Do you ever deal with negative messaging toward you on "work" social media?

[Marasme]

we / I do use social media for work (insta, FB, twitter) and occasionally attract negative attention from small groups of people, which is only really an issue on twitter, with conversations spiralling.

what we post is not particularly controversial per se, but can sometime split opinion (science related) with some messages and threads quickly spiralling to ad hominem attacks and name calling.

I usually do not engage, but it is difficult to see your work attacked (mostly because of misunderstandings, or nuances) without defending it. On occasion, people in my field join into the debate with petty unprofessional comments too.

I ve replied a few times, when i felt there was too much lost in translation, to try to create a conversation but it did not do anything else than fan the flames.

how do you handle this type of online conflict (social media is unfortunately a central part of how we communicate about what we do)?

If it gets mean, turn off comments.

i do this for facebook, but twitter can roll into long threads that go over several days - the aim to share there is to engage, so i guess the negativity is part and parcel of it.

It can be hard to read and i often wonder whether it s best to respond or ignore

In in a completely different industry to you, we have noticed that the negative comments from non purchasers often they are the users of our products but they aren't the ones holding the purse strings, they also often have an unrealistic expectation of what is possible. We usually try to go polite, professional but do respond to negative comments.

So Thank you for your feedback however this product (in my case) is innovative or great because X/Y/ Z.

You'll always get someone who wants to be the big I am on Social media.

i find the whole antagonism frustrating - I am not particularly resilient to it, unlike some of my male colleagues who seem to thrive on creating antagonism.

Even when i respond along the lines you illustrate above, each negative comment (not the silly ones, but the one attacking our integrity, or what we do and our motivations) creates a little dent.