For years, we have all been exploring the new frontiers of social media, sites like Facebook, Twitter, and the Fediverse and I’ve been thinking about a way to improve life on every social platform.

I like to think of it as an immune system for social media. Curated and shared blocklists. It should be rather easy, just a checkmark box on the other person you follow, or maybe they encapsulate their blocklists, like how it is done in Mastodon on the Fediverse. Click on a user, then click on their shared blocklists, pick which ones you want to follow and then poof, all the users on that blocklist are simply gone.

Blocklists can be for anything. Name them anything, trolls, twats, asshats, or even foreign state actors. Before this, I think folks were very hesitant to even think about this because it will lead to social media balkanization. We’re beyond that point now, giving regular folk the benefit of the doubt simply isn’t going to be possible anymore. We need new ways to banish and shun, as shame has died in our world. This is the natural response to shame going extinct. Nobody is ashamed anymore, and as such, they are wretches that run amok, and so, we need new leashes to yoke them and drive them out of our social worlds.

Just imagine how lovely life could be, without Russian trolls trying to pitch misinformation to sow discord and division amongst us, amongst everyone. This sharable blocklist would effectively push them all out of open windows to the pavement below.

Obviously the walled-garden platforms really don’t want this, because it would actively subvert their algorithm which is designed to be as provocative and enraging as possible, so we really can only look to the Fediverse for innovation like this. In the meantime, one way you could do this and help-yourself is to always write a post about who you blocked and why. It’s not as immediate or convenient, but the time is right for us to stop communicating with each other, because there is absolutely no point in mixing or even acknowledging them. Drive them out, ignore them, and leave them in the dark. It’s the only way to save ourselves. Full throated balkanization.