I live in an immediate suburb of Boston, and joined Nextdoor and joined to see what features were attracting so many folks to a new social media platform. Wow! Anyone with a tattoo, going to your door for any reason was considered "suspicious" and reported. One alarming thing, is that NextDoor is feeding on our fears about outsiders who look different, and creating a loop out of this for higher engagement when people post pictures and engage their camera feed.
It's too bad, I think idea of organizing a social network based on proximity and centered around community information is a viable idea, It's just that NextDoor is doing that with our worst instincts.
> I think idea of organizing a social network based on proximity and centered around community information is a viable idea
NextDoor and Craigslist and Reddit's /r/{city} communities just prove that it may be viable but it's pretty undesirable. I think it's best to not give the most neurotic, ill people of your community the loudest voice, but these social networks also create this neuroticism and illness.
You also create a scenario (NextDoor especially) where all the sane people are driven out by the crazies. Back when NextDoor was new, after a year it would come up in conversation and sure enough, anyone normal would admit they tried it and had to delete it.
Social media is messing us up. I don't think we're missing some new take on it that's going to make it all better. I think the vestigially tribal parts of our brain make it a non-starter. We need to get back to the face-to-face -- it seems to be the only way we keep in mind that there's a human at the other end of the line, not some nebulous automaton that we craft into everything we hate in the world.
People behaving badly doesn't always imply they have mental illness. In my experience people with and without mental illness can be quick to be suspicious of others, hold prejudices, and involve law enforcement in the face of people just trying to go about their lives
I agree that the behavior being capitalized on here is pathological but using the terms "neuroticism", "illness", and "crazies" here unfairly and wrongly stigmatizes people with mental illness when in practice people with mental illness are more likely to be harmed by these suspicious posts and behavior nextdoor had been encouraging
I agree with your analysis. It's better to not think of such behavior as a result of a real illness of the mind, but a metaphorical illness of the heart. There's a certain sickness element to it, as well as an element of social contagion, so I understand the words used, but disagree with how they were used.
Yes, exactly. There's a fantastically good book about domestic abuse, "Why Does He Do That?" In it, he takes great pains to make clear that abusers are not abusers because they're mentally ill. They do it because they get something out of it. Exactly what varies from person to person, of course. It's the same with a lot of anti-social behavior.
I think there’s no disjoint between being “normal/typical/healthy” and “mental/ill/bad” but our perception/modeling/worldview requires Boolean distinction(and preferably not ternary in which case a cascaded Boolean substitutes it)
As a counterpoint, I am apart of a "Good Karma Network" Facebook group centred on the suburb I live in and it is extremely wholesome and pleasant. The posts range from re-homing old furniture, organising exercise groups, posting local PSAs, to recommending dishes at local cafes and restaurants.
There is never any conflict that I can tell of and there certainly aren't dubious posts about "suspicious" characters.
Good point. I actually added a sentence to that to clarify: I think this kind of social media only bolsters and broadly spreads (if not creates) that neuroticism and illness.
Frankly I just don't think we can handle social media. We're trying to do this whole technological civilization thing and we've made progress that is absolutely mind bending, but it wasn't long ago that we were using fur and bones and would only meet 100 people our entire life. And our brains are still there mentally, lagging behind the rest of our progress.
IRC, Slashdot, niche communities hosted on phpnuke instances, free/open source software. The early 2000s convinced me the power of sharing knowledge freely online would solve many of society’s problems.
I still can’t reconcile just how wildly wrong i was. I didn’t appreciate that it’s not common to want to know truth, common is titillation and tribalism - which always existed anyway, it’s not that the internet increased it or made it more popular, it’s that i was a geek hacking away in my bedroom and didn’t see much of real society.
Although my biggest hangup contrasting then vs now is that Microsoft is my favourite tech company these days.
I think it's best to not give the most neurotic, ill people of your community the loudest voice, but these social networks also create this neuroticism and illness.
I don't think the /r/cities is comparable to nextdoor. In the last nextdoor community I was in people were ready to lynch a guy who was schizophrenic because they decided he was dangerous. They started a pedophile manhunt for an old man who was literally looking for his lost dog. The /r/cities all seem to be removed enough from the immediate local that they didn't feed this sort of vitriol. But I suppose ymmv.
