Illustration by Dave Donald

The importance of thinking before you click

Online media has monetized humanity’s rubbernecking reflex like never before. “Clickbait,” as defined by Urban Dictionary, is an “eye-catching link on a website which encourages people to read on. It is often paid for by the advertiser or generates income on the number of clicks.” Clickbait is now a widespread phenomenon. These highly clickable links to videos, articles or images thrive on the lowest forms of controversy and intrigue, attracting an audience in the same manner as a bar fight or a car accident.

Back in September of 2013, a viral image spread across the internet: Miley Cyrus in a leather bikini, with knobby pigtails and lascivious red lips, twerking into Robin Thicke’s black-and-white Beetlejuice pants. I saw it paired with an ostensibly feminist headline drubbing the performer. Eager to hear what new lows Cyrus had sunk to, I clicked.

Days later, it seemed, I emerged from the haze of Cyrusbait now repulsed by the image, much the way you might react to the sight of tequila the morning after a binge. Had I learned anything new about the exploitation of female performers? No, I’d gorged on sugary listicles like “22 Things That Miley Cyrus Looked Like at the 2013 VMAs.” Had I ruminated on contemporary approaches to feminism? No, I’d watched as discussion devolved into mud-slinging between Miley Cyrus, Sinead O’Connor, and Amanda Palmer. And I was primed for the new Miley Cyrus video “Wrecking Ball” when it came out—with artful timing—just a few days after the controversy. I clicked, yet again, along with millions of other viewers.

Once we were through with Miley, more highly clickable stories arose in her wake: David Gilmour teaching only “serious heterosexual guys”; the Rob Ford crack circus; Brazilian prostitutes taping Justin Bieber sleeping; a toy company suing the Beastie Boys—to name just a few.

Some of these stories touch on important issues—the pervasive power of straight white men in the literary world, dangerously irresponsible civil servants—but mainly it’s a bunch of people doing stupid shit. Why are we giving them so much attention?

The answer, of course, is money. Websites like BuzzFeed, Upworthy, and Huffington Post are figuring out the best way to pair journalism with ads that are designed so that you can barely distinguish the two. BuzzFeed uses an algorithm to determine what people click on, and then marries successful campaigns with “BuzzFeed Partners” like Virgin Mobile. New York magazine estimates this new “advertorial” approach to journalism nets BuzzFeed around $40 million a year in ad revenue (BuzzFeed does not release official numbers). Jonah Perretti, BuzzFeed’s founder, described the relationship between his company and Facebook by saying, “They own the railroad tracks, we drive the trains.”

Upworthy employs a team to run randomized tests and determine the most clickable headlines. The formulaic nature of these headlines has spawned imitators and parodies, but remains shockingly effective. Before the site was two years old, it had 22 million visitors a month and had raised $8 million from investors—cash that these investors want to see returned. Naturally, Upworthy is trying out its own forays in sponsored stories. Unlike BuzzFeed, Upworthy produces no original content at all; it functions through aggregation and reframing, and as of March, partnerships with hard-news sites like ProPublica. Huffington Post uses the same mixed editorial/advertorial approach—also called “native advertising”—as Upworthy and BuzzFeed, and was sold to AOL for $300 million in cash.

We may think we’re getting a great deal with all this free and fun clickbait, but we’re paying for it dearly in other ways. Tech start-ups and advertising companies are colluding to turn us into a bunch of rats in Skinner boxes, primed to click for the next sugary reward, while they make big bucks off “sponsored content” stories about the new Xbox or Chevy Corvette. In a world of narcissistic articles like, “23 Signs You’re Secretly an Introvert,” hard-hitting journalism becomes an endangered species. War reporters in Aleppo can’t afford health insurance and are paid $70 per article—barely enough for a night’s room and board in the war-torn region.

You can fight back by doing one simple thing: think before you click. Don’t click or share what will only make you or others uselessly angry. (No more Margaret Wente columns—we only have ourselves to blame for her continued career.) You can employ online tools, like Rather (GetRather.com), which allow you to filter out clickbait generators and stories. You can follow Twitter feeds like @Huffpospoilers and @Upworthyspoilers which skewer leading tweets and reveal the banal answers behind mysterious headlines. You can support quality journalism. You can choose not to stop and gawk at the spectacle.

Laura Trethewey lives in Vancouver, where she writes fiction and non-fiction for Geist, the National Post and other publications. Her work has been nominated for a National Magazine Award and a Western Magazine Award.

How we imagine an “arty” Shia LeBeouf may look  || By User:Wiki Lon (Own work) [GPL (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html)], via Wikimedia Commons

When male celebrities implode on the world stage, they’re arty heroes. When women do it, they’re called “troubled” and worse

Did you miss the recent Valentine’s Day announcement that winning warlock Charlie Sheen is getting married for the fourth time? Maybe you were busy having a life, or watching season two of House of Cards (SO GOOD!) or let your subscription to Winning Warlock Weekly lapse.

