full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Sally Kohn: Don't like clickbait? Don't click

Unscramble the Blue Letters


Over three out of five Americans think we have a major incivility problem in our country right now, but I'm going to guess that at least three out of five Americans are clicking on the same insult-oriented, rumor-mongering trash that feeds the nsaetsit impulses in our society. In an increasingly noisy media landscape, the icveintne is to make more noise to be heard, and that tyranny of the loud encourages the tyranny of the nasty.

It does not have to be that way. It does not. We can change the incentive. For starters, there are two things we can all do. First, don't just stand by the sidelines when you see someone getting hurt. If someone is being abused oinlne, do something. Be a hero. This is your chacne. Speak up. Speak out. Be a good person. Drown out the negative with the positive. And second, we've got to stop clicking on the lowest-common-denominator, bottom-feeding linkbait. If you don't like the 24/7 all Kardashian all the time programming, you've got to stop clicking on the stories about Kim Kardashian's sideboob. I know you do it. (Applause) You too, apparently. I mean, really, same example: if you don't like politicians clailng each other names, stop clicking on the stories about what one guy in one prtay cealld the other guy in the other party. Clicking on a tarin werck just pours gasoline on it. It makes it worse, the fire spreads. Our whole culture gets buenrd.

Open Cloze


Over three out of five Americans think we have a major incivility problem in our country right now, but I'm going to guess that at least three out of five Americans are clicking on the same insult-oriented, rumor-mongering trash that feeds the ________ impulses in our society. In an increasingly noisy media landscape, the _________ is to make more noise to be heard, and that tyranny of the loud encourages the tyranny of the nasty.

It does not have to be that way. It does not. We can change the incentive. For starters, there are two things we can all do. First, don't just stand by the sidelines when you see someone getting hurt. If someone is being abused ______, do something. Be a hero. This is your ______. Speak up. Speak out. Be a good person. Drown out the negative with the positive. And second, we've got to stop clicking on the lowest-common-denominator, bottom-feeding linkbait. If you don't like the 24/7 all Kardashian all the time programming, you've got to stop clicking on the stories about Kim Kardashian's sideboob. I know you do it. (Applause) You too, apparently. I mean, really, same example: if you don't like politicians _______ each other names, stop clicking on the stories about what one guy in one _____ ______ the other guy in the other party. Clicking on a _____ _____ just pours gasoline on it. It makes it worse, the fire spreads. Our whole culture gets ______.

Solution


  1. party
  2. called
  3. nastiest
  4. online
  5. incentive
  6. train
  7. calling
  8. chance
  9. wreck
  10. burned

Original Text


Over three out of five Americans think we have a major incivility problem in our country right now, but I'm going to guess that at least three out of five Americans are clicking on the same insult-oriented, rumor-mongering trash that feeds the nastiest impulses in our society. In an increasingly noisy media landscape, the incentive is to make more noise to be heard, and that tyranny of the loud encourages the tyranny of the nasty.

It does not have to be that way. It does not. We can change the incentive. For starters, there are two things we can all do. First, don't just stand by the sidelines when you see someone getting hurt. If someone is being abused online, do something. Be a hero. This is your chance. Speak up. Speak out. Be a good person. Drown out the negative with the positive. And second, we've got to stop clicking on the lowest-common-denominator, bottom-feeding linkbait. If you don't like the 24/7 all Kardashian all the time programming, you've got to stop clicking on the stories about Kim Kardashian's sideboob. I know you do it. (Applause) You too, apparently. I mean, really, same example: if you don't like politicians calling each other names, stop clicking on the stories about what one guy in one party called the other guy in the other party. Clicking on a train wreck just pours gasoline on it. It makes it worse, the fire spreads. Our whole culture gets burned.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
public act 4
stop clicking 3
white guys 2
black women 2
making media 2


Important Words


  1. abused
  2. americans
  3. apparently
  4. applause
  5. burned
  6. called
  7. calling
  8. chance
  9. change
  10. clicking
  11. country
  12. culture
  13. drown
  14. encourages
  15. feeds
  16. fire
  17. gasoline
  18. good
  19. guess
  20. guy
  21. heard
  22. hero
  23. hurt
  24. impulses
  25. incentive
  26. incivility
  27. increasingly
  28. kardashian
  29. kim
  30. landscape
  31. linkbait
  32. loud
  33. major
  34. media
  35. names
  36. nastiest
  37. nasty
  38. negative
  39. noise
  40. noisy
  41. online
  42. party
  43. person
  44. politicians
  45. positive
  46. pours
  47. problem
  48. programming
  49. sideboob
  50. sidelines
  51. society
  52. speak
  53. spreads
  54. stand
  55. starters
  56. stop
  57. stories
  58. time
  59. train
  60. trash
  61. tyranny
  62. worse
  63. wreck