RICK REA: Helping You Grow Through Online Marketing
  • Home
  • Blog
    • Social Media News
    • SEO Marketing News
    • Digital Trends News
    • Photography News
    • Mobile Marketing
    • Business News
    • Gadget News
    • Printing News
  • Contact
  • About
  • Subscribe


The curse of the Twitter reply guy

2/19/2019

1 Comment

 
http://bit.ly/2DY13dV

The curse of the Twitter reply guy

http://bit.ly/2Sdi9JE

On Twitter, a place where a lot of bad things happen, there's a mostly harmless but decidedly annoying phenomenon. A lot of people, mostly women, have noticed that one or two men always, no matter what, reply to their tweets. 

These men are colloquially known as "reply guys." While no reply guy is the same — each reply guy is annoying in his own way — there are a few common qualities to watch out for. In general, reply guys tend to have few followers. Their responses are overly familiar, as if they know the person they're targeting, though they usually don't. They also tend to reply to only women; the most prolific reply guys fill the role for dozens of women trying to tweet in peace. 

Welcome to Twitter ladies. A married man, who mainly follows, and interacts with only women, will be assigned to you shortly

— Shit. Head. (@THE_shitface) February 12, 2019

It's usually pretty easy to ID a reply guy. The sheer volume of responses is a reliable indicator. But there's still some literature on the subject. In a 2018 piece for McSweeney's, for instance, Emlyn Crenshaw wrote an extremely funny Reply Guy Constitution, which focuses above all else on men's commitment to "weigh in on women's thoughts at every possible opportunity." 

Two scientists, @shrewshrew (who asked to be referred to by her Twitter handle only) and Scott Barolo, created the Twitter account @9ReplyGuys based on the experiences of women in STEM.

"We came up with the idea of the 9 Reply Guys after noticing that the kinds of tweets and comments make to women on Twitter (and in real life) follow really predictable patterns," @shrewshrew explained via Twitter DM.

"It's annoying because Reply Guys always think they've made some brilliant contribution, but it's the same nonsense any woman, person of color, or LGBTQ person has experienced hundreds of times," she said.

The account divides reply guys into nine subcategories, each based on a reply guy behavior the two observed in the wild. The Gaslighter, for example, is devoted to minimizing women's experiences, and the Cookie Manster is basically the poster child for #NotAllMen. 

All nine have one thing in common, though, as @shrewshrew pointed out: "Their goal is to control the conversation."

#WomeninSTEM get a lot of “Reply Guys” who repeat the same unhelpful comments.@shrewshrew and I (a woman & a man in science) have attempted to catalog those replies, to save us all the trouble of writing new responses every time.

presenting THE NINE TYPES OF REPLY GUYS

(1/n) pic.twitter.com/0ewNRJloLu

— Scott Barolo (@sbarolo) September 3, 2018

Reply guys aren't just lurking on STEM grounds, either. Petrana Radulovic, a reporter at Polygon, had a reply guy experience that was truly, deeply weird. 

"I had this fella who followed me because I had Cookie Monster in my profile pic and he just kept replying to everything I posted trying to get me to talk about Muppets," she explained over Twitter DM.

Like most reply guys, he was relentless. Eventually, Radulovic muted him. Notably, though, she never blocked him. 

"I have that internalized female niceness where I can't make anyone mad," she said. "I [also] fear men's retaliation and muting will keep 'em quiet, but they'll never know." (Users aren't notified that they've been muted.)

"Muting will keep 'em quiet, but they'll never know."

Another user, who asked to remain anonymous, said she's noticed several reply guys in her mentions. Unlike Radulovic's reply guy, her reply guys respond to each tweet individually. "It's always regarding the content of [my] tweets, contextual," she said. But it still happens like clockwork. 

She's also chosen to mute instead of block. None of her reply guys are "consistent harassers," she said.

Still, reply guy behavior can escalate quickly — which is why a lot of women choose not to block the offenders. I once had a reply guy whose comments started off innocuous, then steadily became more frequent — and more suggestive — when I stopped liking his replies. Eventually, he also found me on Instagram and Facebook, where he continued to engage with the vast majority of my posts.

I didn't block him, though. I didn't want to make him angry. One never knows how far a man will go to make a woman's life hell.

hey i’m the guy who replies to your every tweet trying to one-up your jokes. i have 97 followers and while there’s nothing technically wrong with my facial hair, it’s not the facial hair any reasonable person would pick for this face shape. someday soon i’ll call you a cunt

— rax king (@RaxKingIsDead) February 17, 2019

But what makes a reply guy reply in the first place? It's been suggested — including in a piece from Raw Story — that the reply guy phenomenon is an instance of benevolent sexism. 

As with other types of benevolent sexism, like catcalling disguised as "compliments" and paternalistic pseudo-concern, reply guy behavior can quickly grow frightening if the man doesn't feel his target is giving him the attention he deserves. (Feeling entitled to women's energy has, of course, been a longstanding problem for men.)

If you're a woman on the internet, there's a high chance you find none of this surprising. But what should you do if you suddenly find a reply guy in your mentions?

Of course, how you choose to deal with a reply guy depends on your specific circumstances. If you think you've got a shot at shooing them away, you could hit them with one of @9ReplyGuys's descriptions. You could reply, if you want. (Don't pretend you don't love a good dunk.) If you feel unsafe or if you don't want to see their garbage anymore, you could mute or block. It's your feed. They're the interloper, not you.

And if they get too annoying, you can always commiserate with ... pretty much anyone who isn't a man. I'm sure they'd be thrilled to hear from someone who is not a reply guy.





Social Media

via Mashable http://bit.ly/2DCFv97

February 19, 2019 at 12:50PM

1 Comment
game hacker tool app no root  link
6/8/2020 04:40:28 am

Your blog is very better than average an obligation of appreciation is all together for sharing Then just incredibly charming, thankful for giving to us Enjoyed the entirety of your blog. <a href=" http://technewuk.com/top-8-game-hacker-apps-for-android-withwithout-root/ "> game hacker tool app no root </a> Truly foreseeing scrutinizing all the all the more breaking news and tech and assessment on figuring, the web, online diaries, games, contraptions, electronic life, broadband and that is just a glimpse of something larger.

Reply



Leave a Reply.


    Amazing WeightLoss

    Click Here!

    Categories

    All
    Analyze Top Competitors
    Anti-Abuse
    Apple
    Apple Watch
    Blog Posts
    Brainstorm
    Brand Awareness
    Communications
    Content Marketing
    Conversion Rates
    Editorial Calendar Tips
    Engagement
    Facebook
    Google Analytics
    How To Marketing Tips
    Influencer
    Instagram
    Instagram Live
    Keyword Search
    Marketing
    Marketing Automation
    Picture Quotes
    Podcasts
    Recording Videos
    Repurpose Blogs
    Research Trends
    Sales Funnel
    SEO Marketing
    Sharing Posts
    Slide Shows
    Smartwatch
    Social Media Marketing
    Social Media News
    Social Media Tools
    Social Selling
    Target Marketing
    Twitter
    Twitter Notifications
    User Interaction
    Video
    Video Marketing

    Archives

    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017

    RSS Feed

All content copyrighted (C) 2010 ~ 2020
​All Photos & Content Used Under Creative Commons
​www.RickRea.com 701-200-7831
Privacy Policy
  • Home
  • Blog
    • Social Media News
    • SEO Marketing News
    • Digital Trends News
    • Photography News
    • Mobile Marketing
    • Business News
    • Gadget News
    • Printing News
  • Contact
  • About
  • Subscribe