Session S3B FLAMING and THRASHING: an EXAMINATION of TONE in ELECTRONIC MAIL

Session S3B FLAMING AND THRASHING: AN EXAMINATION OF TONE IN ELECTRONIC MAIL

Marilyn A. Dyrud1

Abstract--Most e-mail users have experienced some sort of correspondence is missing those same cues and, while letters computerized verbal abuse, ranging from less-than-gentle- may occasionally express anger, the distinct inflammatory reminders to full-blown obscenities. This paper explores tone content which characterizes flaming is not present. We need and language usage in electronic mail. Specifically, it to look deeper. focuses on definitions and characteristics, situations which William Safire traces the definition of flaming to a June spawn flaming and thrashing, and ways that hostile tone can 1987 issue of PC Week: “people impulsively react to a affect working relationships. Flaming can be particularly message and send uncensored, emotionally laden and often destructive in the educational arena, where relationships tend derogatory return messages--a practice that is almost to be close and intense. In addition, for instructors who use e- nonexistent in paper writing” [14]. However, two years mail in the classroom, this paper includes suggestions for earlier, in a seminal report for the Rand Corporation, Shapiro maintaining a civil tone and avoiding abusive outbursts. and Anderson address the issue and note simply that flames have “deliberate emotional content” [17]. Index Terms--e-mail, electronic communication, flaming, In the 15 years since the Rand report, things have heated thrashing up quite a bit. John Seabrook, author of Deeper, a penetrating meditation on the Internet and its cultural significance, states INTRODUCTION that flaming means “to lose one’s self-control and write a message that uses derogatory, obscene, or inappropriate “Words,” suggests Clifford Stoll, “have consequence, whether language” and quotes from his first flame, a startling response sent in mail or posted to global newsgroups” [18]. With to a piece Seabrook wrote on Bill Gates for The New Yorker: electronic mail currently outpacing paper mail at a 3:1 ratio “Crave this a--hole. Listen, you toadying dipsh-t [4], we need to take pause and reconsider how the medium is scumbag...remove your head from your rectum long enough to changing not only our ways of communication, but who we look around and notice that real reporters don’t fawn over are and how we relate to each other. their subjects...” [16]. Time magazine estimates 6.6 trillion e-mail messages will Others are less harsh in their characterization of flaming. be sent through US-based networks this year, an increase of 4 Most Netiquette guides, for example, underplay the obscene trillion compared to 1997 [3]; or, as the International Data aspect; the Hollins College Internet Guide notes that flames Corporation projects, about 2.1 billion daily, to climb to 8 are “computer-aided insults. They are usually harsh, billion per day in 2002 [18]. The sheer numbers are repetitive, and low.... Flaming is mean, stupid, and intimidating enough; add to that the fact that flaming dangerous...” [13]. And, we might add, flaming is accounts for a substantial amount of all e-mail traffic [4] and unprofessional as well. we have reason for concern. This paper explores e-mail Web encyclopedias have added the term to their lexicons. flaming and its kin, thrashing, examining the use of language Real-Time Encyclopedia defines a flame as “An electronic and the effects these messages have on working relationships, mail or Usenet news message intended to insult, provoke or particularly in the field of education. rebuke” [8], while Webopedia describes it as “A searing e- mail or newsgroup message in which the writer attacks DEFINITIONS AND CHARACTERISTICS another participant in overly harsh, and often personal, terms” [6]. Although uncivil discourse occurs in many public discussion From these definitions, it is clear that flaming involves a arenas (a quick Web search yields over 7,000 references to hostile tone and some level of expressed emotional content, uncivil workplace behavior), flaming is a phenomenon whether insulting or obscene. A flame is usually a response peculiar to electronic mail. Some have suggested that the to another message, and it is sent quickly, without thought. absence of verbal and visual cues in e-mail gives rise to reader Indeed, one of the hallmarks of the new medium of electronic misinterpretation and hence flaming [11]; but paper mail is it “allows us to act before we think...” [22]. ______1 Marilyn A. Dyrud, Communications Department, Oregon Institute of Technology, 3201 Campus Drive, Klamath Falls, OR 97601; [email protected] 0-7803-6424-4/00/$10.00 © 2000 IEEE October 18 - 21, 2000 Kansas City, MO 30th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference S3B-3 Session S3B While flaming is a widely accepted term, thrashing made general. As we live in a