> Social media is messing us up. I don't think we're missing some new take on it that's going to make it all better.
This is a fair point, and one I think is very important to consider. When I wrote the original quote, I was not thinking of another facebook, but rather a platform that would work on issues like providing access to local government meetings, and probably be closer to what we now think of as "journalism". Which the lack of is a major problem in many parts of the country due to the declining newspaper industry.
Small towns and rural America is in trouble, and although it's naive to say there are simple solutions, I am optimistic that it is possible for technology to solve some problems.
We'll be better at social in 20 years it just takes some practice ... like not smoking cigs ... social is really important, it's letting the people unionize against the state
I subscribe to both those subs, and the signal:noise ratio is very bad. It's pretty obvious that there's a substantial amount of posts from people who have neither lived in nor traveled to these cities. I was visiting both subs regularly until I realized that they just made me anxious and depressed. Posts are frequently just signal boosts of lurid local news about rape/arson/homelessness/etc.
It's not something you see in subreddits for smaller or less popular cities with similar demographics. Subreddits for these tend to be actually useful.
I live in Gilroy, a small town in the bay area. I joined Nextdoor for all of two weeks before I quit in annoyance and frustration.
A typical post:
"OMG Who Is This Suspicious Person!!!"
:: watches video, sees rather bored looking person, driving a UPS truck, wearing a UPS uniform, dropping off a package, then leaving ::
This was 90%+ of what the posts were like. The rest were 'political' screeds so disjointed they were essentially logorrhea. Something about how Nextdoor has shaped their posting methodologies has made even Facebook posts look sane in comparison, and that's saying something.
The added frustration is that real neighborhood watch needs exist. We had some professional thieves roll through our cul-de-sac a few days ago- dozens of people had their cars broken in to, and whatever was in easy reach stolen. The Ring Neighborhood system allowed those of us affected to find who had video of what, and forward it all to the police. That's a real benefit. But it has its own issues.
One human is complex already. People, groups of humans are even more problematic. Social media is a hard problem because people are hard to get a handle on. And I think that's good. People should be allowed to be skeptical, to have anxieties, and to be able to look out for the interests of their people/community. Just because one Karen saw a suspicious person and wanted to let all her neighbors know to be careful doesn't mean Nextdoor/social media is bad. People looking out for each other is a good thing! You see that all the time in high trust societies where you could even safely leave a bike unattended for a few minutes without fearing that it'll be stolen.
Don't get me wrong though. Nextdoor's program to forward suspicions to the police is the wrong play. No one should be arrested and put at harm's way just because someone was a bit anxious one day.
I just think that we should be nurturing a high trust society, rather than moving to a low trust one where, on the surface everyone is tolerant/accepting but in reality they aren't really thinking about the other people in their community at all. "Not my problem." "Oh no, I can't let myself be bigoted. Who am I to judge the masked man walking around with a chainsaw at midnight? He might just be headed out to trim his garden?"
> Don't get me wrong though. Nextdoor's program to forward suspicions to the police is the wrong play. No one should be arrested and put at harm's way just because someone was a bit anxious one day.
Another problem is that such means of inflicting harm on people exist for Nextdoor and it's users.
This has been my experience, as well. Take this type of echo chamber to its extreme, and you get this[1] kind of reaction from an entire community, where they end up chasing a Hispanic family out of town because someone said they were antifa on Facebook[2].
You missed something, because it was more than 4 cars. Members of the community followed them in, then others approached them at a store and several hours later a larger group chased them out. Among the people involved are city councilmen, the mayor and his son, and several local business owners. Dozens of people were involved in person, and dozens more online. Armed people were mobilized in not only Forks, WA, but Olympia and Port Townsend based on rumors about the Hispanic family.
For example, when they were stopped at the store, the family is quoted as saying[1]:
> The family had shopped for camping supplies at Forks Outfitters and were confronted “by seven or eight carloads of people in the grocery store parking lot,” Anderson said they reported to deputies.
