When I first saw a story on Instagram about ICE being on the island, my immediate gut reaction was that it was true. Just based on the national news I’ve been seeing, and then the person who had shared that story being someone who’s fairly politically involved, I believed it. I went to look at the usual source of information (Facebook, obviously) and saw a few more posts about it, this time with more details. Three people detained at Kings.

No, wait, it was at Marketplace.

No, the courthouse.

At this point, my alarm bells were ringing. Then I saw the Sheriff chime in saying these were unfounded rumors. Whew.

The next day, my publisher reached out saying they had a source confirm ICE was in fact here, but it was at the Family Resource Center.

This time, I picked up the phone.

As you all know by now, it wasn’t true. The Family Resource Center denied it, as did all the other FRCs on the other islands. ICE wasn’t at the courthouse, they weren’t at Kings, they weren’t on the island.

The rumors were wrong. My gut was wrong.

Was yours?

I talked to the Sheriff about the situation a little more and he repeated that he would advise islanders to use caution when reading Facebook posts or Rant and Rave updates without any articulable evidence.

“I would encourage people not to recklessly spread rumors without truly verifying them,” he told me. “So that we don’t cause needless panic or angst among our fellow community members.”

Sheriff Peter told me this via text as we struggled to coordinate a time to talk – he was handling traffic control for the triathlon, attending the assembly at the courthouse lawn that day, and then, oh yeah, having a life on the weekend and a wedding to attend.

And herein lies the real problem with rumors. They aren’t harmless. This ICE rumor not only caused undue stress and fear, it used up very real resources that the community relies on. In fact, it used up a lot of resources that the very community members who rumor-spreaders were likely trying to protect rely on.

This is a theme I’ve been writing about recently – this idea of how to share factual information in a time of social media. Our island relies on socials, especially Facebook, to keep each other updated. It’s by far the easiest way to share events, ask questions, and connect with whom we need to. It’s also a medium developed by a trillion-dollar company to capitalize on human attention spans, dopamine, and fear to translate engagement into views for advertisers.

But what are we to do about it? Facebook isn’t going away any time soon, especially not on this island. Can we use it to benefit our community while minimizing the harm? Is it possible?

Maybe starting a conversation can help us ultimately find a solution. For now, I hope it can at least inspire a pause – a break for the scrolling brain to come back to reality for a moment – before we hit share.