Name: Corn Dawg's review of We Had To Remove This Post by Hanna Bervoets
Item: We Had To Remove This Post
Rating: 2
Author: Corn Dawg

Hanna Bervoets

Kayleigh needs money. That’s why she takes a job as a content moderator for a social media platform whose name she isn’t allowed to mention. Her job: reviewing offensive videos and pictures, rants and conspiracy theories, and deciding which need to be removed. It’s grueling work. Kayleigh and her colleagues spend all day watching horrors and hate on their screens, evaluating them with the platform’s ever-changing terms of service while a supervisor sits behind them, timing and scoring their assessments. Yet Kayleigh finds a group of friends, even a new love—and, somehow, the job starts to feel okay.

But when her colleagues begin to break down; when Sigrid, her new girlfriend, grows increasingly distant and fragile; when her friends start espousing the very conspiracy theories they’re meant to be evaluating; Kayleigh begins to wonder if the job may be too much for them. She’s still totally fine, though—or is she?

We Had To Remove This Post

Wat wij zagen

Genesis (@whisperingchapters)

Kayleigh needs money. That's why she takes a job as a content moderator for a social media platform whose name she isn't allowed to mention. Her job: reviewing offensive videos and pictures, rants and conspiracy theories, and deciding which need to be removed. It's grueling work. Kayleigh and her colleagues spend all day watching horrors and hate on their screens, evaluating them with the platform's ever-changing terms of service while a supervisor sits behind them, timing and scoring their assessments. Yet Kayleigh finds a group of friends, even a new love—and, somehow, the job starts to feel okay.

But when her colleagues begin to break down; when Sigrid, her new girlfriend, grows increasingly distant and fragile; when her friends start espousing the very conspiracy theories they're meant to be evaluating; Kayleigh begins to wonder if the job may be too much for them. She's still totally fine, though--or is she?

We Had to Remove This Post

Corn Dawg

Emma Rault

Ainsley Jeffery

Relationships between the characters were great and the narrative even better. I liked how the narrator only showcased punchy details of stories; something indicative of how we take for granted that others will know the background of the stories we tell. It was not a memorable story, however was exciting, quick, sleazy, and sharp.

armoni mayes

i don’t know why i just wasted 2 hours of my life on this audiobook

Marz 

Unlike a lot of people in the reviews, I did not come across this book on social media rather I saw it in-store and the cover made me interested because it looked so obscure. Regardless I was still really disappointed, this book does not feel complete it feels like a rough draft. None of the ideas or plot lines are fully developed, while I saw the other did a lot of research into content moderation it seems perhaps they should have spent some of that time actually developing the plot of their book. 

The observations and commentary on how social media sites treat their content moderators and the innate horror of their jobs are so surface-level. If you were to read an article on this topic you would come away with better conclusions and it would be more interesting to read. The storyline around Kayleigh is similarly poorly developed, it was cliche and I don't really feel like I could fully understand when or how she was changed. I think focusing the plot not around the content moderation but rather on relationship drama was certainly a choice and I don't think it really paid off. I just did not understand or connect with the characters of this book, again their traits and choices were explicitly laid out to me and not really developed. 

Overall I feel like this book was a waste of what could have been an excellent short horror instead it feels like a bit without any teeth.

Cait🪼

I am so disappointed...this book could have been incredibly interesting, but it just wasn't. I'd hoped it would be something like The Circle by Dave Eggers: social commentary mixed with a dystopian chill. But 90% of the book focused on the unbearably toxic relationship between the protagonist and her girlfriend - the latter of whom seemed pointless and confusing. I also really disliked the excessive use of slurs...it didn't add anything and just seemed to be used for shock value. 
Not great :c

