The rise of fear-based social media
Violent crime in the US is at its lowest rate in decades. But you wouldn’t know that from a crop of increasingly popular social media apps that are forming around crime.
Apps like Nextdoor, Citizen, and Amazon Ring’s Neighbors — all of which allow users to view local crime in real time and discuss it with people nearby — are some of the most downloaded social and news apps in the US, according to rankings from the App Store and Google Play.
Nextdoor bills itself as the “world’s largest social network for the neighborhood,” where you can ask for nearby restaurant recommendations, buy used furniture, or report a stolen bike. In practice, its “crime and safety” section has been a hotbed for racial stereotyping that’s forced the company to rewrite its software and policies.
These apps have become popular because of — and have aggravated — the false sense that danger is on the rise. Americans seem to think crime is getting worse, according to data from both Gallup and Pew Research Center. In fact, crime has fallen steeply in the last 25 years according to both the FBI and the Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Discover more from Florida Action Committee (FAC)
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Social Media is the perfect place to spread fear and hate. It has proven that people are far to willing to believe in many crackpot theories. It is amazing how in a single generation we’ve gone away from believing organized religion and psychic phenomenon to believing wind from windmills cause cancer and chemicals in the water turning the frogs gay.