No one in the community is willing to come forward with the names of the guilty parties, however many of them were okay with spreading violent rumors about out-of-towners, both of which are levels of complicity in my book.
In my neighborhood it’s only been lost pets, HOA questions, neighborhood events and a heads up that people were going door to door in a posted “no soliciting” neighborhood. Also “clean up after your dog” posts.
Haven’t seen any suspicious persons type posts, but we did coordinate the entire neighborhood to help the police after people broke into multiple cars in driveways in ours and the adjacent neighborhood.
It’s been mostly good with the occasional spammy business posting.
People providing reports and sharing home and neighborhood cameras. Just making everyone aware of what happened resulted in people providing a bunch of additional footage.
Similar experience for me... I joined when our cat was missing so I could post to see if anyone had seen him.... this is in Los Angeles, and I have been pretty shocked by the racism and classism... I feel like 75% of the posts are things like "I saw a black man walking!" and "someone was SLEEPING in a car! Someone needs to call the cops!"
It is crazy how much everyone assumes all these people are out to get them.
> a social network based on proximity and centered around community information is a viable idea, It's just that NextDoor is doing that with our worst instincts
I have only seen a little bit of NextDoor, and please correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems to me to be more of how people are deciding to use the platform as opposed to NextDoor purposely promoting our worst instincts. Do you feel like they really are promoting the most inflammatory posts for the purpose of increasing engagement? (like so many of the other major platforms out there)
For me it is sad to see that there are so many people out there too quick to pass judgement on anyone that looks different in their neighborhood. But so far it feels like another example of how web platforms allow people to be more comfortable in expressing their true feelings, and while often disappointing, is a good reminder of the very different views people around us can hold.
My Nextdoor has none of the things people are complaining about. Here, the worst thing is arguments about whether we are taking COVID seriously enough or not, but I suppose that is a natural consequence of discussing which businesses are closed etc.
> Do you feel like they really are promoting the most inflammatory posts for the purpose of increasing engagement?
I don't think it's necessarily intentional, but posts which foster fear (like "I saw a scary black person walking down the street") will naturally invite more engagement from users, and the site may respond to that by promoting those posts over less controversial content (like "my cat is missing").
In my neighborhood it's quite OK and useful. For example people are exchanging information about internet slowness so you know it's not only you that has the problem. The reports about suspicious activity usually make sense, like videos of people checking out someone's porch.
I live in downtown Brooklyn and I’ve never seen any issues of this kind, like at all, even once. I think at least some of this has to do with the people in the area in question.
Well, unless it's changed, the big problem is that it seems the first person to sign up is the moderator/leader/whatever. And those are the people with nothing better to do, who subdivide to gain power over some amount of houses. Basically, like the people who try to form HOAs. Most complaints about Nextdoor would be fixed with reasonable moderation.
Also: I think a lot of people who complain about Nextdoor need to reflect on where they chose to live. My little city in KY was perfectly fine. People offering help, lost/found animals, events...standard stuff.
Yeah it’s a double edged sword. On the one hand you know if your neighborhood is getting hit by package thieves, car-break-in’s, etc., on the other hand people walking disheveled in their sweats can get called out.
On the other hand this is a neighborhood app and is used differently in different neighborhoods. Tenderloin vs Nob Hill.
ha I just posted about Nextdoor Tenderloin. I live in a different neighborhood now and its a totally different community, very welcoming while also generally empathic to the desperate people doing actual illegal things and redirecting the angst from housed neighbors towards more productive empathy.
We've already seen how these algorithms encourage conflict on Twitter and Facebook. The idea of those paradigms moving to my living community, and by proxy to my real, physical life, is scary.
I see that you are blaming nextdoor, when nextdoor is just a symptom. The actual issue is that these people are paranoid and scared and marking anything as suspicous. If not for nextdoor, it will be some other app - but the issue will stay the same.
> I see that you are blaming nextdoor, when nextdoor is just a symptom.
I am trying to share my observation, and express my disappointment that a company has created a skinner-box engagement loop based on fear and neuroticism. People will always be afraid, but technology should be used to bring out the best qualities in humans, not amplify the worst.