McLuhanesque cocoon of incivility, its debut recently, in Seabrook’s 1997 Deeper. According to it is not surprising that rudeness and obscenity are present in Seabrook, thrashing is a sort of group flame, which he our electronic discourse communities. Notes Stephen Carter, describes using a jungle metaphor: Yale University law professor, “incivility in our society is a sign of the times to which the academy is not immune” [12]. Someone would throw a stone into the conversation, mainly to see the ripple it made, then someone would SITUATIONS throw a bigger stone, then a third...would find herself splashed by these stone-throwing macaques and splash Academic discourse has a rich history of vituperativeness: in back.... Then one of the aging silverbacks in the tribe the Middle Ages, gangs of professors clashed; Darwin’s would take it upon himself to teach these impudent theory of evolution spawned “nasty intellectual debates,” as youngsters a lesson. Suddenly people you had been did the Vietnam War [12]. Peculiar to the cyber age, chatting with civilly for weeks or months were locked however, is speed. E-mail makes instantaneous insults into a wild, raging battle. There was so much emotion possible, with escalating hostilities that can erode trust, involved! [16]. respect, and community. As Brian Schrag, Indiana University, explains, “Rude and derogatory speech or behavior Unlike flaming, which is transmitted between individuals, has a downward spiraling effect. Once we have breached our thrashing is a communal activity, with one person bearing the standards of courtesy and respect, it becomes easier for us to brunt of the abuse. repeat the behavior, corroding our self-control and unleashing Other types of flames are more receiver-perceived than the passions” [15]. People who are perfectly civil in vis-a-vis sender-intended. “E-mail leaves a lot of blank spaces in what communication can turn into dastardly curmudgeons behind we say,” maintains Diana Houghton, president of the a keyboard. marketing firm Jaffe Associates, “which the recipient tends to Virtually any academic situation can give rise to flaming fill in with the most negative interpretation” [9]. And flame or thrashing. The common element is that flame-throwers are perception may be, in part, gender based. According to a Web exercising power, “muscle-flexing.” Consider the following, survey that presented readers with a list of statements and written in response to a lampoon article in our college asked them to indicate which represented flaming, men found newspaper. Each term, the paper publishes a satirical issue 85% of the items to be potential flames, while women and typically profiles a faculty member; this person was not indicated only 47% [1]. amused (the e-mail’s original spelling and grammar are Why do people flame? Emory Mulling, a business faithfully reproduced): managerial consultant, suggests a transferal of emotion: “The bottom line is that if I send you an offensive E-mail, I feel Dr. XXX, as faculty advisor for the [newspaper] should great. I’ve gotten something off my chest. But now you take be discharged from that position and reprimanded by our on the anger. It’s a way of passing anger” [9]. Others institution. Apparently, XXX and others believe that attribute it to ennui and boredom; senders flame to make the there is “ absolute freedeom of the press”, despite conversation a little more exciting [7]. Anonymity and lack community standards of decency and civility.... His of accountability may also be factors; Susan Herring, who censored article, “ What do you think of Dr. ZZZ?”, is teaches linguistics at the University of Texas, Arlington, both vulgar and crass. There is a pattern here of states, “People will say things [online] that they wouldn’t say instituional harassment directed towards myself.... What when somebody could punch them in the nose” [3]. is XXX’s agenda? How do you think the article appears My own theory is that flaming, trashing, and other uncivil to my students, professional colleagues, and the discourse simply reflect current trends in popular culture. We community? How do you think the article might effect my have grown increasingly tolerant of and inured to escalating student ratings and promotion possibilities? How do violence and language in television and films, indeed in think the article might effect my own self-esteem society in general; talk shows which encourage uncivil, “in and professional activites at OIT? Am’I over- your face” verbal and physical behavior, such as Jenny Jones sensitive? I’am deeply offended, disappointed, and Jerry Springer, are unbelievably popular, as are and discouraged by such vulgar trash from OIT! courtroom realism shows: Judge Judy consistently berates both plaintiffs and As a power play, this message was sent to the president defendants and unabashedly lectures them about life in with copies to the faculty advisor, the provost, the sender’s

