You are on Facebook. Social media is a staple in your life. Like eating, sleeping, taking a shower, and all other routines in your life, social media is now one of them. You have many friends on your list. (Yet still keep in mind that I use the term “friends” quite loosely). You see that many of your friends mostly post / share one of the following: selfies, random videos, and…memes. Memes galore. We are all hooked on memes: Funny memes, inspirational memes, religious memes, political memes, raunchy memes…there is clearly no shortage of meme topics. Not to mention that the more provocative memes are sure to make some of your friends go into blood-boiling conniption fits.
Sadly, just as the divorce rate has rocketed withing the past generation, so have broken friendships And what is the growing reason why friendships are also being torn apart? Fights on social media. We are all guilty of that.
I personally don’t have an issue with passionate debates, as long as all people involved know how to discuss topics as reasonable, critical thinking oriented adults. Consider all the vitriol that thousands upon thousands of people spew out on Facebook – and especially on Twitter – every day: We are apparently far from the goal of productive discourse. Moreover, it’s a bit ironic considering there is also no shortage of memes and soapboxing about avoiding “drama”. In other words, we are creating drama to fight drama.
Why are so many people here in the U.S. so full of rage? Why are we so vitriolic toward each other? It’s as I heard an acquaintance recently explain: “We talk to our ‘friends’ on social media as if we actually know them, when we really don’t know much about them all, besides how we judge them according to their social media posts.”
And sometimes, our judgement is quite accurate. Many people who are hateful, bigoted, narrow-minded jerks, often make that pretty obvious to the rest of the world. Those people should be blocked from your friends list for being a toxic mess to society.
But then there is the rest of the population: A whole lot of people who have opposing views, but may not have the proper education in critical thinking and constructive debate. That is not to look down on those people. In my recent article. “Why Facts Matter”, I go into more detail about the overall lack of critical thinking education in our country. Well, it has improved some in recent years, partly due to the mass amount of fact checking we can more easily do, right at our fingertips. People who are generally more resourceful, who are more inquisitive, who are generally not highly agreeable or a pushover, tend do their homework more thoroughly and sincerely care about facts.
However – and as I also mentioned in “Why Facts Matter” – people often put feelings before facts. Which then leads to the more emotionally inclined individuals vomiting hate speech left and right.
Here is a serious experiment to conduct: In a single day, count how many people post a comment or meme that tells, either right to the point or in so many words, other people to **f*ck off**. I don’t have a big issue with the word “fuck” per say – it has good, effective utility in some circumstances – but when it turns into every other person telling every other person to go f*ck themselves, all day, every day, we have a tremendously serious problem on our hands.
Western society was supposed to be a beacon of hope for the rest of the world. We have values that put us in a prime position to be role models for the rest of the world. We have even garnered some respect for it when we are perfectly in our element and reflecting our core values as thoughtful human beings.
Then we manage to find a way shoot cannonballs into our progress. I believe it was Oscar from the show The Office who once said in an episode (about whether Hillary Swank was hot or not) that “the problem with debates is people get even more entrenched in their views than when they started the debate”. We see this all throughout social media. Just watch anti-Trump supporters versus Trump supporters go at it. There is practically no room on either side to consider each other’s argument. That’s also because people are easily prone to tribalism and becoming ideologues.
Then, the ideologies spread with a vengeance. If you post that everyone should be vegan, look out for the hyper-alpha, meat-eater, who grow up shooting possums for fun with his shotgun, post a “you don’t know what the hell you are talking about, you libtard!!!!” (Yes, don’t forget the string of exclamation points that follow).
Or if you are a Trump supporter, and despite being possibly misguided about the flood of misinformation that Trump espouses, you make a fair point that China is cheating us on trade deals – only to have a liberal shank you with you with hateful words: “You are a racist, Nazi supporting ammosexual with a small wiener!” And, of course, usually followed by “go f*ck yourself!”.
But it doesn’t stop there: Then you have to factor the dozens, possibly hundreds, possibly thousands of people who will read your comments, get fired up in their own rage, post their own hate comments, thereby creating a domino effect of treating each other like complete garbage.
Meanwhile, many of those same, hate-filled people are super hypocritically posting feel-good memes about how we need to stop and smell the roses and be a force for good.
I have heard the definition of insanity as doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result. Here is an addition to that: Insanity is letting ourselves turn into hideous Jeckyl / Hyde characters who let our dark side speak just as loudly as our positive side.
I partly blame our ever growing “entitlement” culture, which has viciously infected every area of discourse and all forms of relationships. We focus much more on our rights and privileges than how we can responsibly tend to each other’s needs, concerns, and views. It’s as if most people on social media spend all day screaming “ME, ME, ME, ME!” inside their heads, and then the output is what they post on social media. “I am a badass”. “I am awesome!”; “I am a warrior”; “I will never settle for less than what I deserve”; “I am done giving a shit”….and on and on.
Consider that another experiment: Count how many people on your friends list, just in a single day, post or share something to glorify themselves or pat themselves on the back.
Any of you seeing the problem yet? We cannot possibly keep going on this way. I am not even talking about the next Civil War here in the U.S. – at least not in the ultra-violent sense. However, we are quite substantially butchering each other up so vitriolically – and so egotistically — that we could possibly reach an even more devastating point of return. That’s not to be apocalyptic. Rather, it’s just highlighting the situation that WE – yes, ALL of us – have created. It’s not good, people.
We must…STOP…the hate.