I do love a good old banter. I rarely find myself surrounded by either minions too scared to utter an opinion or herds of people who agree wholeheartedly with every pearl that slides out of my mouth.
That's the beauty of living amongst others.
I have never lacked the confidence to say what I think, and even though I am pretty arrogant about reckoning I am right, I know there are lots of people with other ideas that I find interesting in the hearing and occasionally so compelling that I am lead to research to possibly change my beliefs.
So life is a colourful leap through lively conversations with people that I know and like.
Until that is, you venture onto online forums.
Now it should be noted I guess that people enjoy the safety of the company of like minded souls. So if you are madly anti abortion then security could probably found in some fundamentalist religious right to life forum, though if you are looking for directions to such, I am sadly bloody useless, and if you have always been a card carrying unionist with greeny leanings, then being part of the right wing conservatives forum probably wouldn't be for you.
I read all sorts of online stuff. I think it is a habit built from years of having such a shit knee that sitting was my preferred position, and I am yet to wean myself form any of it.
Trolls, which used to be those nasties hiding under the bridge who scared little kids, seem to enjoy winding up the settled secure audiences of forums, by making inflammatory statements and then running away.
These fools are easy enough to ignore even though sometimes their outrageous nastiness is so mean that you wonder what in the world can have possible slapped 'em hard enough to leave 'em so brittle and miserable. It is ridiculously easy to really let someone have it, just tap away and click enter and walk away.
It's pathetic though isn't it? So cowardly and puerile.
Sometimes I read stuff and I so vehemently disagree with it that a comment flies out of my fingers. I don't try to sugar coat what I think and I don't second guess every word I write. I just write what I think and why I think it. It is an issue based response, not personal. How could it be personal, when I have no idea how to see through the anonymity of cyberness, to meet the authors of the opinions with which I disagree,
It would be a waste of my time and effort to spend time on name calling or making derogatory remarks about the arguments of others, so I am always surprised when I am the brunt of a personal attack, too often thrust by trolls who have neither fully read nor comprehended my comment.
Anyway, I don't suppose this modern phenomena is ever likely to disappear. It is just too easy to cowardly and ignorantly slap away at someone. It is so common place that perhaps I should write some guidelines to present to kids so they can become resilient to it all.
An intelligent exchange is far more common in person preferably accompanied by food and maybe a bit of a bevvie.
No comments:
Post a Comment