We left off recognizing that any strategy that insures immediate survival of the prey species (vulnerable online community members) will be successful until the predator species either evolves to overcome the survival mechanism. Two strategies suggested are reproduction and defense mechanisms.
Can the prey species evolve defenses? The nature of evolutionary cycles is that once a prey species evolves a defense the predator species evolves better methods of getting past that defense. This is what evolutionary and survival pressure is all about.
Right now (and this is where NextStage's research is currently pointing) it seems the best defense mechanism is to rely on group cohesion, teaming to protect "weaker" species members from predation.
This is both an easy and not easy thing to develop. Members of the prey species who are most likely to be victims of online abuse and assault (and the kinds of assault and abuse that spill over in the real world) are often not willing to take part in social interactions. They can be "alone in the middle of a crowd" because loneliness is psychological, not statistical. These individuals, because they have often been preyed upon in the real world, are suspicious of outgoing strangers and invitations to take part in social activities. It is this very fact that makes they easy to prey upon. They allow themselves to be lonely and this can translate into depression, which usually translates into "vulnerable".
Inclusion by the group is the cure. For now. Right now online predators tend to be solitary hunters. Evidence, as mentioned before, is that they're starting to gather to share techniques and methods. Soon this will lead to hunting parties who function by isolating a single member from the herd, if you will.
The herd's hereditary strength is its numbers. The next stage in online herd evolution, if you will, must be the herd's willingness to care for the lonely other. The greatest defense is herd that defends itself as a herd. It recognizes there are lonely others in its ranks and defends them with the full strength of the herd. Even a wolfpack will defer when all the sheep turn and charge them. Musk ox, forming a circle with horns out and lonely others safe in the center, can keep wolves and polar bears at bay.
Please contact NextStage for information regarding presentations and trainings on this and other topics.
Links for this post:
- Books for your own explorations in this area:
- Emotions Inside Out: 130 Years After Darwin's the Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences)
- Landscapes of Fear
- Languages of Sentiment: Cultural Constructions of Emotional Substrates (Advances in Consciousness Research)
- Public Appearances, Private Realities: The Psychology of Self-Monitoring (Series of Books in Psychology)
- The Self: From Soul to Brain (Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences)
- The Psychology of Loneliness, Part 1
- Posts on The Village
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