> I think idea of organizing a social network based on proximity and centered around community information is a viable idea
Shameless plug: We are exactly working on this and want to bring better community information app without other distractions. Currently only in Denmark.Will be updating the details soon.
However, I agree that the way NextDoor is handling community interactions is really disturbing.
Hah. East Germans know exactly what this sort of thing will lead to: selective enforcement against those that the police wish to target anyway. Nothing like a bit of good old snitching to the authorities. Too bad if you're not lily white and walking around in a posh - or not so posh - neighborhood past what others think should be your curfew.
Of course, if you are witness to a serious crime you should report it. But if someone waters their lawn, sleeps in their car, or pees in their garden then that's their business and usually not yours so as long as you are not inconvenienced you should mind your own business lest one day the tables are turned and you forget to bring in your garbage container. And that's before we get into reporting people 'walking while black', those things might actually be against a law.
If you're breaking N laws per day think about what the effect would be if those were all enforced. Do not do unto others... And don't give racists even more tools for harassment.
One thing I’ve learned over the years is that many people perceive:
- themselves as perfect but making the odd honest mistake every now and then
- others as fundamentally flawed, persistent rule-breakers who Need To Be Punished
Even if they’re broadly the same or worse. This is true on the road, in college or writing code. A lot of people will be unable to look at their own tiny little infractions and see them as equivalent to the flagrant disregard for the rules that they observe in others.
Close, but it’s more like “people perceive themselves and their ingroup as perfect but making occasional honest mistakes” and perceive their outgroup as flawed, persistent rule-breakers. And guess who the outgroup tends to be in racially homogeneous neighborhoods.
When people see others in the neighbourhood that fit a 'pattern they might associate with criminality' this has nothing to do with viewing 'others that need to be punished' rather just a fearful view of difference, and probably lack of exposure to people that creates some low-key bigotry. Throw in some neuroticism and too much free time, possibly some mental health issues and it's a problem.
The vast majority of nextdoor posts in my area are people asking whether a snake is a copperhead or not and then arguing over whether or not to kill it. Followed by people complaining about X (speeders, dog poop, roaming cats, etc). Also a lot of folks looking for miss-delivered packages.
It's useful for borrowing a car seat, getting recommendations for plumbers, electricians, etc, advertising extra garden produce we wish to give away, and so forth. Otherwise, I stay off of it.
Also from a technical and UI perspective, the web site is atrocious. It loads terribly slowly on a current generation iPad, constantly tries to route you to its app, makes it way too easy to accidentally interact with a post or comment, defaults to "top posts" instead of "recent activity" and on and on. It's barely any better visiting on a desktop.
I much prefer the sub-reddits, city-data forums, and even FB groups for my area for keeping in touch with what's going around me.
Same here, although within the last 24 hours, my neighborhood's chat is starting to look like a Twitter-ish hate-fest. If they don't stop, I'm going to chuck it in the same dumpster as Twitter.
I think the problem with such tools is that the technology disconnected our societal checks to make sure that such tools are used correctly. Or didn't consider the need for that function at all as this new online capability was created. It was just some developer+PM saying, "what if we offered this?" And it just appeared, a new feature in the world.
Now, maybe I will be downvoted for saying (in this climate), but the ability for people to see something suspicious and do something about it is important. You would have the pendulum swing the other way and have people actively tell themselves to ignore potential crime / bad actors, or be unable to report something legitimate?
But the point is that up to recent years, your interactions with police were not anonymous, and you had to (generally) put your name and reputation (or phone number and your voice) behind things that you asserted were true. There was an element of credibility verification in the reporting.
Today, anonymity on the internet, and the ease of creating false (or biased) reports has unleashed a tidal wave of noise and bad information, with no repercussions (reputation-wise, or cost) to the persons creating it. And the effects are all externalized to those who wrongly come under suspicion.
There are some things that need to have a barrier to being done, and taking it online lowers that barrier. Until we figure out what that caused, and how it's to be handled correctly, it's right that these portals disable the features that are causing us these kinds of societal mistakes -- and we actively should choose to slow down our adoption of things that we don't yet understand the full implications of.
The ability to report dangerous things to the proper authorities is one of the ways you know you live in a functional society.
