By K J Foxhall 
The art of communication is not dead even with the abundance of electronic communications, so why is there so much confusion and misinterpretation?
Why is Twitter (or X) so toxic, why is social media in general a portal for defamation and disdain. Perhaps it is the lack of clarity, tone, facial expressions, body language and non-verbal cues.
For those of us who grew up in the 40-plus age bracket, the shift in communication has been dramatic. We didn’t get our first mobile phones until around 19. There were no 11 or 12-year-olds walking around with devices. As technology expanded, so did the volume of communication — and with volume comes miscommunication. Just as the internet has given us an overwhelming amount of information (much of it unreliable), constant digital communication has made misreading each other almost inevitable.
A Case Study in Misreading
A recent experience illustrated this perfectly. After my long-standing electrician retired, I turned to a local Facebook community forum to find a replacement. I posted asking for a qualified and certified electrician, gave a rough timeline for the work, and noted there might be additional jobs to add. Simple enough.
The response was not. A handful of people — mostly those who had never posted on the forum before — reacted with laughing emojis. One person accused me of being a penny-pincher and claimed to be “warning” others against people like me. In reality, I had simply set an expectation, not a deadline, because I know tradespeople often juggle multiple jobs. My asking for qualified and certified professionals wasn’t a slight — it was common sense when someone is working with electrics in your home.
There was no reasoning with this person. They had fixed their interpretation and weren’t shifting. Eventually, I blocked them and moved on. The majority of people on the forum were genuinely helpful — this was a small but vocal minority making something out of nothing.
Why It Happens
This kind of miscommunication isn’t new or unique to that forum — it’s part of why I stopped using Twitter. A few key factors tend to drive it:
Lack of clarity: Messages can be vague, ambiguous, or open to interpretation. Having a background in the legal sector, I tend to write with precision — but even then, people will read what they want to read.
Lack of tone: Without facial expressions or body language, meaning gets lost. Body language is said to account for around 55% of communication. Text strips that away entirely.
Emotional state: Typos and rushed writing can signal that someone is stressed or emotional, which can trigger a mirrored response in the reader. If you’ve ever dealt with an upset customer, you know how quickly that energy can escalate — and how much skill it takes not to absorb it.
No non-verbal cues: Digital communication removes the rapport-building elements of face-to-face interaction. Without them, it’s easy to assume the worst.
Getting It Right
A few principles worth keeping in mind:
Write as if you’d want to receive the message. If something reads as too blunt or direct, soften it. Emojis can help in casual settings, though obviously not in professional ones. If you’re unsure what someone meant, ask — there’s no shame in seeking clarity.
Email, for all its limitations, has real advantages: it’s a permanent record, it gives you time to think before responding, and it keeps communication out of the heat of the moment. The same care that goes into a well-written email should go into any digital message.
The Harvard Business Review has published a useful piece on ten common digital miscommunications and how to avoid them — worth a read if this is something you navigate regularly.
The Bottom Line
Not everyone causing friction online is a troll — sometimes it’s a genuine misread, a rushed message, or a bad day bleeding into a comment section. But some people are just there to cause trouble, and the best response is often no response at all. Block, move on, don’t get drawn into a back-and-forth that was never going to go anywhere useful.
The goal is always clarity: in what you write, in how you interpret others, and in knowing when a conversation isn’t worth having.
Harvard Business Review – 10 Digital Miscommunications and how to avoid them
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