0-7803-6424-4/00/$10.00 © 2000 IEEE October 18 - 21, 2000 Kansas City, MO 30th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference S3B-4 Session S3B department chair, and the school dean. It actually tells us so I came to work. Please forgive me for what I’m about more about the sender than the actions of the newspaper to say. Some of it will be sarcastic and some joking, but advisor. We can see that the writer did not proofread, as he above all I’m disappointed, frustrated and down right makes many typing mistakes, such as “freedeom” and mad.... “instituional,” and several grammatical errors, “effect” instead I just got finished with failing 18 [technology] seniors of “affect,” “myself” instead of “me” (in general, e-mail tends enrolled in [BX 357] taught by a first-time adjunct. It to be messier than paper). The sender was obviously enraged seem that when the instructor asked the students which of when he wrote this and uses an ad hominem attack, you are graduating this term (fall) 20 students in 2 castigating the advisor of the student publication. And, different sections raised their hands. So the final, valued finally, the sender reveals his lack of knowledge regarding at 30% of the total grade was not administered to 20 media law and First Amendment rights, specifically as they students. Well as it turns out only 2 students actually apply to obviously satirical material (the students had graduated. The remaining 18 lied and are warm and consulted a college media advisory group in Washington, DC, snuggly taking winter courses. We were notified in a before going to press). Curiously, the writer did not letter sent by another student (not one of the 20) that communicate with the newspaper editor or the staff writer “You have been had....” who produced the article: he preferred to go for the jugular. How could this happen??? Eighteen students with the Tense personnel situations can also fan flames. Here is exception of one or two are from the same program, a message from an administrator reprimanding members of a [technology]. This is one of the showcase programs at department who were slow in electing a new chair: our institution--grants, healthy enrollments, and successful graduates making big bucks. Gentlemen your If a chair is not identified by Monday, I will armor is tarnished.... recommend that the department budget be transferred to What can we do to clean up our own back yard? Well, my account...and that, in effect, XXX cease to exist as an for one, the problem we are currently experiencing with academic department until such time as a chair can be the [technology] students is likely not limited to [Joe]’s identified. geeks. I feel we are part of the problem by not enforcing ...the amount of time and effort consumed in this futile a more disciplined and professional learning and totally demoralizing attempt to allow the department environment. I have been on a past discipline committee to name its own leader, plus the tone of many of its where we have voted to overlook cheating because the comments and interpersonal interactions...has thoroughly student didn’t understand what plagiarism was.... underwhelmed me. Therefore, I will entertain, reluctantly but assuredly, And on and on it goes. In one fairly lengthy message, the resignation of any faculty member who cannot or will this faculty member managed to insult, irritate, and otherwise not make a positive contribution to moving the annoy most of the campus: follow-up e-mail from faculty and department forward and healing the wounds. students alike whizzed back and forth, some ameliorative, some even more aggressive and hostile; student “geeks” from This missive was not well received by department faculty, the maligned department roamed campus wearing buttons who viewed their process as one of careful deliberation, not proudly proclaiming themselves “[Joe]’s Geeks.” In all the foot-dragging. The tone is hostile, and the writer is fuss and fury, the ethical problem of student lying was lost. threatening actions that are impossible to implement: he While the writer of the initial e-mail may have been correct in cannot fire tenured faculty without clearly showing cause, and his assertion, his choice of e-mail to express his concerns was he has no ill-conceived. E-mail may be a very handy communications power to arbitrarily dissolve an academic department nor medium, but not all topics are suitable for electronic absorb its funding. discussion. Sometimes, an emotional electronic outburst can disrupt Listservs and other cyber watering holes can also spawn an entire academic community. Consider the following flaming between educators. One common problem with group message, sent to the “All Faculty” mailbox, that details a space is that replies are often sent to the entire list, rather than purported student plot to worm out of taking a final exam. to the original sender. The subscriber who sent the following The college has a policy stating that instructors, at their e-mail over an engineering technology listserv had apparently discretion, may excuse graduating seniors from final exams: reached the breaking point: “Why send all the bull sh-t responses you have for individuals to everyone on the list. I It’s 4:30 a.m. on Thursday morning, and I can’t sleep have much better things to do with my time than waste it

