“A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.”
– Proverbs 15:1
It’s that time of year again! For the past 21 years, Oxford University Press has chosen a “word of the year” based on user evidence drawn from news sources around the English-speaking world. The purpose of the project is to identify new or emerging words that have social and cultural significance. Past winners have included “selfie” (2013), “vax” (2021), and “brain rot” (2024). The 2025 runners up included “biohack” and “aura farming”. But this year’s winner (drum roll please…) is “rage bait,” which is defined as “online content deliberately designed to elicit anger or outrage by being frustrating, provocative or offensive.”
“Rage bait” is at least as old as 2002, when it was posted in an online discussion group about drivers exchanging, um, rude gestures. Since then, it has gained currency as a slang term for a very specific form of attention-seeking online behavior. According to Oxford’s usage data, its frequency skyrocketed by a factor of three this past year. Even people who’ve never heard the word before immediately understand what it means.
Why would people practice rage baiting? The answer is rooted in the intersection between how our brain works and how social media works. Posts that stir up strong emotions (positive or negative) elicit a more visceral reaction, thereby garnering more clicks, likes, and reposts than milder fare. The name of the game both for high-minded content creators, influencers, and brand advocates as well as wanna-be influencers, shillers, and propagandists is more exposure. Rage baiting is the low road to gaining more followers, garnering more clicks, and drawing more attention.
If “rage bait” is the word of the year, what reflecting do we need to do about how we as Christians interact within our larger culture? Here are some questions I think are worth chewing on:
- What are the ways that internet content seeks to manipulate us emotionally? When was the last time you felt manipulated by online content?
- How are you tempted to use internet content to manipulate others? How are we complicit in this project, even if we don’t do rage baiting?
- How can we resist being rage baited or sucked into “eye-for-an-eye” and “tooth-for-a-tooth” exchanges in online comment sections?
- How might we keep discussions of emotional and controversial topics civil and high minded, rather than devolving into name calling, assuming the worst of others, and listening only to those who agree with us?
- How do we resist the temptation to peevishness and self-righteousness, both of which make us vulnerable to being set off by rage bait?
- At what point do we exit the conversation, understanding that some folks just love to argue for the argument’s sake?
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