How to Tell the Difference Between Disagreement and Bullying

Clarifying and improving our exchanges online

I was involved recently in a series of online exchanges which involved disagreement. Said disagreement, which in and of itself doesn’t bother me at all, escalated into bullying. This is a sincere attempt to identify the differences,and strengthen not only your ability and mine to receive honestly-offered intelligence to help us improve, and decide when communications have descended into abuse.

Some writers, whose sense of self might be a little tender, and many folks live in that space, might experience disagreement or a callout on a factual error (rightly or wrongly)as a personal attack.

It may or may not be. Before I address the environment into which such words land, let’s clarify:

To disagree: have or express a different opinion.

To bully: seek to harm, intimidate, or coerce (someone perceived as vulnerable).

Set side-by-side, the difference is considerable.

You and I may have a disagreement. It can even be a serious one involving raised voices. It has a lot more to do with how you and I may perceive facts or what we believe are facts or truths. Doesn’t matter. By definition, a disagreement is just that: we don’t agree on X. We have a different opinion. Said opinion is our sacred right. How we got there, who cares, unless that process allows someone else to understand us more fully.

Bullying implies the intent to do harm.

People who disagree can love each other, work together, create solar panels and rocket fuel and Covid cures and babies. Disagreements offer the opportunity to learn, grow, understand and examine our thoughts, beliefs and prejudices. Disagreements can be, and often are, terrific gifts.

Disagreement often leads to new ideas and new ways of seeing. In fact, how you and I move through disagreements with both respect and courage can create trust, safety, deeper connections. Conflicts form the powerful building blocks of deep regard. The way you and I work to keep each other whole where we may not see eye-to -eye speaks to our character, our emotional maturity.

In far too many exchanges on social media, I see just the opposite.

Bullying harms. Period. Because there is an aggressor and a victim.

When someone reads something you wrote, expressing that disagreement, depending on how it’s expressed, is in sober cases simply offering up a challenge or a new point of view. Correcting a fact, or offering up different ones. Sharing an opposing viewpoint. This can and does provide a chance for respectful debate, and both parties can learn. They can also respectfully disagree.

To wit: in an article I wrote about food, one writer took issue with what I had written about salt. He offered a slew of links, some research and suggested I take a look. It was respectful, polite, and eye-opening. It changed some of what I thought, not all of it. The exchange was a model of how someone who disagrees can provide new information, offer it with respect, and not slam you up the side of the head with a two-by-four by calling you names(which is bullying) in the process.

Disagreement, the respectful kind, shows a personal commitment to you and me. Yet too many of us completely misunderstand and in fact end up insulting the very people who offer us the greatest value.

It’s quite different when that writer escalates, insults, uses capital letters to shout, comes after us repeatedly, the tone and choice of words meaner and more brutal.

Here are some samples and how you might be able to see the difference.

“I would respectfully offer that there are a couple of different ways to look at this”

“You may want to check out this link; it appears that what you claim isn’t precisely true”

“I don’t agree; from the standpoint of my work this is what I found.”

These are all disagreements. There is no implied harm. No harsh words. No insults, no verbal browbeating or demeaning.

On the other hand there’s this:

“ You’re a stupid mewling idiot if you believe that bullshit.”

“You’re just like all the other f*ckwits on the Left. You don’t have the brains God gave a garden snail.”

“Nobody wants to read your articles. You have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m going to report you. If I see your writing on here again I will track you down…”

“YOU’RE A F*CKING MORON.”

Those four, well. They are compilations of what I’ve received from folks I ended up blocking.

Now.

If you and I have any kind of conceit about becoming or improving as a writer, it would serve enormously to grow a tough skin. I know something about tough skin, having massaged a rhino or two. Lest you think I jest:

I’ve been writing since I was four. Much of what I produce is pure pap. Some of it is pretty good, and some has gone on to win a number of prizes. I have no particular concern about what bullies think about my writing, because people who don’t like me, don’t like my lifestyle, don’t like my POV, are threatened because I do not live life inside their lines, don’t conform, can go SPIT.

Those I respect have eviscerated my prose, torn it up, thrown it into the trashcan, drowned it in red ink. Berated me for writing junk.

Not only did I love them for it, I paid them a lot of money for it. Because they were right. I don’t have to like it. If I want to get better, I do have to learn from it.

Because this: not only will I never be a decent writer without feedback from people a whole lot better than I am, if I don’t learn to handle feedback from better writers and from those who are kind enough to point out errors or tenuous facts, I will forever be mediocre. Worse than mediocre. There’s already plenty of that, and thousands of them write regularly on Medium and all over the Internet.

Just because your writing shows up online does not automatically mean you can write with any proficiency.

Let me offer an analogy. Last summer I went on a four-week extreme riding adventure with one rank rookie who proclaimed, at the end of our trip, that she was a “rider.” No. She wasn’t. She barely hung on, her ass flopping around the saddle like a loose sack of potatoes, having no clue whatsoever how to use her legs, direct the horse or behave safely in the wilderness. In fact she was a deadly danger on more than one occasion, in that blissful ignorance of the monumentally blindered. But she was convinced she was a rider. No. She wasn’t.

