Why Internet Debates Are So Awful

[^_^ 5,021]

Your thoughts?

"I have thought a lot about why people get so hostile online, and I have come to believe it is primarily because we live in a society with a hypertrophied sense of justice and an atrophied sense of humility and charity, to put the matter in terms of the classic virtues. ... In our online debates, we not only fail to cultivate charity and humility, we come to think of them as vices: forms of weakness that compromise our advocacy. And so we go forth to war with one another."

--Alan Jacobs, professor of English at Wheaton College, writing at Big Questions Online. (Via ArtsJournal.)

[Danno 1,228]

Your thoughts?

- Moderates tend to avoid the conversation, those with very fixed positions do 90% of the posting.

- Since body language and tone are absent, readers often assume those elements which can grossly skew a posters view.

-The general respect most of us have in face to face encounters, seems to evaporate in on-line encounters.

[Ban Hammer 14,147]

i blame aj, and then the british.

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

I think most people get hostile because ...

1. They have little intellect to contribute. Absent good thoughts and arguments, there is little else but to raise your voice, hurl insults. Definite sign of weakness. There are LOTS of weak people, empty headed people in the world. Our education system cultivates them. They all have a computer. Many have one at home and another that their employer stupidly gives them. The faster they raise their voice and hurl insults, the weaker and less intelligent they are. In other words (for those on the left) "he you says 'DOUCHEBAG' first...loses"

2. Hostility can also come from not waking up next to a hot naked FSU chick every morning. If you married badly and have to wake up with someone that makes your day miserable, what would you expect? If you wake up next to a hot naked FSU chick every morning...what on EARTH can make you hostile? I contend it is impossible. (some people not married to hot FSU chicks will get hostile I said this...just watch)

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Debate is a contact sport. Grow up people!

[Nagishkaw 510]

Some people are just @zzholes. And everyone knows an @zzhole has two functions. 1, chit comes out of it and 2, it stinks.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

I think that in general, certain personality types are drawn to express their views as well as their emotions that they typically keep to themselves in real life. Anonymity as well as the safety of being behind a computer screen give a lot of people a false sense of confidence, just like driving behind a wheel gives to many people.

[IncorrectPolitics 26]

They are so awful because they go on and on and the same thing is repeated over and over. These people find snippets of information on google and argue about things that they would otherwise know nothing about. On top of that they keep an online thesaurus and dictionary close by and look for the most complicated words they can find to pull together a sentence that makes absolutely no sense because the synonyms they have pulled together completely change the meaning of the point they were originally trying to make....all of this is done in order to appear more intelligent than the person they are debating with.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

I love when dictionary definitions come out. You know someone has lost the plot when they do that. Or talk endlessly about themselves.

[Atencio 43]

I liken internet chats to the movie that someone just mentioned in another thread "Fight Club".

We all have our other personalities on-line.

In real life I bet we are all somewhat different and probably would be friendlier to each other. Our comments would be more thought out before spoken.

But as mentioned, behind the computer we are something else. You only see what is in front of you, the print. You don't see expressions. You don't always take the words in context. You miss things posted by people. All of this can lead you to take things the wrong way, to feel the other person is attacking you. Gets your adrenalin flowing.

People post what you consider pointless remarks. They call your remarks pointless. Conversations get taken out to weird tangents that would never occur in a real conversation. By this time you really feel like Tyler Durden.

Well no, the movie was much more complex than that.

Some of the posts here mention some people, they, but really anyone who has debated a lot on the internet should be able to see themselves in many of the examples.

I used to visit a website and this was the norm. You could say the sky is blue and get 50 people to tell you that you are an idiot.

As ########## said, it is a sport. Some people just enjoy it.

[justashooter 430]

I think most people get hostile because ...

1. They have little intellect to contribute. Absent good thoughts and arguments, there is little else but to raise your voice, hurl insults. Definite sign of weakness. There are LOTS of weak people, empty headed people in the world. Our education system cultivates them. They all have a computer. Many have one at home and another that their employer stupidly gives them. The faster they raise their voice and hurl insults, the weaker and less intelligent they are. In other words (for those on the left) "he you says 'DOUCHEBAG' first...loses"

in a face to face people like this tend to back down quickly, because they know they have lost before the conflict even begins. on the net, they are hiding behind a keyboard, so have opportunity to work out their failed real life. just little snippets in attack. never a well thought out argument, or even an original thought. just bashing people that have clearly bested them. calling names like "xenophobe" or "homophobe" or "ethnocentrist" that are neither inherently negative, nor determinative. nobody here is afraid of homos. we just don't want them kissing in our front yards, unless they're hot chixx, in which case we ask them inside...

[The_Dude 1,142]

in a face to face people like this tend to back down quickly, because they know they have lost before the conflict even begins. on the net, they are hiding behind a keyboard, so have opportunity to work out their failed real life. just little snippets in attack. never a well thought out argument, or even an original thought. just bashing people that have clearly bested them. calling names like "xenophobe" or "homophobe" or "ethnocentrist" that are neither inherently negative, nor determinative. nobody here is afraid of homos. we just don't want them kissing in our front yards, unless they're hot chixx, in which case we ask them inside...

Kind of like how some pussies hide behind guns?

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Kind of like how some pussies hide behind guns?

Who needs guns when you have the Center for American Progress and the Huffington Post?

ETA: Oops! Did I just make this thread political?

Edited September 6, 2010 by ##########

[The_Dude 1,142]

Who needs guns when you have the Center for American Progress and the Huffington Post?

ETA: Oops! Did I just make this thread political?

Fail AARP member is Fail.

[Nagishkaw 510]

Kind of like how some pussies hide behind guns?

Better to hide behind guns than behind women's skirts.