That said, this whole topic brings up the question of "At what cost?" We won't see the macroeffects these have on our communities for quite a while. Our base insticts when it comes to how we should react when we see something off, are slowly changing.
I just logged into NextDoor today after years of inactivity because I wanted to see if there were resources about how to dispose of bulky trash items.
Wow, what a mess! Standard lost dog fare, but also a lot of busybodies nitpicking about neighbors' municipal code violations, suspicions of people who don't look like they "fit" the neighborhood, and general bickering in every comment thread.
NextDoor seems like a good idea, until you execute and it turns out the power users are busybodies holed up at home who have way too much time to micromanage the goings-on in their neighborhoods.
My neighborhood in Nextdoor was actually pretty non-toxic until recently. It has become overrun with lost/found/who owns this cat posts and people complaining about fireworks and dog trauma. (Since we had riots fireworks have been a constant presence)
Some of the things on Nextdoor remind me of "Snow Crash" sometimes.
"Fairlanes, Inc. is laying new ones all the time. Have to bulldoze lots of neighborhoods to do it, but those seventies and eighties developments exist to be bulldozed, right? No sidewalks, no schools, no nothing. Don’t have their own police force — no immigration control — undesirables can walk right in without being frisked or even harassed. Now a Burbclave, that’s the place to live. A city-state with its own constitution, a border, laws, cops, everything."
"MetaCops Unlimited is the official peacekeeping force of White Columns, and also of The Mews at Windsor Heights, The Heights at Bear Run, Cinnamon Grove, and The Farms of Cloverdelle. They also enforce traffic regulations on all highways and byways operated by Fairlanes, Inc. ... MetaCops’ main competitor, WorldBeat Security, handles all roads belonging to Cruiseways, plus has worldwide contracts with Dixie Traditionals, Pickett’s Plantation, Rainbow Heights (check it out — two apartheid Burbclaves and one for black suits), Meadowvale on the [insert name of river] and Brickyard Station. WorldBeat is smaller than MetaCops, handles more upscale contracts, supposedly has a bigger espionage arm — though if that’s what people want, they just talk to an account rep at the Central Intelligence Corporation. And then there’s The Enforcers — but they cost a lot and don’t take well to supervision. It is rumored that, under their uniforms, they wear T-shirts bearing the unofficial Enforcer coat of arms: a fist holding a nightstick, emblazoned with the words SUE ME. ... These Burbclaves! These city-states! So small, so insecure, that just about everything, like not mowing your lawn, or playing your stereo too loud, becomes a national security issue."
As someone who is trying to run a vaguely similar service (streetmates.net) I'm wondering how communities can be guided to be constructive and pleasant.
Or maybe people are just people, pleasant and unpleasant and everything else, and it can't really be helped?
It seems like putting something on the front page like "hey don't be a racist busy-body" isn't really enough. And at the other end of the extreme you've got Facebook employing organisations that filter sensitive content - with fairly horrific outcomes for the individuals who do the monitoring.
HackerNews is a pretty good example of getting a certain standard of behaviour out of people en masse. I wonder what the secret sauce was?
Nextdoor just seems like another 1984 esq system especially because of their ties to the state through the Police. This will never be making its way into my home. It honestly astounds me that people buy into these things especially with potentially petty neighbors you're one bad day away from being the person who "doesn't belong" in the neighborhood.
heh yeah i get lots of "beware of this suspicious person" messages that turn out to be hte mail man on Next Door. However, it is very useful for lost pets. IMO they need to expand on that utility, i routinely see lost/found pet posts were the owner and pet are eventually re-united via Next Door.
Nextdoor is known to be platform that enables bigotry and perpetuates racial stereotypes. Nextdoor, not forwarding bullshit suspicions to the police, is the least they could do since they created the fucking problem to begin with.
It encourages one to view everyone who you don't immediately recognize as an outsider, causing you to fear them, and then share that fear with others so they too can be afraid. It's absolute madness, and I haven't ever heard a good thing in the real world about Nextdoor. I have had people assume my race incorrectly though, and gleefully admit their racist usage of it not knowing what they were about to say would be considered so fucking awful...
