Never (and I mean never) read the comments

[digger71]

Luckily the Zone exists in its own world where a vast majority of posters are just interested in the stoke they find in paddling and surfing, but every once in a while I am bored/foolish/hopeful enough to actually read comments on news articles or other social media sites.  And I regret it every single time.

So learn from my mistakes and don't ever do it!  You really don't need to know what your uncle's unfiltered and ill-informed opinion is on (insert controversial social issue here).  As Outside magazine so well graphed out below, it will destroy hope!

[stoneaxe]

I think it has spread far beyond the comments to pretty much all social media. Though the comments are where it seems worst.

[PonoBill]

I noticed this years ago. Comments in even reasonably intelligent publications reflect the worst of human nature. I think it's the effect of anonymity, plus the simple fact that the notion that we are an intelligent species is hopelessly optimistic. Sometimes I wonder how technology moves forward. The overwhelming majority of the people I meet don't know how an induction motor works, much less a smartphone. Reading comments is one of the biggest mistakes I've made (and I've made some doozies). Left me cheering for the cockroaches to hurry up and take over.

[surf4food]

Sometimes the commenters are not even anonymous. For a short while I belonged to a facebook veterans group and one of the members (I think an Army vet) ranted at me with a pretty colorful statement calling me a fag loving liberal who eats the raspberries out of clown poop. Lol.  All you can do is pity someone like that and take them with a grain of salt.

Even on NPRs facebook feed things get pretty nasty with people using their real names and profile pics. 

[PonoBill]

Even though facebook is theoretically real names, there's a big difference in delivering a rant in person vs. through media when you're alone with just your computer. I used to have to be enormously careful with email, because I don't naturally connect emotionally to people. I have to think about how the things I write will effect others. You might notice that most of my posts have edits. Generally they are for that purpose. Most ranters and people posting disgusting comments are just letting the monster in their head run loose. If they did that in the physical world they would be shunned and isolated. A hugely cowardly thing to do, but that's the online world.

[Tom]

Not all comments  come from  real people .

[stoneaxe]

If they did that in the physical world they would be shunned and isolated. A hugely cowardly thing to do, but that's the online world.

And have their lights put out.

That's also a problem Tom. Plenty of manipulation going on.

[Weasels wake]

I was going to comment on this, but the subject of the matter precluded me from doing so. 

[pdxmike]

I was going to comment on this, but the subject of the matter precluded me from doing so. 

That's also why I'm not making any comments here.


Luckily if I do decide to comment, I can start with, "I won't even mention..." in front of whatever I want to say, so it doesn't really count as a comment.

[digger71]

Not all comments  come from  real people .

That's an entire issue on its own, but the one's that scare me the most are people I know.  Or at least I thought I knew...

[Tom]

Not all comments  come from  real people .

That's an entire issue on its own, but the one's that scare me the most are people I know.  Or at least I thought I knew...

and the  people  you  know  that  believe  the  posts  from  the  not real people 

[SUP Leave]

I didn't realize I was related to so many racists until Facebook came around.

My mother loves Facebook. She takes every online quiz (and post the results), she quotes bible verses, she gushingly comments about her abilities as a grandma, she posts eloquent walls of text regarding the political soup du jour, and clearly gets 90% of her fulfillment from online posting. I have been sitting next to her, seemingly having a normal conversation when a post pops up on Facebook about Trump or the Seahawks. She is posting right in the middle of a conversation with me! My sister and I have been having the talk lately, it is not who will take mom's car keys away anymore, it is who will take her social media away?

I am amazed by the psychology of it all (my wife has a masters degree in Psychology) and she sometimes even agrees with my take and sometimes vehemently disagrees with my take (even when she is wrong). It seems like people who go all in on social media "I love my wife/husband/partner so much for x,y,z, she completes me!" are sleeping on the couch or at their mistresses house the next week. Same thing with kids. We have a next door neighbor who routinely posts about how great her kid is in school, sports, dance, whatever. It looks like a great relationship. I asked my daughter why we haven't the kid in a while and she was like "Oh her mom called the cops on her and kicked her out of the house."

Everyone contrives on Social Media. One of my businesses has a Facebook account run by the company who does our advertisement. I live in abject fear of the Facebook page. The best that can come of it is someone posts "They did a good job, would hire again." But last week someone sent me an e-mail that said "We asked for a quote last week and have not received a return e-mail, clearly you aren't interested in our work. I am going to leave a review on your Facebook page about this."  A proposal takes a couple of weeks for this business and normally we check back in, but I was out of office for other work stuff. Simply forgetting to write a simple reply e-mail could have gotten us a bad review. There is no point in Facebook for a business like this (Land Surveying). I had to spend an extra hour soothing this person, who didn't hire us anyway.

[stoneaxe]

I find myself all too often thinking I was better off not knowing the inner thoughts of my fellow humans. Despite our huffing and puffing about being civilized we are obviously just a short evolutionary step from flinging shit at each other.

[headmount]

I like FB, the good, the bad and the ugly.  As people have mentioned in this thread, there is much online bravery but that's cool.  We get to see those monsters they unleash and that's worthy since many face to face interactions are cleverly or not so cleverly covered up.  So in the multi personality vein, we get to see their worst... or maybe their best.  That's revealing to me as you can become insulated in a very tight world where you only are exposed to like minded souls.  I've picked up many 'FB friends' that are FB friends of a real life friend based on the fact that if my real friends put up with them, maybe I will too.  Ah but no.  I haven't de friended anyone as I'm forever hopeful and know it's only teenage wasteland.  But I do scroll fast depending on my mood.

Also there is the very interesting world of manipulative propaganda in the form of memes and videos that is perpetuated on outlets like FB.  It's interesting to see what the state of the art is, however absurd the position being put out there.  I don't spend much time on them but monitor their use and frequency.  How many people 'buy' this crap and are we to '1984' mind control?

There are also many that whine about what they see on FB and try to express what they think people should post.  These are pathetic in my eyes.  Scroll faster.  Not every wave is a good one but there are some great posts, especially photos and surf videos from people I actually know in real life.

Unlike most here on the zone, many FB users are, for the most part pretty lazy, expressing themselves through others.  Maybe it's the younger crowd.  But if someone takes the time to write something in their own words, no matter what their position is, or bad grammar (mine is horrible) and spelling, they have my respect in this low bar world.  If they're lazy they sure don't get any interest on my part. 

[PonoBill]

I have a hair trigger on facebook. Start preaching--gone, start some whackjob political diatribe--gone, be a mean dick or dumber than a bag of hammers--gone, post more than one disgusting recipe with no actual food in it (cheesy tater tots with guacamole and hot dogs)--gone. I've ditched family. Stupid is as stupid does. I don't need to see it. I might have to love them, but I don't need to "like" them.

Hopes and prayers, well, I might give that a by, but they're on probation. Is there anything more pointless than saying "I'm sending my prayers, blah, blah". Just get it over and say "I'm not really going to do anything to help, but I don't want you to know I don't give a fuck".