In a July 2020 interview on the rounding up and imprisonment of the Uighur people in China, BBC journalist Andrew Marr showed a clip of the human rights abuses to the Chinese ambassador to the UK, clearly uncomfortable at the scenes before him. “Can I ask you why people are kneeling blindfolded and shaven and being led to trains in modern China?”, Marr asks the ambassador as he squirms.
We might ask a similar question about the launch of hostilities by Russia against the Ukraine and by implication the West. Why in a modern world is this happening? Why, when we literally have direct links through LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and shared leisurely pursuits through other instantly available media such as Netflix, is it still possible to divide through war and abuse people? The Uighur and dissidents in Hong Kong, people under occupation in Palestine, countless people under despotic regimes in Africa and the Middle East, many of which enjoy the hypocritical support of the West such as in Saudi Arabia and Egypt? We have seen the powerful effect of social media on the Me Too and Black Lives movements, why not in war, conflict, despotism and human rights?
Anyone who has their wits about them will suspect a lot more is going on in the Ukraine conflict than can be gleaned from news reports and statements by officials on either side. Sources in the West depict Russia as rogue, headed by a kleptocratic and authoritarian leader who fiddles elections and poses with a bear chest. Whilst that may be so, in Russia on the other hand Western nations are depicted as being again up to no good, trying to entrench their influence in former Soviet states, entice them into NATO and turn them away from Russia. And that too, may be so. Only the most naïve would consider either side has a monopoly on civilised conduct, truth and fair dealing. Intrigue, state delinquency, corruption and violence in the service of power and economic gain are tools of the trade in so-called international relations. And despite the veneer given by the UN, ICJ and other global bodies of international law and order, this arena of international relations is essentially anarchic, moderated by diplomacy and economic incentive or sanctions when you are not quite mighty enough to get your way, and force and threat of devastation when you are. Force has a legitimate place in this arena when the other side is the aggressor, yet it is not always clear who the aggressor is, or whether indeed there are legitimate concerns on both sides that are being handled honestly or openly.
The facts are that when states deal with each other at this level and under these circumstances especially it is exclusively without the participation of their citizens. Thirty years on from the collapse of the USSR we are all connected in ways as never before, through means that give us the chance to cultivate a sense of shared needs, global responsibility and destiny, yet we are still at the mercy of leaders and governments who beat the drums of war under a narrative that is tightly spun for national consumption, and which isolates and divides us from others who are also subject to their own nationalistic propaganda and divisiveness.
The internet has changed the face of human connectedness on a global level, far beyond television and radio, when at most international events such as the Olympics and the World Cup would be watched by millions simultaneously all over the world, imparting a sense of shared existence. Today’s connectedness is far more powerful and profound, epitomised by phenomenon such as YouTube, Amazon, Netflix, and many other services and social media that offer instant and continuous connectedness. More than that, and most powerfully of all, they offer every individual the opportunity for self expression, with countless personal and activist channels on platforms such as YouTube and Instagram with the capacity to reach, influence and even mobilise people on a vast scale.
The perversity is that given this unprecedented level of connection and implied familiarity on a global scale, you would think the idea of killing each other would be embarrassing if not utterly abhorrent. It’s not easy to shoot at a chap who enjoys Game of Thrones as much as you do. He’s supposed to have different tastes and offensive, corrupt beliefs, darkly opposite to your own enlightened view of life. The profound, surreal aspect adding to the insanity of any modern day conflict is that after trying to kill each other, enemy soldiers might very well both log into the same episode on Netflix, download a tune from Spotify, or buy something from Alibaba or Amazon.
No such connection between foes existed for conflicts prior to the rise of the internet, social media, and online services. Much has been made of a reported football match between British and German soldiers during the Christmas truce of 1914, capturing the imagination and heart, set against the horror of trying to kill each other only hours earlier, and still further, for the fact that military superiors reportedly had to shell the players to get them to go back to this important task, worried that the shared connectedness “would undermine fighting spirit”.
Though not a complete failsafe, such humane connection and interaction lets us view each other humanely, making us less willing to harm and fight each other to resolve our differences. Just as with the shelling to end the friendly football game Christmas 1914, leaders must shell us with propaganda to disrupt the humane, civilised connections we have always possessed, as well as those fast developing with our new age of instant global connection.
So whilst today’s internet services and social media may be accused of many ill effects on society, their global accessibility among even enemies may be one of their good points yet to be fully tapped. It is now possible to watch Russian and Chinese films and TV series easily, cheaply and on demand, bringing us face to face with the humanity of people who few of us ever meet yet whom we discover are little different (Squid Game being a notable Korean worldwide blockbuster success from Netflix). One wonders what productions media companies could come up with in an appeal to the humanity rather than the barbarity of soldiers led to war by corporate greed, as with US administrations with Iraq for example, or tyrannical desperation and corruption as we are seeing with Vladimir Putin in Russia as he gangs up on Ukraine.
More powerfully still, the potential for social media to directly connect populations one-to-one on an individual level via video and chat, along common lines and shared interests, or simply out of curiosity (somewhat in the spirit of old-fashioned pen-pals but with much more on offer) is as yet entirely untapped. What would be happening right now if 10 million people in Russia were in connection with 10 million people in Ukraine and throughout Europe via Zoom, WhatsApp and Facebook etc., exchanging recipes, pet and DIY tips, organising visits to each other, learning the other’s language, or perhaps indeed expressing their horror at what their leaders are doing, and organising to make their voices heard? What does the social in “social media” actually stand for if it is not for this? What do we want out of it more than giving us a means to connect online with people we already know just to parade our holiday pics and get a few likes?
Unfortunately the people who have made most effective use of social media to forge transnational links are those sadly seduced by the far-right. Based solely on ideology, such networking is soon to be facilitated by Donald Trump as he sets up his own social media platform for those who, like him, have been banned from the likes of Twitter and Facebook for fake news and extremist views.
The world needs a counter to this form of misguided zealotry, and should it ever transpire would overwhelm it without doubt, as the good people of the world are much more in number, yet sadly so far, also much more easily isolated and divided.