I suspect you are projecting too much on their motives. It seemed to me to be a great place to establish neighborhood communities they could advertise to, with the side benefit of opening up communication inside the neighborhood as well.
What's unfortunate is how some people choose to communicate and fear monger. I've seen it used both positively and negatively- really depends on the neighbors.
Depending on the privacy agreement, would be very intriguing to see neighborhood sentiment analysis... Maybe pick out those racist neighborhoods to avoid (or join? Maybe you are into homogeneity).
The big advertisers have been Ring and security companies, so they tend to attract people worried about other people. They suppress things like political posts, so there really isn’t anything to do but worry about lost cats or busybody crap.
> Civil rights and privacy advocates have raised concerns about how the feature streamlined the reporting of suspicions about minor offenses, encouraging police to follow up on what would have otherwise been casual observations on social media.
Why is this a problem? Minor offenses are still offenses and they can often be very frustrating and problematic. They still deserve police attention where they constitute a violation of the law. Streamlining the process is a positive not negative, and the framing here just seems like these activist groups don’t want people to be held accountable.
>Why is this a problem? Minor offenses are still offenses and they can often be very frustrating and problematic. They still deserve police attention where they constitute a violation of the law. Streamlining the process is a positive not negative, and the framing here just seems like these activist groups don’t want people to be held accountable.
Be careful of what you wish for. You might wish to look at your local municipal/county/parish/state laws. I likely break dozens of laws/ordinances every day and I'm very positive you do as well, without even knowing it.
I am very saddened that I have to spell this out. I don't know whether you use NextDoor, throwawaysea. Would you be willing to post this under your real name in NextDoor and share the link here?
>I likely break dozens of laws/ordinances every day and I'm very positive you do as well, without even knowing it.
Okay but then isn't that the real problem? Of not regularly weeding out laws against things that people don't really feel need to be banned? It's kind of clumsy to take the approach of, "We're going to keep dubious laws on the books, and also have ultra-random, haphazard enforcement of all laws regardless of how merited."
The problem is that when everyone is guilty of something, the government can pick and choose who it punishes, through prosecutorial discretion, selective policing, and other means.
yes, that is a real problem and it should be solved. but in the absence of a solution to that problem, shutting down tools that make it easy to take advantage of that problem to be racist and/or annoying is a decent starting point.
Yeah, but "bollocks" is a four-letter word (metaphorically) -- the feature doesn't first establish consensus on what laws are bollocks. What you call a bollocks law, I might call "reasonable one that ensures people aren't screaming outside my window at 1am".
>>Most people will not ever interact with law enforcement over bollocks laws.
That is actually a very bad thing, and once the people in power abuse
If few people encounter "bollocks" laws then there is no outrage over their enforcement, therefore if you piss off the wrong person in government suddenly they go over your life with a fine tooth comb and you have 100 "bollocks" charges and your life is ruined but since you are just one person there is no so speak out for you.
>There will always be bollocks laws.
That is a bollocks position and one that can be solved (in part) with mandatory sunset of all laws. Every Law, Regulation, and policy should have to be affirmed by the legislature at minimum every 20 years if not more often. If not is ceases to exists
Example: It’s a felony federal crime to throw away someone else’s mail. That includes mail that is addressed to a previous occupant that was delivered to your home (unless it says “or current resident” or similar). Penalties are up to five years in jail and fines.
There is a book, "Three Felonies a Day" that may interest you. The suggestion is that essentially all of us are committing at least three felonies a day. I have not tried to verify the claims made in the book.
Thanks. I have a hard time finding concrete examples from the book but I get the impression that it's partly due to the US judicial system (I'm not from the US). Would be nice to see the top felonies people unknowingly commit on a daily basis.
It's by the way really annoying that my question gets downvoted by zealous users who think I'm trying to make some kind of point when I was just genuinely interested. This site feels like a big aggressive battlefield nowadays, where everyone is just arguing and no-one is discussing like normal curious human beings.
I believe that this results in this being used as a tool of harassment against people who are less popular in the neighbourhood for arbitrary - sometimes discriminatory - reasons.