Who can blame you after Sheen’s well-publicized 2011 meltdown, or “meltforward” as he called it, complete with truth torpedos, goddesses and weird rants about tiger blood. The media covered Sheen’s meltdown—I refuse to make meltforward happen—like it was a sitcom or comedy tour, wondering what hilarity and hijinx Sheen would get up to next. His history of violence against women, substance abuse, anti-Semitism and responsibility for making #winning happen were largely swept under the rug. Sheen’s behaviour was often described as “antics” or dismissed, as “hey, look Charlie’s being zany again.”

In fact, during his meltdown heyday, Sheen was treated like a rock star. He landed a Rolling Stone cover and made several primetime appearances that provided him ample airtime to explain himself and his behaviour. Sheen was also the highest paid television actor at the time—earning a reported $1.8 million (US) per episode of Two and a Half Men. That kind of cheddar buys a lot of bowling shirts. Sheen’s mental state may have been questioned during his meltdown, but not nearly as much as that of a 2007 meltdown era Britney Spears.

Sheen’s media image hasn’t changed much since 2011. Coverage of his recent engagement largely laughed off his 2011 “antics,” instead focussing on his desire to have children with his new bride. No mention was made of Sheen’s history of domestic violence or lacklustre parenting record. Does this man even have custody of any of his other four children? Do his children just go directly from the womb to Denise Richards’ care?

Compare coverage of Sheen’s meltdown to that of Drake-lover Amanda Bynes or an umbrella-wielding Britney Spears and it doesn’t take long to see the double standard when it comes to celebrity meltdowns. At the same time Sheen was gracing the cover of Rolling Stone, Lindsay Lohan appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair in a piece that painstakingly detailed Lohan’s substance abuse issues and legal troubles. It also made frequent reference to her haggard appearance and questioned whether she would ever, ever get her once promising career back on track. The verdict: no. Sheen #winning. Lohan #tragic.

But Sheen’s not the only one benefiting from the media’s double standard. Once squeaky clean pop star Justin Bieber has had a DUI arrest, disrespected Bill Clinton while peeing in a restaurant mop bucket, egged a neighbour’s house, been photographed sneaking out of a Brazilian brothel and sparked a US petition to deport him. He also wants to change his name to Bizzle, which is not technically a crime, just kind of a crime against humanity.

Media coverage of Bieber largely downplays the severity of his troubles, chalking them up to growing pains as the singer transitions into adulthood and sheds his Bieber skin to become Bizzle. Like Bieber, both Bynes and Lohan started out as child stars, but their troubles are rarely attributed to growing up, instead the media focuses on their mental state or their drug use. At least Bieber is allowed to grow up. If the media had their way Miley Cyrus would remain in a perpetual state of Hannah Montana.

Despite finding drugs on his tour bus, pilots on his plane having to wear gas masks (is that even safe?) cause the marijuana smoke was so thick and sources close to Bieber—I refuse to make Bizzle happen—concerned about his addiction to Sizzurp (Google it) and pot, Bieber’s substance abuse and troubled behaviour has largely been portrayed as socially acceptable teenage rebellion. Again, none for you Miley.

Writing after Bieber’s recent surrender to Toronto police for allegedly assaulting a limo driver the media wondered if maybe this was all a carefully constructed public relations move or an image rebrand designed to improve Bieber’s bad boy image. Hey, it worked for Sheen—who I would like to point out is worth a reported $125 million (US). The media noted that Bieber’s record sales weren’t what they used to be. Perhaps vandalism and monkey abandonment were just the thing to get the record buying public interested in him again.

For Bieber being a bad boy is good for business. Not so much for Lohan. Her last film The Canyons was largely panned before it even hit theatres. Reviewers seemed unable to separate the Lohan they saw on the big screen with the Lohan they saw on the TMZ small screen. Lohan is definitely not the worst thing about The Canyons—next time perhaps the director could avoid hate filming his actors or people could remember that Bret Easton Ellis-penned characters are largely vapid and often laughable—but almost every review focussed on Lohan’s performance and never missed an opportunity to refer to her as “embattled actress Lindsay Lohan” or “troubled startlet Lindsay Lohan.” Chris Brown is always just Chris Brown not “Rihanna beater Chris Brown” or “violent misogynist Chris Brown” or “serial douchebag Chris Brown.”

Even if being a bad girl can be good for business the media is quick to remind us that this fame and success could vanish at any minute. During her meltdown days Spears made some questionable choices—shaving her head, marrying Kevin Federline, hanging out with Paris Hilton, just to name a few—that the media will never let her forget. Despite media concern over her post-meltdown career, Spears continues to top the charts, judge The X Factor and headline a two-year Vegas residency. Despite this, the majority of her media coverage never fails to mention her quickie marriages and rehab visits and suggests that another meltdown might be waiting just right around the corner.

And then there’s Shia LaBeouf. Where do we even start? If you’re just joining the LaBeouf crazy train already in progress he’s been plagiarizing people, punching people, walking out on press conferences while plagiarizing people, punching people at bars, fighting with Alec Baldwin and just generally behaving bizarrely. Rumours of substance abuse have long plagued LaBeouf. He generally brushes them off as “method acting” or blames others for not understanding his intensity (read: love of the sauce).

