Sorry slacktivists: The Man is shredding your robo responses

"[The original promise] was that computers would liberate us from all the old forms of political control, and we would become Randian heroes, in control of our own destiny. Instead, today, we feel the opposite - that we are helpless components in a global system - a system that is controlled by a rigid logic that we are powerless to challenge or to change" - Adam Curtis

I'm with Morozov

Slacktivists use technology to assuage their technology-addled and coddled consciences. They play into the hands of the PR brigades who can identify which topics need some well-meaning massaging while the general fuckery is unabated. As long as people are twittering about transgender toilets for sheep, they're not protesting in the streets about the price of food, schools or hospitals.

Taking slackivists seriously is a waste of time and resources. This was cleverly satirised in The News Room which took on the "Occupy Wall Street" protests.

And if you do take slacktivists seriously they won't thank you for it because their goldfish minds will have moved on to the next thing they don't really care about.

This is pretty standard

I used to work in editorial at LexisNexis and would read the official responses to these kinds of consultations on an almost daily basis. It's usual for >90% of the public responses to be dismissed because they were auto-sent via an organization such as 38Degrees, though there's often a further explanation along the lines of "the reply did not properly address the terms of the consultation". To be fair, that's often true - the kind of ranty, feel-good letters sent by such groups (Avaaz is another one that cropped up a lot) tend to be heavy on rhetoric and light on the specific details requested by the consultation. As a measure of public sentiment it might mean something, but that's not normally what's being asked for.

Of course, this is all rather pointless anyway because the only reason that 95% of consultations are carried out in the first place is to provide some protection against judicial review of whatever decision is ultimately made - it doesn't matter whether the consultation was effective, or the results even looked at - that it took place is what's important to the law. Sir Humphrey would be very proud, I'm sure.

Sadly, I think this is probably one of the 5% of consultations that is being carried out with (some) genuine aims. Whittingdale has been very open about the fact that he doesn't yet know what to do about the BBC, and I've not heard anything from the Civil Service that indicates that any kind of decision has been made. Intelligent opinions may well have made an impact had they not been drowned in internet-assembled slurry (of course, they would have drowned in Civil Service molasses had they been listened to anyway, but this is about consultations and not the ineptitude of our tax-funded seat-warmers).

Bah! Enough shouty millennials and their e petitions, tweets and emails!

Methinks you millennials have protested one too many times and politicians are no longer afraid of shouty children with way too much time on their hands and their ludicrous "causes".

Just like the "Boy who Cried Wolf"; you "Social Justice Warriors" have whined and complained too much and your collective bullying is exposed for what it is.

Now get off my lawn!

Sliding Scale

If you really want to change things here's a scale of effectiveness:

1. All out revolution - pretty effective, although may have undesired consequences.

2. Strikes - may work, may result in long-term unemployment.

3. Voting - for or against, your choice, it might even work.

4. Demonstrating - may be ineffective - see Iraq War demo.

# unknown: Sitting on your arse pressing a button. (Unless button is red, in which case 1. and then some).

Can't both sides lose?

The MoF consultation about the BBC was ludicrously jargon ridden and (and I am no great fan of the BBC) seemed worded to be slanted towards a particular outcome.

Slow Learners Take Heart: You Too Can Be A Successful Bureaucrat.

"Whittingdale [...] scrapped the consultation, and has started it all over again."

Because some people never learn.

one glaring problem

there is NO SUCH THING as a "prosumer". No matter how much you spend on what boutique advertised stuff, you're still a "consumer". Renaming one's place because you bought into different advertising is meaningless. vegan free range conflict free computerized solar powered espresso machines are still a device, as "essential" or not as any poor bastard who picks up a percolator at a big chain. No more, no less. You can't then pretend to be different than that guy who couldn't crank out $5K or more for his coffeemaker.

38 Degrees' description of their name reminds me of Despair.com's 'Teamwork' poster...

A few harmless flakes working together can unleash an avalanche of destruction.

Sentencing

"and sentencing has historically been left to our independent judiciary, not crowd-pleasing politicians."

The crowd-pleasing politicians make the law and set min and max sentences for various crimes. Guideline are also issued for a more nuanced decision by the Judge. Mandatory custodial sentences for knife crime is an example.

The judiciary may be independent (a good thing) but must act within constraints.

(UK, not sure about the rest of the world.)

Hardly one click

The future of the BBC is probably of interest to a lot of UK residents, but from the questions, this consultation seemed to be aimed mainly at media professionals. I don't think any of the many questions had one-click options, they all required properly thought out text answers that addressed the issues. I, and friends and family that I alerted to the consultation, spent at least half an hour each thinking about our responses - which we did completely independently. We're not pleased that our homework has been binned.

If 38 Degrees allowed multiple responses, they are at fault - but not the only ones, because as far as I remember, their page merely redirected users to the government one. And the fact that such a high proportion of answers came via one source really shows how badly the consultation was written and publicised. Maybe the government was hoping to sneak it through largely unnoticed. If so, then 38 Degrees has at least made this a bit less likely.