I’m an equestrian; fellow horse people will know the difference. I still don’t consider myself an expert but I am one damned good rider. I pay for the lessons, put in the hours, come off my horses, get right back in the saddle and suffer the criticism of my trainers. And pay them a lot of money for said feedback.

Same thing I see on line with folks who have a lot to say, but don’t say it particularly well.

Some of them have plenty of followers. That doesn’t make them good writers. Gwyneth Paltrow has lots of followers. That doesn’t make her smart or the inanity that she’s presented as good ideas particularly good ideas. But that’s just me.

Being in the creative arts is hard damned work. If your ego is too tender, I suggest the mail room. For whether you want to be an actor (a director will rip you horribly for poor delivery) or a fitness model (she’s too short/tall/ethnic/fat/skinny/bony/muscular etc.) or anyone that is going to create for public consumption, people are going to throw shite at you. Someone is going to criticize, edit, correct, change, advise, and in any one of a thousand ways, tear holes in that tender ego. Criticism, feedback, disagreements are part of life.

The inability to deal with disagreement or feedback will likely lead to great misery.

Might as well learn how to take it, and also learn how to parce out what’s useful from someone’s puerile bawling, and ignore it, and appreciate the hell out of comments that are left with every intention of adding value.

I might point out that those who have taken time out of their day to offer me thoughtful feedback have given me something they can’t get back: their time. They’ve offered me the courtesy of reading my material and caring about it enough to offer a correction, a POV or note an error. To slap that back or get angry or get offended or block them insults the gift of their attention.

A number of us have written about leaving PMs so that if you’ve got a correction or suggestion to improve grammar or spelling, it’s not public. That’s simple courtesy. We’ve got writers for whom English is a second language. Every so often I’ll leave a PM making a note about proper form. That is in no way a criticism, but simply making a piece more readable because the English could be better.

What doesn’t work is to do this publicly. Not only is that rude, but it disrespects the writer. They may for their own reasons disagree. I got into a pissing contest with someone over my choice of a casual phrase, which I was using intentionally. Not only did he feel the need to publicly call me out on it, he simply could not leave it alone even after I sent him a perfectly clear explanatory link about the use of the phrase. Message after message. Time vampire.

Blocked. Because he became a bully about absolutely nothing.

People who bully attempt to invalidate YOU. They have no interest in adding value or protecting your integrity by communicating privately. The purpose is to erase your agency, not support your work as a writer.

If you are fortunate to get feedback on your material, please keep these things in mind. Different people have different ways to offer feedback, and their personal style may come across as brusque. I would counsel against overreacting. I’ve had that kind of feedback. When I’ve explored with that person, it nearly always turns out they mean well.

Let me offer an example: I recently wrote a story which garnered a few comments and challenges from Hermes Solenzol Ph.D. At first, they felt critical. Then we had an exchange, which later led to some very thoughtful and insightful comments that Dr. Solenzol offered about his own method of making comments. As a researcher and a scientist, my take on the good doctor is that both solid research, accuracy and attention to detail are very important. Where he interprets writing as less than rigorous, he may be likely to have a say about it. This doesn’t make him or the writer wrong. Nor does it make his style of making comments incorrect. What it may lead to at times is that people may misinterpret his intent because of the style of delivery.

To that I would offer this:

It doesn’t surprise me at all that some of the comments I get from people who might otherwise be more mindful come across as a little pressured or angry. It’s where many of us are, and to that, it’s the height of both kindness and respect to give each other a little space to be stressed out.

The difference is the choice of language, as I outlined above. If you and I are going to improve, we need feedback. You can get that by investing in writing classes, which I strongly recommend. If not that, then hire an editor, which is expensive but that will improve your prose. If not that, then have the courage to accept feedback here on Medium. You have the right to block and report harassment or bad behavior.

But before you potentially overreact to someone’s feedback, take a breath. If you’re angry about it, that’s feedback in and of itself. What is it about the comment that makes you angry? If it’s bullying, which by definition is a personal attack on YOU, that’s one thing.

Delete, block, report.

However. If it’s about your writing, take a breath and read the comment. Your anger is a signal that there may well be something worth considering. Before you overreact, see if there is something worth attending to. Every time I feel anger at a comment, there is indeed something important that I learn. I’ve learned a great deal more from critical feedback than all the compliments I’ve ever received.

We can fail badly in life if all we read are our positive press releases. By the same token if we concentrate far too hard on feedback and misinterpret it as character assassination, we also don’t grow. Learn to understand the difference.

Medium provides an extraordinary place to grow. Gracious feedback is a gift. Ignore it at your peril, for all of us can learn from each other. Bullying is abuse. Treat it as such. But please understand the difference, for the difference in the long run can truly pay off if you want to be a better writer.