0-7803-6424-4/00/$10.00 © 2000 IEEE October 18 - 21, 2000 Kansas City, MO 30th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference S3B-5 Session S3B looking at garabage [sic] on email.” While many of us have emotions people will show in comparison with their face-to- probably felt this way, it is much more tactful (and face behavior” [19]. professional) to simply delete the unwanted message. At the The tendency to flame also affects decision-making very least, deleting is a form of damage control. processes; when using electronic media, whether e-mail or While flaming is widespread, thrashing is a relatively groupware, “Conventional behavior, such as politeness and new addition to our electronic squabbling toolkit. Since it is acknowledgment of other views, decreases. Group decisions a group activity, thrashing will undoubtedly increase due to are unpredictable, unconventional, democratic, and less services that provide public discussion space. But thrashing constrained by high-status members.” In addition, the time can also occur over e-mail, as the following example involved in decision making dramatically increases, ranging illustrates: from three to ten times longer, depending on group size, than An instructor prepares a support course for a Web degree that of face-to-face communication [19]. completion program offered through another department. Another unintended consequence of electronic Following established procedure, she gives each member of communication is, ironically, increased isolation. While her department a copy of course materials for peer review. most people enter virtual communities, including distance She receives no response. The next term, she distributes final education courses, for interpersonal interaction, they find that versions of the materials she will give to the institutional the very act of computer-mediated communication results in curriculum committee. Shortly thereafter, the pixels start less face-to-face talk with friends and family, resulting in pulsating: the instructor is electronically bashed, with a dozen “increased loneliness and signs of mild depression, such as or more messages questioning the content and value of the feeling unable to ‘shake off the blues’” [5]. Oregon Senator materials, her ethics, and her credibility. And even though Mark Hatfield observes a similar trend, “At the same time we two years have passed since the flogging, residual effects and are connecting to this world of information via our computers, resentments still linger. we run the risk of becoming disconnected from other people” [10]. CYBERPSYCHOLOGY AND RELATIONSHIPS Despite the chatter about the Internet bringing people together, it seems clear from the literature that the medium “E-mail is not just electronic mail sent via the Internet,” itself divorces people interpersonally and actively fosters an explains John Suler, advocate of an emerging field, the incivility alien to paper communication. As Seabrook psychology of cyberspace. “E-mail communication creates a explains, “Whatever capacity the medium has for bringing psychological space in which pairs of people--or groups of people together, it has an equal capacity for driving them people--interact. It creates a context and boundary in which apart; and the solace one may find on-line is offset by malice, human relationships can unfold” [21]. Given the hostile tone and the compassion by cruelty, and the goodwill by spite” [16; of flames, it is no wonder that they can wreak havoc on see also 20]. working relationships. Sproull and Kiesler, at California State Polytechnic SUGGESTIONS University, Pomona, conduct experiments in electronic group dynamics. While electronic meetings have several advantages Our students will join the millions of Americans who over face-to-face meetings--such as allowing more people to communicate via e-mail every day of their working lives. To talk due to the asynchronous environment, flattening help them avoid abusive verbal behavior, it behooves us to hierarchies of management and subordinates, and making alert them to the benefits and dangers inherent in electronic status less recognizable and hence less important--they are communication. Showing spicy samples of flaming will also secure more conducive to uncivil discourse: “In one of our student attention, and a fruitful discussion of tone, ethics, and experiments, groups made 102 flaming remarks in twenty- professionalism may ensue. Other suggestions are listed four electronic discussions while the same groups made only below: 12 such remarks in twenty-four face-to-face discussions. • Discuss the importance of thinking before sending: Anger in one electronic discussion escalated so much that details such as avoiding the temptation to gratuitously participants had to be escorted individually out of the flame or biting on obvious flame-bait; keeping emotions building. Flaming was especially extreme when we arranged under control for group members to talk anonymously. Electronic mail is • Reinforce the significance of audience: message receivers not the undoing of straitlaced people, but it does increase the are people, not computer monitors

0-7803-6424-4/00/$10.00 © 2000 IEEE October 18 - 21, 2000 Kansas City, MO 30th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference S3B-6 Session S3B • Talk about the importance of maintaining a pleasant tone 3. Bovee, Courtland L. and John V. Thill. Business Communication Update • Set up a class listserv or use conferencing software for 3, no. 2 (October 1999): 9 pages [electronic newsletter]. group interaction and analyze the flames that will probably emerge 4. Bovee, Courtland L. and John V. Thill. Business Communication Update • Arrange for an e-mail exchange project with a 3, no. 4 (February 2000): 11 pages [electronic newsletter]. comparable class at another university; analyze the 5. Bower, Bruce. “Social Disconnections On-line.” Science News, ensuing conversations for tone September 12, 1998: 168. • Periodically share flames that you personally receive and 6. “Flame.” Webopedia. http://webopedia.internet.com/ TERM/flame.htm. speak openly and honesty about your reactions (3/7/00).

