why-is-everyone-on-the-internet-so-angry

[jaydot]

i am reminded of 'the selfish gene' by this article(
http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... e-internet
-so-angry&page=2 ) and in particular some of the comments regarding the
parasites sucking the lifeblood out of society.

i recall professor dawkins remarking that when a group of individuals becomes
oversubscribed by selfish individuals, those put upon rebel and refuse them
succour as the oak excludes gall wasp larvae in the oak apple.

of course people are angry, whether or not they permit that to be seen beyond
their physical dimension. far from banning the vicious and foulmouthed, i see
this as an opportunity to demonstrate my beautiful manners (work in progress)
in calm, reasoned reply. my aim is to be the most polite, civilised virtual
presence, always calm and reasonable. no matter how angry, rude, vitriolic or
vicious my interlocutor becomes, i shall remain serene.

i can do this because i can walk away from the keyboard and engage in some
activity to dissipate my rage. anger, it would seem, is the off switch to
reason. anger is useful in that it peps one up no end. i have a use for that
energy - not to be wasted on some febrile, peurile response to insult.

see what happens when a mate comes round with a bit of green. by golly but it
gets verbose. i'll have a read of this later and see if it makes me groan.
right now it appears marvellous.

[FBM]

It's a lot easier to be incisive, rude and insulting to someone you've never met and will probably never meet. Easy to channel life's daily frustrations onto a 'safe' target, saying things online that you'd never dream of saying to a person face-to-face. This is one reason I don't post more than I do in serious topics of potential interest to me.

[rasetsu]

"Oh piss off."

[FBM]

[Kristie]

No anger here!

[Tero]

Hemorrhoids. Prostate problems. Back pain. Too much sitting.

[hadespussercats]

I think it might be like road rage.

Any minor annoyance becomes an excuse to dump your pent-up anger on a stranger.

[Kristie]

I think it might be like road rage.

Any minor annoyance becomes an excuse to dump your pent-up anger on a stranger.

Ohhhh, I get road rage like a mofo!

[surreptitious57]

Human beings have a natural disposition towards anger, as indeed they do to all emotions. This has absolutely nothing to do with the internet. We were angry a long, long time before it came along. It is therefore wrong to assume that it is making us angry. It isn't. What it does however, is allow us to validate that anger.

There are two reasons for this. The first is that we are anonymous. We can post what we like and no one knows who we are. I would suggest that if everyone had to post their full name and postal address instead of a username or avatar that the level of anger would desist significantly. There is nothing guaranted to make one behave if they know they can be identified. The second reason is that we feel our greviances are legitimate and that the net legitimises these even moreso because we have a potential audience more accessible than ever. Remember the old days when you would have to write a letter to a newspaper to get your voice heard? Well they are no more. And now anyone with access to a computer can tell the whole world what they think and feel. And they do. But make no mistake. The anger was always there. The net is just a vehicle for it.

But why get angry in the first place? I have a self imposed life time ban on ever judging anyone. It is part of my moral rehabilitation, if you like. Getting angry comes under that remit. So I never get angry towards anyone. They get respect. Their ideas don't, however. But even when attacking these, I do so without recourse to emotional language. If you have to reference anger, then it invalidates your argument, or at least presents it in a less than favourable light, where alternative phrasing and a neutral disposition would fare much better. I therefore do not do anger. I see no point in it. I spend a lot of time online. If I am going to be angry for all of it, then something is seriously wrong.

[rasetsu]

The philosopher Sartre once opined that anger is the attempt to achieve that which is not achievable by ordinary means through magical means, that anger is an attempt to forge a path where none truly exists, by sheer dint of will. Now the flip side of this is that we, as emotional animals, react to anger in similarly magical ways, creating paths without the need to do so; the aggressor in coming off her center, pushes the receiver off theirs, and in cases, sometimes, a path does indeed open up. Much of what makes the emotional brain tick, I suspect lies hidden, additionally covered over by myths and stories created to give the myth maker a lever to use against the force. Are these myths true? Some, perhaps, in that they coincidentally align with facets of the behavior of the emotional brain. More than that, I suspect they are as true, or perhaps better phrased, as false, as any other myth. Psychology has a long way to go to have an integrated model of the emotional brain, and febrile explanations constructed out of the erector set of folk psychology are sure to be a mixture of success and failure. Cultural memes and all that shit, ya know.

Anyway, I always bring out the Sartre chestnut on occasions such as this. I don't know, I guess doing so makes me feel comfitted, and somehow more in control.

You got a little extra from me tonight; the turtle peaks out from beneath the shell. Next time, don't put so many quarters in.



Oh, one other thing that occurs to me is that it may be serviceable to approach it from Buddhist psychology. All suffering, stems from craving, the desire for something that you have not. This craving should be viewed as the kernel from which anger grows, ultimately. And, as an aside, I believe the Buddha said that suffering and harm is like ripples on a pond, it doesn't stop where the conflict began, but ripples outward, causing more harm. And where that fits in here, I don't know. I think my mojo went to the kitchen for a snack.

[JacksSmirkingRevenge]

People are angry on the internet because fuck you.

[FBM]

[surreptitious57]

Oh, one other thing that occurs to me is that it may be serviceable to approach it from Buddhist psychology. All suffering, stems from craving, the desire for something that you have not. This craving should be viewed as the kernel from which anger grows, ultimately. And, as an aside, I believe the Buddha said that suffering and harm is like ripples on a pond, it doesn't stop where the conflict began, but ripples outward, causing more harm. And where that fits in here, I don't know.

I tend to agree with this. As to where it fits in, I think it is repeating itself in a circle of self perpetuation, where the anger of one collectively fuels the anger of another, and so on, ad infinitum. The ripples have reached the edge and are in a state of eternal motion within the pond because there is nowhere else to go. Such motion can increase the volatility of the flow and raise the temperature, thus increasing the intensity of the anger.

Sorry to see you have changed your avatar. We did so much like the old one. I am assuming it is you. How easy you are on the eye. I am also impressed by your depth and scope of knowledge. I do hope you stay here.

[Audley Strange]

I knew folks that were researching behaviours and road rage. They were working on the hypothesis that each thing that impedes a motorist going from A to B, traffic lights, bad drivers, road works etc builds up stress. They in turn become less conscientious and themselves are more likely to make mistakes and piss people off which further escalates the stress and it can keep building and building.

One of them once told me they thought that it was akin to the research that showed that those using public phone boxes would use them longer if they knew people were outside.

[Tyrannical]

One of them once told me they thought that it was akin to the research that showed that those using public phone boxes would use them longer if they knew people were outside

I've actually heard of that phenomenon in the past.