Geoffrey Froggatt

What is “normal”? What is “right”? And who gets to decide? These are the major questions at the heart of this story. To be a content moderator is to see humanity at its worst, but Kayleigh needs money. So she takes a job working for a social media platform whose name she isn’t allowed to mention. Her task: review offensive videos and pictures, rants and conspiracy theories, and decide which need to be removed. It’s grueling work. Kayleigh and her colleagues spend all day watching horrors and hate on their screens, evaluating them with the platform’s ever-changing moderating guidelines. Yet Kayleigh is good at her job, and she finds in her colleagues a group of friends, even a new girlfriend, and for the first time in her life, her future seems bright. But soon the job seems to change them all, shifting their worlds in alarming ways. How long before the moderators’ own senses of right and wrong begin to bend and flex? This book largely examines the trauma that comes with the job of reviewing and removing offensive and graphic content from a platform and how it effects the characters in this job position. I like how this story examines the behind-the-scenes of content moderators and it was interesting seeing the rules and guidelines and finding out what falls through the cracks or what constitutes as what. I thought that the scene showing the moderators using dark humour to cope was interesting as it was simultaneously an example of the characters flirting with taboo/darkness in a cathartic way and a sign that they’re all being desensitized to and changed by the content they’re forced to examine for hours each day. Seeing how the content moderation job was the pipeline to radicalize some of the characters through misinformation was interesting and realistic, but I wish it wasn’t the biggest storyline in this book. I think it was an interesting approach to hint at and only briefly touch upon the content that these characters moderated, but a disturbing part of myself wanted to hear what terrifying things they were seeing and what was the worst of it. I think it was the wrong move to focus on the protagonist’s relationship and how she fell out of the job rather than focus on the repercussions of having a job like this effects human beings. There were many great interesting themes and ideas here that are only briefly touched upon and ignored in favour of the easiest and most boring way to tell this story. I wanted to hear more about the desensitization, the nihilism, the trauma, the radicalization that comes with content moderation, but instead we get a very surface level novel exploring how misinformation spreads and the effect it has on people, with a focus on the protagonist unraveling as a way to close out the story. The ending was very sudden and unsatisfying, and it felt like the author had an interesting idea but just chose to stop writing the second she reached her word count. I finished this story feeling like I wasted my time or that I had read the first quarter of a rough draft of an unfinished manuscript. This was ultimately a very disappointing novel only because the brilliant premise had so much potential to be so much more, and out of all the interesting branching paths this story could have taken, the author chose the most boring way to wrap things up which ultimately felt like a cop out as this story felt like it ended before it ever truly began. I’ve always said that the most disappointing stories are the ones with an excellent premise and a poor execution, and this novel is a perfect example of that.

jess larry

weird nonsense filled book, i hate that ending

i expected soooo much more

Salma

Robin

Wanneer Kayleigh in de financiële problemen raakt, solliciteert ze naar een baan als 'content moderator' voor een online platform waarvan ze de naam niet mag noemen. Haar taak: beoordelen welke aanstootgevende filmpjes, foto's en tirades moeten worden verwijderd. Het werk is zwaar. Kayleigh en haar collega's zien gruwelijke dingen voorbijkomen, en de richtlijnen van het platform zijn vaak onnavolgbaar. Toch voelt Kayleigh zich op haar plek, binnen het moderatorenteam vindt ze broederschap. En als Kayleigh verliefd wordt op haar collega Sigrid lacht de toekomst hen toe. Of lijkt dat maar zo? Wat wij zagen is een verhaal over wie of wat ons wereldbeeld bepaalt.

Nessa Luna

I had no idea what this book was about, to be honest, because I'd never read the synopsis. It wasn't until I'd heard someone talk about the English translation of it that I thought 'well that sounds interesting', and when I went to add it to my tbr, I saw I already owned it. 

Honestly, this book was kind of disappointing. I get that you can't really do much when the book is less than 100 pages, but I really think it may have been a better story had it been longer. I do think it had potential, but I just had too many questions by the end of this story. An ending that left me completely unsatisfied, I might say.

This was a One sitting read on a Wet Saturday afternoon and I do feel a little let down by this one, it started strong, but I felt a little let down by the ending it was not what I through the story was building up to which was a little disappointing as the premise of the book sounded fab.

Having said that We had to remote this post is an incredibly fascinating, sharp, and provocative read. Inspired by True Stores of Social Media Content moderators. This book follows Kayleigh, a 20 something woman who takes on a job as a content moderator as a big social media company (Which is never named) and this book shows the impact on both her and her colleague’s lives.

The Book examines the trauma that comes with the job of reviewing and removing offensive and graphic content online, but also explores the widespread desensitisation among the general populace as well as seeing what happens when you click on that Report button as a user.

This book will leave you questioning everything you thought you knew about the internet, social media, and humanity.

Ian Brakspear

This was a One sitting read on a Wet Saturday afternoon and I do feel a little let down by this one, it started strong, but I felt a little let down by the ending it was not what I through the story was building up to which was a little disappointing as the premise of the book sounded fab.

 

Having said that We had to remote this post is an incredibly fascinating, sharp, and provocative read. Inspired by True Stores of Social Media Content moderators. This book follows Kayleigh, a 20 something woman who takes on a job as a content moderator as a big social media company (Which is never named) and this book shows the impact on both her and her colleague’s lives.

