As someone who has dealt with an inordinate amount of abuse online, Meghan Markle is in a unique position to comment on the issues plaguing social media lately. Markle spoke at The New York Times DealBook Online Summit on Tuesday, and the former actress opened up about something she thought could help the current social media climate: adding a “dislike button.”
“One of the things that seems like such an easy solve from my lens, if you look at Instagram for example, there’s a ‘Like’ button and then there’s comments,” she explained. “So if you disagree with something you have to comment on it in a really vitriolic way. If there was a ‘Dislike’ button, wouldn’t that hugely shift what you were putting out there? Because you could just ‘Like’ it or just ‘Dislike’ it.”
Videos by PopCulture.com
“Now you have to ‘Like’ it or say something negative. It is just adding to this really unfortunate cycle that I think is having an unfortunate effect on women across the world,” Markle said. Markle also wanted people to realize the adverse effects of reading tabloid media. “Well, firstly I would urge you not to read tabloids. Because I don’t think that’s healthy for anyone,” she stated. “Hopefully, one day they come with a warning label like cigarettes do. Like, ‘This is toxic for your mental health.’”
Markley has had to deal with more than her fair share of online negativity in recent years. In October, Bot Sentinel, a Twitter analytics service, reported some unfortunate findings of the Twitter activity related to Markle and Prince Harry. The service found that there has been a coordinated campaign of targeted harassment towards Markle on Twitter, according to Buzzfeed. They also noted that there are 83 specific accounts that are to blame for fueling the negativity towards both the Duke and Duchess of Sussex online.
Bot Sentinel reportedly analyzed more than 114,000 tweets regarding Markle and Harry before coming to its conclusion. While there is plenty of negativity about the couple that can be found online, the service found that 83 accounts are responsible for around 70% of the negative content concerning the royal pair. They shared that these accounts have the primary (and, possibly, the sole) purpose of spreading negative messaging about Markle and Harry. These accounts have a combined total of 187,631 followers.
A Twitter spokesperson released a statement to Buzzfeed about this report, telling the publication that they are “actively investigating the information and accounts referenced in this report – we will take action on accounts that violate the Twitter Rules.” Christopher Bouzy, Bot Sentinel’s CEO, also spoke to the outlet following the service’s findings. The CEO said that they have never seen this kind of targeted hate effort before like the one towards Markle and Harry. Bouzy said, “There’s no motive.” He added, “Are these people who hate her? Is it racism? Are they trying to hurt [Harry and Meghan’s] credibility? Your guess is as good as ours.”