You can both disagree with petty laws for minor violations and still want prohibitions against theft or public disturbances enforced in your neighborhood.
Flash mob style, waiting in line, no! camping out for days waiting in line, not to buy tickets to the next reiteration of $sameoldstorybutwithmorelensflare, but to turn yourself in with video evidence of jaywalking or cycling without a helmet.
there is a bit by the comedian Doug Stanhope about how the time of the 'occupy wallstreet' group of people would have been better spent by sitting within the lobbies of large banking institutions and applying for superfluous loans that would be known to be denied before hand, taking advantage of the laws in place that disallow discrimination with regards to loan applications.
His example is something like 'Yes, I came here to apply for a loan of a billion dollars for an ant farm, yes I would like a complimentary coffee.'
That's actually an excellent idea and fairly easy to put into practice. Most of those processes don't scale at all and rely on self pre-selection and evaluation. The fact that NINJA applicants ever stood a chance was a good indication that something was terribly wrong.
No it's not, buddy. Firstly, I'm what you would probably call "white" (two hundred years ago I'd be just another dirty non-white immigrant) and secondly I know more than one black Karen, one of whom fits the Karen stereotype.
So no, you're the one being racist by assuming all Karens are white.
I stand corrected. Can you link me to a mainstream media article showing a black Karen? As far as I knew it was directed at white women. A quick Google search shows the search engine itself is suffering from the same misunderstanding about “Karen” I was, so I’m going to kick responsibility for my mistake up the chain. It’s not my slang.
If you don't want to take responsibility for overreaching due to personal ignorance, that's fine with me. Blame Google. I just don't see why I need to link you a news article to convince you that there are some black people named Karen, and some black people who act entitled, just like any other race or ethnicity.
The black Karen I know personally assaulted me while I was disabled and then told all of my friends that I assaulted her in order to further hurt and isolate me and bury the truth, if that's not a Karen move I don't know what is.
I'm not aware of a time requirement for a term to qualify as a slur. It seems pretty straightforward that "Karen" does qualify though. You generalize the behavior of a group (women, housewives, etc) and describe them with a pejorative.
Adult women have a right to complain about things and report things if they think they are illegal. That some number of women may have filed false or exaggerated reports doesn't give you or others license to dismiss everyone of a similar demographic.
The defense that "this slur was recently coined" doesn't strike me as that compelling. "Karen" plays on long standing stereotypes of women as hysterical or nagging. The name-as-insult is new, but the stereotypes are not.
I use the term Chad just as often. We're talking about common societal stereotypes and not slurs at all. When you have 8 billion people, you start to see patterns in personalities. Karen is one such observed pattern in modern society. You don't want to die on this hill, bud.
The problem, as is always the case, is that "minor offenses" are not equitably enforced.
So if the local white kids are hanging out at the corner of the park smoking weed, no one cares. No one posts to Nextdoor. The police don't show up. But four young hispanic men walking through the same white neighborhood (to get to a job, say) will freak someone out and a busybody post to nextdoor will end up getting them stopped. Oh, and it turns out that one of them has weed in his pocket. There's your "minor offense". It's still an offense, right? It deserves police attention?
You're looking at this with a microscope. No one is saying don't enforce boring laws. People are saying do it fairly. Nattering busybodies on Nextdoor are the opposite of fair.
By offering this very low friction way of contacting the police, you end up enabling people to reach out to the police for minor inconveniences that they wouldn't otherwise have.
There may be noble outcomes from this, but there are also clearly negative ones. Once again, I'm not claiming it was ever ND's intent to do this. Just that in practice the design of the system enabled and tacitly encouraged these behaviors.
Because what is an “offense” is designed to capture a certain kind of person who harms the public but leaves the other, much more harmful kind, untouched. What is the harm caused by stealing a package off a doorstep compared to creating a Facebook ad for oversexualized garments targeting young girls? Compared to marketing addictive pharmaceuticals to people who do not need them? Compared to issuing a fraudulent AAA rating on a mortgage backed security and selling it to a pension fund? Which gets the police involved?
It's too bad, I think idea of organizing a social network based on proximity and centered around community information is a viable idea, It's just that NextDoor is doing that with our worst instincts.