Bullying
Pet
peeves, morality issues, political wrangling—gun laws are a big trigger—it’s
easy to find instances of emotions running high, rude comments, and outright
bullying. You’re stupid if you don’t fall in line with the outlook of the
person posting. Easily recognizable, you can ignore it, answer it in like vein,
or try reasoning.
I
like to keep in mind the advice not to throw your pearls [of wisdom] before
swine in case those you’re trying to convince turn to tear you apart. We hope
with words only. People who post such negativity—whichever side of the issue
they espouse—ignite and foster anger and are unlikely to be in a kind frame of
mind or open to listening to any other point of view.
A
more insidious form of bullying exists, one that pulls readers in under the
guise of doing a good thing and makes them feel guilty if they don’t follow the
directives of the post: everyone shares a train wreck (in the figurative sense);
let’s see how many will share this—pictures of a vet on Memorial Day was the
latest popular thing. So if you don’t share, it intimates that you’re
unpatriotic or ungrateful—emotional blackmail of a sort and bullying.
There
are also those that pander to the human propensity for superstition: share this
and receive good luck, money, whatever—manipulation, another form of bullying.
Living
on the Sidelines
The
lure of online communication that worries me most for my kids: so and so did
such and such (a positive thing); let’s see how many likes we can get. It makes
us feel part of a good thing to physically tap the pad and like the post. But
have we actually taken part in anything meaningful? Living vicariously from the
sidelines, while it seems we’re included in what’s going on, needs no real
decisions and actions.
I
hope my kids take part in a rich life of doing and of learning from everything
they undertake and their face to face interactions with live people. I hope
they don’t just watch and comment.
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