ONCLUSIONS 7. Flaming Defined. wysiwyg://416/http://www.geocities. C com/Athens/Forum/3281/ftext.htm. (3/7/00).

Electronic mail is not going to disappear. It is cheaper, faster 8. “Glossary of Terms.” Real-Time Encyclopedia. http:// www.realtime- and more convenient than paper. It reaches a wider audience info.be/encyc/techno/terms/95/33.htm. (3/7/00). than paper. It allows users more control than paper. And it 9. Gwynne, S. C. and John F. Dickerson. “Lost in the E-Mail.” Time, April is much more dangerous than paper. How we interact with a 21, 1997: 88-90. technology at once enthralling and repellant may well depend 10. Hatfield, Mark O. “Keynote Address.” Proceedings of the 50th on what we are taught--and what we teach. Schrag suggests Anniversary Symposium, Addendum. Klamath Falls, OR: Oregon that “civility is essential in the academy--in the pursuit of Institute of Technology, 1997: 3-5. truth, for teaching and creating a proper learning environment 11. Help with Internet E-mail and Mailing Lists. http:// www.city.grand- and for the proper discharge of faculty governance prairie.ab.ca/h_email.html. (3/7/00). responsibilities” [15]. 12. Leatherman, Courtney. “Whither Civility?” The Chronicle of Higher Do we want our students to be flame-throwers or fire- Education, May 8, 1996: A21-2. fighters? Do we want them to use the medium responsibly or 13. A Quick Guide to Netiquette: Basic Courtesy on the Web. 1996. rashly? Do we want them to be truly involved in online http://www.laurentian.com/newbie.html. (2/2/00). communities or feel depressed and isolated? Our professional and personal interactions are changing, and electronic 14. Safire, William. “My Old Flame.” The New York Times Magazine, June 19, 1994: 14. communication “is both the catalyst and the instrument of that change” [22]. 15. Schrag, Brian. Civility in the Academy. 1997: 8 pages [working paper]. Raymond Barglow, author of The Crisis of the Self in the 16. Seabrook, John. Deeper: My Two-Year Odyssey in Cyberspace. New Age of Information, discusses this contradictory nature of York: Simon and Schuster, 1997. technology: “It simultaneously empowers and disempowers...affords new opportunities for cooperation but 17. Shapiro, Norman Z. and Robert H. Anderson. Towards an Ethics and also walls people off from one another....” The choice, he Etiquette for Electronic Mail. 1985. http://www.rand.org/publications/ MR/R32383.html. (2/2/00). suggests, is up to us: “as a cultural ‘text’ of a kind, [technology] articulates and extends the fissures and 18. Spring, Tom. The Ten Commands of E-Mail. March 21, 1999. inconsistencies that characterize our lives. We can let that http://www.appleseeds.org/Email_Commands.html. (3/7/00). text be written by the interests that currently organize the 19. Sproull, Lee and Sara Kiesler. Electronic Group Dynamics. http:// planet; or www.csupomona.edu/~sciman/html/library/internet/325w98/ we can decide that we are going to write that text elecGpDy.html. (2/2/00). collaboratively and democratically, so that technological 20. Stoll, Clifford. Silicon Snake Oil: Second Thoughts on the Information innovation enlarges the scope of human freedom and self- Highway. New York: Anchor, 1995. determination instead of contributing to new forms of irrationality and domination” [2]. 21. Suler, John. E-Mail Communication and Relationships. August 1998. http://www.rider.edu/users/suler /psycyber /emailrel.htm.

REFERENCES 22. “We’ve Got Mail.” Newsweek, September 20, 1999:

1. Analysis of Flaming Survey. wysiwyg://9http://www.geocities.com/ Athens/Forum/3281/sur.htm. (3/7/00).

2. Barglow, Raymond. The Crisis of the Self in the Age of Information: Computers, Dolphins and Dreams. London: Routledge, 1994.