plan a weekly live chat to discuss the various issues surrounding Ferguson. Details will be posted on our website and social media platforms.
To be clear: It’s not that we don’t want to hear from those who disagree with us. Quite the contrary. Every day we publish letters from people criticizing our editorials, and we engage in discussions on Twitter and Facebook about the things we write. We believe those venues offer a safer, more civil place to talk about the racial injustice that dominates the Ferguson discussion.
Let’s give civility a try.