A daily read of any website, including this one, reveals an ugly side of America. No matter what the topic, be it politics, celebrity gossip, healthy living or food, a quick review of the comments posted by readers is a sad commentary on who some of us have become, and how the Internet has made it so much easier to say mean, harsh and inappropriate things without consequence.
What is up with us?
It should give us pause that we are capable of such ugliness and even more pause that we will make ugly comments in an anonymous setting about people we do not know. It seems that with our location and true identity concealed behind an avatar or screen name, we take full license to unleash venom on the president, Congress, chefs, J.Lo, the Kardashians and not to mention the authors, reporters and bloggers themselves who are targeted by this vitriol for writing a story or stating their opinion.
Human nature is interesting. On one hand, we loudly condemn people like Sarah Palin for placing cross hairs on districts where the representative is "targeted" to be defeated in an election. (I am not defending her by any means -- Ms. Palin personally offends me politically, intellectually and as a woman.) We condemn and ridicule Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly and Ann Coulter for the hatred that spews from their biased views. On the other hand, a commenter feels completely justified in calling Jennifer Lopez a "momma ho" because she is getting divorced and made a silly comment about loving herself to a magazine. It's fine to snipe about how short Tom Cruise is and don't forget, a Scientologist, which somehow makes him stupid, crazy, untalented and unworthy of his fame and a bad father.
What does this say about the readers who post these awful comments about people they do not know? None of us can understand Jennifer Lopez's married life (unless we know her). None of us can know what goes on behind the closed doors in Washington that result in some of the decisions we must live with (God help us).
Are we so base a species that, given circumstances that will prevent us from "getting caught," we will post such awful sentiments, feeling free to let loose all of our prejudices, jealousies, frustrations and disappointments on those of us who happen to be famous in one way or another? Or lead what we perceive as a better life?
Are our lives so small that this is who we become in our darkened dens, computer screens glowing, as we read about people we perceive to be more glamorous, with more privilege or power, more opportunity, that we must make ourselves feel better about ourselves by posting insipid, mean and small-minded comments on a website?
In the extreme, this kind of baseness has resulted in cyber bullying and child and teen suicide. But the thinking begins with these mean-spirited postings. The public posting of vitriolic hatred and pettiness plants the seeds that make it okay to cyber bully.
Maybe I am naïve, but I think we live in a time when there is no place for this kind of behavior. We have big problems to contend with, and we need high-minded, intelligent ideas to solve them. We live in a time when we are all struggling -- to make ends meet, find gainful employment and keep our sanity in the climate of political insanity in which we live. Rather than waste time on whether or not Tom Cruise is crazy or our president a Christian, would we not be better served as humans if we took the higher road and used our creative energies to lift each other up rather than tear each other apart? The Internet is a useful and meaningful tool and would be better served for spreading information and postings on sites to highlight the best in humanity, not bringing each other down in anonymity.
I love that here at The Huffington Post, they are celebrating their 1 millionth comment. Wouldn't it be cool if the next million did not include any venom?
Okay, bring it on -- let the comments begin.
Malkia A. Cyril: The Internet Strikes Back: Why the Internet Needs Jedi Knights
Diane Dimond: Internet Anonymity: Unleashing Our Inner Sociopath
Johann Hari: Has The Internet Brought Us Together -- Or Pulled Us Apart?
STOP cyberbullying: Cyberbullying - what it is, how it works and ...
Cyber Bullying - Internet Safety - NY DCJS
Cyber-bullying - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
YouTube Comments Are No Longer Safe for Mean People on the Internet
Comments on "Does the internet make you mean?" | Psychology Today
People produce a lot of nasty behavior. We all have the impulse from time to time to criticize such behavior, and if the behavior is nasty enough, to criticize the people producing it. Some people can't tell the difference between criticism of their arguments or their thought processes, and criticism of their basic humanity. Is it mean to point out that someone's argument for a public policy is unsound, ill-founded, or dishonest? Some people think it is. Is denial of a fallacious argument's validity nasty?
