Breaking Our Cultures Addiction to Conflict
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
this is a story
about the end of the world for thousands
of years
cultures and religions have told us the
end was coming
and we’re still predicting it but now
joined by
apocalyptic based news and entertainment
industries that
increasingly profit by showing us all
the ways the world will end
through movies and television books
and video games or just by showing us
what’s happening in the real world
now for over 20 years i’ve investigated
human trafficking across the globe and
in that time
and collaborating with others we found
an enormous amount of child abuse images
on facebook now think of it for the
first time in history
pedophiles didn’t need to hide what they
were doing
across language barriers across borders
across the world these people were
gathering
on facebook validating each other
enabling each other and trading images
and videos of children
being attacked which is all a form of
human trafficking
now in reporting all this to law
enforcement
i had a front row seat and because of
this work
i’ve seen the end of the world for
thousands of children
through images of destroyed lives
images that i have to live with so
i decided to do something because i
think the end of the world
especially the world of children is
really something we should avoid
so whether through theological forecasts
from long ago
or through the new religions of
electronic entertainment
we’ve taken the stories of the end of
the world and gobbled them up
like a chocolate eclair and in the past
70 years or so for the first time
we can make it happen we don’t need a
deity
we don’t need aliens or another comet
with nuclear or bioweapons the choice
to end the world is ours and like never
before
this armageddon option is on the table
as a viable
solution to resolving conflict
imagine how living in that
shadow of death has made all our other
conflicts pale in comparison
imagine what that has done to our
humanity to our global village
of ideas and innovation with the world
ending
why should we seek resolution why should
we cooperate with each other why should
we
collaborate or compromise or show
compassion
if it weren’t for a few glimmers of hope
it seems we’ve simply given up and
turned our backs on the better
angels of our nature it’s clear we live
in a culture of conflict led by the
adversarial industrial complex
that profits from a violent culture that
no longer seeks solutions to the
enormous challenges facing us this new
industry
built on all forms of conflict seeks to
continually increase the shouting
the fighting and the arguing it’s a
cacophony
of conflict that gets higher ratings and
more votes
makes more money creates more followers
and most of all
makes us feel really good when we get
into an endless argument on social media
and that’s when we completely lose our
motivation
for coming to agreement
through every form of communication the
adversarial industrial complex produces
bitter conflict at higher levels all the
time with no end
it’s like an addiction and we the
addicts
always need a bigger dose to feel
satisfied
these cultural conglomerates are always
there
like our eager dealers doling out
stronger fix
every hour of the day and like the
global heroin supply
the conflict drug is more addictive
today than ever before
but conflict is a corruption of ideas
it pollutes the imagination it bypasses
kindness
igniting flames of hatred and tolerance
and violence
within seconds of experiencing conflict
the
stress it brings releases adrenaline and
cortisol into your body
as if you were actually in danger this
isn’t new
it’s mostly a defense mechanism and
survival mechanism
we evolved in conflict and fear and in a
survival mode
until only recently we had to spend
every moment
of every day thinking about survival
finding enough food
finding shelter avoiding getting eaten
by something
or attacked by other humans for
thousands of years as our brains
developed
we became wired for a lifelong fight for
survival
now is it possible that we still have
our ancestors mode of thinking lurking
within us
that we’re still expecting those life or
death conflicts every day
that we think we need to keep running
even though nothing’s chasing us
the question is are we stuck here
in this addiction to conflict
so we started reporting these abusive
images
of children on facebook directly to law
enforcement
and there were thousands of them
facebook didn’t like that they told me i
should report the images directly to
them and only to them
now these images were clearly criminal
so i asked facebook what other crimes
exist
that should be reported to a corporation
instead of
to law enforcement now of course there
aren’t any
and that is when facebook stopped
talking to me completely
now i had never been in a conflict like
this before
it was just me my computer
no money against one of the world’s
largest most influential tech companies
and after fighting them for about a year
with no chance of winning
a very wise mentor of mine suggested
that i
step away from the conflict because he
said conflict was just one
option why not try compelling
facebook to change now i didn’t even
know what that meant
because i wanted to fight and i wanted
it to get nasty
the the darkest motives of human nature
inevitably seep into our lives they
remain
woven throughout our delicate fabric
of this vulnerable planetary community
advanced science communications
government cooperation
and commerce have unintentionally
conspired and providing us with the
sense that
we have moved beyond chapters filled
with senseless violence
especially violence against children the
no matter how civilized evolved or
advanced we become hatred peers in our
windows
the story of humanity is filled with men
who come
in the night ending the world for
mothers
fathers and children the killers of
dreams exist in all generations
it’s one of our constants in roughly the
past century
the same human endeavors that carried us
to new levels of knowledge comprehension
and understanding
also gave evil the diabolical tools to
destroy
millions of lives at a whim
higher levels of technology don’t equate
to higher levels of wisdom or
benevolence
only to higher levels of ability both
wondrous
and insane much of our current
addiction to conflict is played out
through our own
personal worldview our politics
and the harsh reality is that we’re now
behaving more like politics
than like ourselves ezra klein author of
the book
why we’re polarized says we’re