 

The Book examines the trauma that comes with the job of reviewing and removing offensive and graphic content online, but also explores the widespread desensitisation among the general populace as well as seeing what happens when you click on that Report button as a user.

This book will leave you questioning everything you thought you knew about the internet, social media, and humanity.

Amani Zaha

This book's claim of belonging to the horror genre is laughable, really. It promises that and a deep dive into the horrifying! experiences of a group of social media content moderators, neither of which it delivers on. I was so very excited for this but it ended up not being what it claimed to be. 

I expected: nightmare fodder. A descent into madness. Blurred lines between reality and the virtual. Subtle, layered character development; at the very least some character depth. Maybe some thought-provoking questions about morals and ethics.

Instead, I got stories about our main character's past romantic relationships. An overarching narrative about her current romantic relationship. Add in sprinklings of derogatory language, conspiracy theories and occasionally, characters describing videos they've had to watch of body mutilation and other kinds of violence. A cast of could-be interesting supporting characters who ultimately have very weak presence.

Characters behave in one way until we get to the end and suddenly they're drastically different, with no traces of where or how this change began. I think what bothers me the most is that the story gives all of its attention to Kayleigh's romantic relationship and while the author tries to tie it to the job that is supposed to be at the centre of the story, the whole thing mostly falls flat.

Sick book cover though!!

sophia n

there’s a subtlety to this book that i think is intentional and honestly makes it’s point very clear in the fact that it’s actually not making it very obvious but more insidious, but i still somehow wanted something more. maybe this is simply just my taste bias in wanting horror or surrealism to at minimum feel like the THREAT of a hard bite, and this missed that edge for me. but it definitely was super interesting and i think tackles a topic in real life happening right now that is fascinating in its horrifying psychologically traumatizing nature. a really interesting read that i'm glad i picked up.

also to quote the top dutch review on here: moral of the story, slap holocaust deniers more often. 

tws: f-slur, self harm, antisemitism, violence, animal cruelty, child abuse, gore, suicide, animal death, child death, drug use, physical abuse, sexual content, torture, toxic relationship, xenophobia, stalking

A short book about the life/effects of being a content moderator for things that should not be on the internet. Listened as an audiobook and some of the situations were a bit troubling to listen to but in all honesty are what some weirdos post. Are content moderators real??? Bc if so I cannot believe social media companies pay ppl to do that, seems so unethical! 

Kyra Cracchiola

Wanneer Kayleigh in de financiële problemen raakt, solliciteert ze naar een baan als 'content moderator' voor een online platform waarvan ze de naam niet mag noemen. Haar taak: beoordelen welke aanstootgevende filmpjes, foto's en tirades moeten worden verwijderd. Het werk is zwaar. Kayleigh en haar collega's zien gruwelijke dingen voorbijkomen, en de richtlijnen van het platform zijn vaak onnavolgbaar. Toch voelt Kayleigh zich op haar plek, binnen het moderatorenteam vindt ze broederschap. En als Kayleigh verliefd wordt op haar collega Sigrid lacht de toekomst hen toe. Of lijkt dat maar zo? Wat wij zagen is een verhaal over wie of wat ons wereldbeeld bepaalt.

Dit boek was het Boekenweek geschenk van 2021.

Wat Wij Zagen

Femke

Klein boekske, handig om mee te nemen.
Maar daar is 't ook mee gezegd.

Niet mijn ding.

Tom van de Bruinhorst

Ilse

Een gedurfd boek over een onderwerp waar ik wel eens vaag wat van heb meegekregen, maar me nooit in heb verdiept. De schrijfstijl van Hanna Bervoets vond ik ontzettend goed, en het verhaal interessant. Waarom dan toch maar 3 sterren? Ik snapte het einde niet. Het was abrupt en stopte recht in de actie. Ze heeft het heel de tijd tegen meneer Stitic gehad, maar op het einde is die hele man vergeten en ben ik het spoor bijster van waar ze met dat hele verhaal naartoe wilde. Hoe haar relatie is stukgelopen?

Daar lijkt het voor mij nu op wat ik jammer vind, want het novella begon ijzersterk. Bovendien is dit een onderwerp wat echt belangrijk is en vaak vergeten wordt. Het is daarom alsnog een boek wat ik zou aanraden, al is het enkel om het lijntje over content moderation wat ze er zo meesterlijk in verwerkt heeft.

Genesis (@whisperingchapters) &
We Had To Remove This Post by Hanna Bervoets

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Genesis (@whisperingchapters) &We Had To Remove This Post by Hanna Bervoets

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Genesis (@whisperingchapters) &
We Had To Remove This Post by Hanna Bervoets