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Posted on 01/06/2010 7:33:38 PM PST by GOP_Lady
Rude and abusive online behavior should not be met with silence.
In less than 20 years, the World Wide Web has irrevocably expanded the number of ways we connect and communicate with others. This radical transformation has been almost universally praised.
What hasn't kept pace with the technical innovation is the recognition that people need to engage in civil dialogue. What we see regularly on social networking sites, blogs and other online forums is behavior that ranges from the carelessly rude to the intentionally abusive.
Flare-ups occur on social networking sites because of the ease by which thoughts can be shared through the simple press of a button. Ordinary people, celebrities, members of the media and even legal professionals have shown insufficient restraint before clicking send. There is no shortage of examples—from the recent Twitter heckling at a Web 2.0 Expo in New York, to a Facebook poll asking whether President Obama should be killed.
The comments sections of online gossip sites, as well as some national media outlets, often reflect semi-literate, vitriolic remarks that appear to serve no purpose besides disparaging their intended target. Some sites exist solely as a place for mean-spirited individuals to congregate and spew their venomous verbiage.
Online hostility targeting adults is vastly underreported. The reasons victims fail to come forward include the belief that online hostility is an unavoidable and even acceptable mode of behavior; the pervasive notion that hostile online speech is a tolerable form of free expression; the perceived social stigma of speaking out against attacks; and the absence of readily available support infrastructure to assist victims.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Tell me about it!
And not unnoticeably rubbed off on politicians too . . .especially Democrats
Their level of discourse has proven anything but “civil”
To add to this, I think “online behavior” translates into face-to-face behavior, with people being increasingly more rude to one another. Simple phrases like “please” and “thank you” can sound like a foreign language these days.
There is a lot of crap out here on the internet. I once came across a site which included gruesome pictures of a murdered family. The visitors were mocking the deaths of the man, his wife, and their four year old daughter simply because the deceased man was a pastor. What a horrible thing to do to the deceased, putting their pictures on a site full of leftist sociopaths.
Free speech? A myth?
What an insulting little rant. The writer should just shut up and tend to his chores.
Right, lets turn the internet over to the PC police too.
The beauty of the internet is that you are not in physical proximity with those you are discussing or debating? No one can intimidate you with their size. The good looking dont get more attention. No one knows if you are handicapped, your race, your sex etc.
The internet is all about ideas. We can individually decide to feed trolls or not as it amuses us. We don’t need PC police saying what is ok, because we know how that story ends. It ends with liberal ideas, like say global warming, getting the stamp of approval and conservative ideas, like individual responsibility, being labeled racist or sexist or something.
I think the internet was primarily created by and for zit faced nerds that spent their formative years not getting laid and being pushed around by football players. The internet gives them the power to say and do things to people that they would never be able to say or do otherwise. at least that’s how I explain the over abundance of mean spirited key boardists out there.
“Tell me about it!”
You’ve seen the future!
And it swears...
Those who made fun of that, they are not going to get away with it. In our 1-hour plot wrapup society, our microwave mentality, it may seem that they are. Justice delayed isn’t justice denied. They will account.
I check in there daily to keep tabs on the enemy. I always feel like I need to take a shower when I’m done. Been banned about 7 times so far. They really hate it when their social political arguments fail to measure up. Once they get argued into a corner, you’re banned and then the losers declare victory.
Mr Wales is the founder of Wikipedia? and he is lecturing on civil discourse?
Ideas originate in people. And people have names and faces in real life.
Internet names (anonymous) and the absence of faces and the impersonal dialogue still doesn’t cover up the fact that behind that curtain is a person and it’s persons who have ideas. Ideas aren’t like light bulbs suspended in the air.
Internet can provide incredible good, but there’s no denying that it can also become a haven for some who are psychologically impaired and/or who conveniently put away the restraint they would use in real life, in real places, with real people.
Oh, I found the PERFECT picture of someone on their PC, but I just couldn't post it. I saw it and just laughed and laughed and laughed.
Oh, but MSNBC and the rest of the state run fringe media are exempt on rudeness, eh?
LOL. You should write a book before someone else does.
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