callout culture
One of the most frustrating things about callouts is the way the people propagating them abuse the sense of urgency and import that people inherently have. They tend to fall apart under the most basic scrutiny, but the emotional charge of the accusations is often given as self-evidential to the claims and they're often designed to force people to make the mental shortcuts so that they _won't_ use due diligence.
Callouts (specifically the kind that are not grounded in reality) are just a form of emotional blackmail designed to guilt people who do not immediately subscribe to them. They're used primarily by people looking to farm social capital and clout. It's simply another form of abuse that is difficult, if not impossible, to counter and disperse.
re: callout culture
@shaderphantom That is my #1 complaint about callout culture. Even if the person being called out legitimately did do something bad, the purpose of the callout is to shame and harass people who have better things to do with their lives than participate in your stupid boycott or enforce ostracism.
re: callout culture
Intentional omission of context and information is negative emotional manipulation designed to control the listener and make them believe what you want them to believe.
If you pay attention, you'll often see that callouts are snippets of chat logs or email threads with all context ripped out so that the callout reader can't make heads or tails of the situation without spending more time digging at it. Since time is money, it's easier for people to give up scrutiny and fall in line immediately. It's exactly the same thing that yellow journalism does.
Moreover, people see the way people who _don't_ fall in-line get harassed and destroyed and think, "maybe I should just fall in-line immediately and avoid the trouble". Doesn't that sound fucked up? This is exactly what callout posters want people to do.