so locked into our political identities
that there’s virtually no candidate
no information no condition that can
force us to change our minds
we will justify almost anything or
anyone
so long as it helps our side and the
result
is a politics devoid of guardrails
standards
persuasion or accountability so this
is identity politics at its most
powerful and divisive
and it crosses over to identity media
identity entertainment identity religion
and our virtual
identity on social media and isn’t
online conflict the absolute easiest
it has no consequences not many of us
would take some of the harsh things we
say
and post online and say them to someone
in person our culture of conflict
glorifies the act
of destroying the very people whose
cooperation we need
the act of calling for reconciliation
conflict resolution problem solving and
collaboration
has become an absurdity we label those
who
compromise in order to find the best
solutions as weak
and as traders if they don’t agree with
us
a hundred percent all the time then they
are the enemy and the cause of all our
problems
no matter what they say or do no matter
what solutions
they may bring none of it matters the
only acceptable solution
is their eradication but all this
doesn’t mean
that we’re stuck in one position ezra
klein asks
aren’t we better than this we have the
freedom to choose don’t we
we can go in any direction we want and
to make every choice
out of compassion instead of conflict
so in time i put aside the idea of
fighting facebook
and search for something that would
compel them to take action
and get rid of child abuse on their site
so to protect these children
i decided to imagine compassion
and in that imagining i began to think
of the children first
the children in danger i imagine giving
them a voice
and telling their stories of how they
see the world
my conflict with facebook became a
campaign
led by compassion for children and that
made all the difference
by leading with compassion i realized i
needed to build an alliance with other
people
who may not agree with me on everything
but who cared about saving children
this idea would use technology and a
message of compassion
to rally people from around the world
and compel facebook to shield these kids
from predators after reporting my
findings on causes.com
i very quickly gained a hundred thousand
followers
then half a million and eventually to
this point
where we now have over one and a half
million people
in over a hundred countries demanding
that facebook protect children
with over four hundred thousand
signatures on a petition to mark
zuckerberg
now with that facebook has implemented
new software and ai tools to locate and
remove these images
they’ve hired thousands of moderators to
scour postings and reports
probably the worst and most
psychologically damaging job in
all the tech sector and they now have
facebook liaisons with local law
enforcement
in offices around the world they also
established a way for law enforcement to
quickly gain access to information when
a child is in danger or suspected of
being exploited
now this isn’t to say that facebook has
solved the problem they haven’t there’s
much more
that can be done but they’ve started
because we compelled them to start
now on the momentum of what we did with
i wanted to address another injustice
escort advertisements in the tribune
companies
advocate newspapers in connecticut were
proven by the u.s department of justice
to be selling human trafficking victims
owned by the united states oldest
newspaper these ads ran
openly for decades and were a huge
source of income for the publishers
for five years i argued with them to end
these ads
i even showed them similar ads that they
had run
announcing awards for the return of
runaway slaves over two centuries ago
both ads promoting slavery the
publishers wouldn’t budge
again it wasn’t a fight i could win i
had to imagine a different way
one that led with compassion for those
being sold for sex in the 21st century
so i approached some of our lawmakers
and explained
the problem in the context of human
rights
i wrote legislation that would make the
publishers accountable
if young people were found to be
advertised in these listings
it was a team effort it took a lot of
work but
my idea eventually became law and one
week
after the law went into effect the paper
stopped running the ads
and within a year the paper sees
publication altogether
now imagine this there are ways to win
without fighting
without conflict in every moment
there’s the possibility of a better
future but we get caught up
and we won’t do what’s necessary to make
it a reality
because the future doesn’t ask anything
of us today
so i’m going to ask you in a moment
close your eyes for just five seconds
and imagine i’ve handed you
a magic wand and when you do that
imagine you could take your magic wand
and change just one thing in the world
what would it be just five seconds
imagine the first thing that comes to
mind now
now whatever that was for you remember
how important it is
because you can make it happen and in
moments of conflict
imagine compassion delete conflict in
your life
and you’ll delete it in the world we
live
in a continually evolving era in which
everyone can be heard
and make an extraordinary change if they
build collaboration
with anyone who wants to help don’t
conflict or compete
just compel with compassion and adopt a
philosophy of no drama
because whether or not you believe that
everyone has a right to live their life
the way they want to
they are going to so don’t waste your
energy on circumstances that are beyond
your control
stand up and take action because if you
don’t
how will you feel in 10 years
how will you explain doing nothing to
your children
to their children or to yourself
we can’t continue to live under these
morbid dictates
or be defined by those who seek to end
all the possibilities of today
or the promises of tomorrow instead
we can reject the fear and hatred of our
enemies
in the face of all threats you have the
opportunity to engage with activists on
the ground level
and become an activist whatever that
means to you all on your own
we need the change you will bring to the
world
so you have a decision to make give into
the fear
and malevolence thrust upon you or
devote yourself to compassion
we break our culture’s addiction to
conflict by rejecting it
and healing our individual addiction to
it
so let’s step out of the fray and for a
moment
imagine compassion because it’s not the
end of the world
thank you
you