I think that people who believe they are "hurt" or "injured" in an argument with someone they have never seen are overvaluing their momentary emotional responses to someone else's words. In any argument, there are likely to be participants whose main goal is to "win" the argument, instead of determining the reality of the situation. They may resort to personal insults. Sometimes those insults are made on the basis of inferences made about another person with no basis whatever. When people's personal interests are in conflict, the conflict is likely going to have some personal overtones. That's life.
The good news is that you can always start your own website where you can censor people who issue unwarranted hostility. A lot of my favorite forums have been co-opted by trolls, however. It's disheartening to make a comment about an author or artist I admire, only to be responded to with personal insults by someone who loves the same things I do.
But the Internet is also a medium where people can get news from outside the monopoly of the Big Six. With so many people in America stuck inside a distorted reality, not even aware how much they're really being manipulated, that's an important thing to protect. The pettiness we see reflected there is only projected by the toxic thoughts lurking inside them. These characteristics, this hostility has always been there. This country is full of people who are selfish, bigoted and cruel. And we need to acknowledge just deep those anti-virtues run in our culture. We also need to get people educated how our media monopoly is fueling the fires for this kind of ignorant anger.
Only until we quit deceiving ourselves about what we're becoming can we objectively decide how to deal with it.
It provides an environment to use our voices without any regard as to whether we have anything worth saying.
SSDD: Same Stupid, Different Decade
Trolls used to anger me but now I’ve gotten pretty good at identifying them and immediately passing over their trolly comments. Dumping all over some website or poster is the new equivalent of pulling a fire alarm at a dance or setting a flaming bag of dog-doo on someone’s front steps and I find them sad more than anything. I mean, the internet is so full of avenues of learning and enjoyment, I don’t understand why they would spend so much time hoping only to irritate and spoil.
Also, I think people are far too sensitive about criticism many times and some take such swipes from anonymous jerks far too seriously. Most meanness one encounters online is from people just trying to get under their skin. Don’t let them. Answering trolls gives them credence.
What it has really done is made it possible to spread mean farther and faster, to more people, and leave the mean lingering.
Used to be the most common way to be mean was verbally, and face-to-face, or acquaintance to acquaintance. The next step was directly physical, the push and shove, the pinch or pull, the disheveling and then tearing of clothes. At distance the spit-ball or shot rubber-band, thrown object, splashed mud. If one wanted to write something mean, one used a pencil, or pen. The nearest to the internet was writing a victim's number on a bathroom wall.
Today, with the internet to be mean requires learning to type. At least to a degree. To write nasty phrases. Almost always more purpose directed and less crude than in the old days. It requires searching for victims' "web-presences" and learning techniques to sabotage those.
But the effects go a lot farther, and with google, and other search, caching, they can stay around a lot longer. And the moment of the viciousness can be searched for and found, and re-lived again and again, by victim, victimizer and stranger.
I don't see more viciousness, or meanness, only more repetition through publication. It is like everyone has a printing press and can each make his or her own nasty drawing or suggestion
However, in theory, I agree that I find it a bit odd that people read an article, say, about the Kardashians, and feel the need to comment, "Who cares?" "Why is this news?" or other, much nastier thoughts. If you don't care, then why'd you open up the article to begin with?
My grandma always said if you've got nothing nice to say, then don't say anything at all. Well, that simply doesn't apply in today's world. But after all, who am I to judge, right?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_disinhibition_effect
I can not comment on the ugliness concerning posts of celeberty status, but I can tell you that , on a political level, this country has been polarized into 2 camps. The people are not divided by a differance of opinion, but a difference of Principal! You have not yet seen ugly! It is one thing to attempt to promote political agenda online, but if the very same liberals where to physically, in person, pick my pocket, steal from my house, take fruit off of my trees or produce from my garden, I would use lead to let the air out of them or turn their heads into canoes, and the problem would be solved! Theft, in any form, is immoral, unethical, and wrong!! Even if it is done through the taxation implemented through majoritive tyrrany! the ugliness that you see is a warning to which you should pay heed!