Pointless email

I've been a contractor at three organisations which have been subjected to massive email campaigns orchestrated by 38 Degrees and three others which have been on the receiving end of other roboform generated activism.

All six simply implemented a mail filter at the exchange level to block email as soon as it was identified. In the case of 38 Degrees, I believe they use a predictable enough email source that all emails get blocked now so every future campaign will simply be invisible.

I honestly think the goals of these groups is admirable, its just that technology isnt on their side.

Twitter and Farcebook campaigns might be more effective because the target cant limit the inbound flow.

As I recall from when the FCC was soliciting comments on net neutrality, they essentially analyzed responses for uniqueness and discarded duplicates. Seems like a good way to keep form letters from dominating the responses without having to scrap the entire thing.

Democracy is a commercial thing.

Why is anyone surprised at this?

The real problem with modern British democracy is that is following the American pattern, career politicians who have been paid off by big business. Formerly we had at least a few that had risen from the "real world" and had gone into public life to make a difference - sadly now it seems to be the domain of some workshy wannabes that feel they have the answer to everything based on the experience of nothing, and operate under the mistaken belief that they "own" us and our lives, freedom and rights, rather than serve us which is how it is SUPPOSED to be. To act in the way they have illustrates how arrogant Government has become in the UK.

Responses no matter where from are valid and should be addressed, this is part of the very respect that Politicians demand for themselves. What they hate is the fact that t'interwebs gives people a way to gather support of an issue and focus a voice. The fact that the submission is a roboform just means that at best the response is a "vote" on a subject that may otherwise be unheard, it is simply convenient to do it this way. I have particiapted in campaigns by both groups on a couple of subjects I have had stroing views on, and have always added thoughts to my submission, THIS IS AS VALID AS ANY SUBMISSION FROM ANY OTHER PARTY - ESPECIALLY BUSINESS LOBBYING GROUPS - whose views dont seem to be given the same disgraceful treatment - proving that Money talks in our "democracy" and has a far louder voice than the average guy who actually holds the franchise (vote).

If you are involved in a pressure group such as ORG or 38 degrees you cant count in their estimation because you most likely haven't contributed in the correct way, It is of course only corrupt if you are an average private citizen, different rules apply in politics, business and wealth. They cannot tolerate the organising of resistance by ordinary people to laws they propose or want to change. They feel they know better than us, and having to respond to a decent number of objections wastes their precious time.

Its the usual thing with politics except that they are not usually so brazen in their disregard of the opinions of members of the electorate - although on this scale it is hard to disguise when it involves those affiliated to one group.

If the opinions of the electorate counted they would outlaw voting - the only time they pretend to listen is when they want our votes at elections which they seem to consider a necessary distraction from the business of earning their post political feather bed, while the rest of us see the rights we have paid for stripped away or moved further down the road.

A pox on modern politicians, a bunch of rich kids with no life experience.

Ministry of Fun

A Reg-ism?

I'd not be so enthusiastic to appropriate David Mellor's leavings as my own

Nice censoring your doing andrew

Comment seem highly censored on this story, nice to see how far the Reg has fallen with the new crew in charge, Seem like I'll need to find a better site once again!.

38 degrees not leftist

Andrew your showing your bias again!.

They are non-political crossing many party lines, of course more whining is done at the tories they are the ones in power, doing random sh*t we didn't tell them we wanted doing, presuming that 30% support from the voters gives them a mandate to f*&K us all! for their friend's (in this case Murdock!!)

Why not ignore JUST THE SPAM?

What evidence is there that 38 Degrees allowed multiple submissions? If a person emailed multiple submissions direct to the government what is the difference? It is the receiver's responsibility to filter out multiple submissions by a person and ignore THOSE not the vast majority which were not. Filtering multiple emails from the same address is not rocket science and not labour intensive. Also MPs could subvert petitions by creating multiple submissions themselves to justify rejecting genuine views.

I sent an email direct to my MP who said he was ignoring it because it was prompted by 38 Degrees! Where is the accountability if MPs ignore the same oppinion from more than one person?

Hmmm

The "truth" about the ever increasing cry (by the "establishment") regarding the alleged assault by bots is they are, for those paying any attention at all, incredibly selective in their scrutiny and action against robo posts. Why is this rabidly inconsistent behavior a threat to the common man? Simply put, the "establishment" itself, and those that support it, are far and away the worst offenders of robo posting around the world today. Which means that it is the establishment itself which is using the claim of robo posting as a red herring to override the voices of the masses when ever and where ever it suits their needs.

The 2 most blatant, egregious, and ultimately the most dangerous and damaging examples are the establishments use of robo posting to manipulate the demise of net neutrality in the United States and the engineering of fictitious opposition to Brexit in England. These 2 actions without question represent a direct attack against the common man by the ruling elite. IMHO of course.