LaBeouf’s latest stunt involves his announcement that he is retiring from acting, followed by an appearance at the Berlin Film Fest for the premiere of Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac sporting a paper bag over his head with “I’m Not Famous Anymore” scrawled on it. It turns out this was all part of—wait for it—a performance art piece called #IAMSORRY that LaBeouf was mounting in Los Angeles. The performance involves LaBeouf sitting silently in a dark room with the paper bag over his head and various mementos from his career; including Indiana Jones’ crystal skull and a Transformers action figures. I give his show three 2009 Joaquin Phoenix’s out of five. Can’t LaBeouf just join General Hospital like James Franco did?

Media coverage of LaBeouf’s meltdown in the name of art has largely focussed on his eccentricity—there’s those zany antics again—and his valuable contribution to the dialogue around performance art. One media outlet even gathered a panel of performance artists to discuss LaBeouf’s work with one going so far as to say: “he’s starting a broad cultural discussion that needs to be had.” Way to go, Even Stevens—LaBeouf was a child Disney star too, but we don’t get reminded of this nearly as much as we do with Miley.

By embracing his performance art angle the media legitimizes LaBeouf’s bizarre antics. There’s no mention of his mental state. No mention of whether his career will ever recover. Media coverage of Bynes’ meltdown focused largely on her physical appearance, commenting on what she wore and how much her appearance had changed—and not in a good way—since her “25 Hottest Stars Under 25” days in 2006. Media rarely comment on LaBeouf’s appearance or commented on Phoenix’s I’m Still Here appearance, despite the fact that both of them are definitely less dashing as performance artists.

While the media regularly updates us on Sheen, Bynes has received little post-meltdown coverage. She’s doing better—having spent time in rehab and away from Twitter—but the media only likes a redemption story if there’s a male protagonist. Bynes only gets the meltdown and then she’s tossed aside. And while the Bynes story has a happy ending, that’s not always the case. If Lohan or Bynes were to die they would get a media circus of Whitney Houston proportions not the respectful coverage afforded Philip Seymour Hoffman or Heath Ledger.

I hope it doesn’t come to that, and that Lindsay’s actually been punking us all this time. Soon she’ll announce it’s all been one big performance art piece. If she did, the media would no doubt accuse her of stealing LaBeouf’s paper bag.

Allen isn’t the first to be accused of doing this. The most popular example at the moment started back in August: Miley Cyrus’ VMA performance.

Amongst the slut-shaming nonsense came valid points about Cyrus’ use of black women as props. Her all-black group of back-up dancers seemed to be there more to authenticate Cyrus’ need to appear “urban” as opposed to the bubblegum wholesome image she started her career with. By now, we’ve probably all heard about her slapping a dancer’s bum as the rest of the crew admires her own as it twerks. Part of the former child star’s revamped image is to be more sexy, and playing on racist stereotypes that black women are more sexual, seems to be part of this revamping.

In a September 24 Rolling Stone article Cyrus says, “I don’t keep my producers or dancers around ’cause it makes me look cool. Those aren’t my ‘accessories.’ They’re my homies.” And yet the timing is all too convenient for her new  image. When she spoke with the songwriters behind her single, “We Can’t Stop”, she told them, as reported in a June 12 Vibe article, “I want urban, I just want something that just feels Black.” For her, that seems to mean gold teeth and twerking.

The question if Cyrus’ twerking was cultural appropriation was first posed on the blog Black Feminists on September 17. A commenter named Daria responded, “Within the mainstream conversation, there’s the implication that I somehow have [to] identify with twerking and its supposed place within ‘black culture’ to feel angry that’s it’s been appropriated. It bothers me that in order to understand the anger behind the Cyrus situation, people have to understand and equate this to being a ‘black’ thing that she is imitating which leads to all sorts of issues about supposed norms and stereotypes surrounding black female sexuality.”

Talk show host Wendy Williams responded to the VMA performance and Rolling Stone article on her show, “You can’t pick up black and put it down. Black is something that you are, and it is.” Her more thorough explanation includes, “When young white people do ‘the black thang’ these same young white people grow up to be middle-aged white people. They take off the whole black accessory thing and they become white again.”

There are obstacles out there that those of us with white privilege will never have to face. Maybe that’s why it seems so easy for some to reduce a race to a fashion statement. “Miley and the black actors in the video are all props on the stage of visual pleasure,” Akil Houston, professor of African American Studies at Ohio University tells Vice writer Wilbert L. Cooper. “I think it’s important to consider that these images function within the sphere of multinational corporate control so both the lead (Miley) and the accessories do not maintain a high level of autonomy in terms of imaging.”

Cyrus tells Rolling Stone that she doesn’t try to be black, her bum is too flat for that. But we all know women, of all colours, are more than their physical assets. We, all of us, are not props.

A former This intern, Hillary Di Menna writes Gender Block every week and maintains an online feminist resource directory, FIRE- Feminist Internet Resource Exchange.