Arising from the Internet?

[sr71plt]

A front-page commentary in my paper today tackles what it sees as rising public rudeness in American society as hallmarked by the recent on-camera celebrity rudeness times three: Congressman Jim Wilson's outburst in a presidential address to Congress, Serena Williams volunteering to operate on a lineswoman's throat with her racket and tennis ball, and KenYa West's tromp on Taylor Swift's music award.

The commentary centered on the nasty innuendo increasing in the polarized political sphere. It occurred to me, though, that even behind that might be the posting behavior in Internet chat rooms on sites like this one, which develops (or festers, maybe?) as the Internet ages and sinks ever deeper into every-day life. Is the ready rudeness employed in anonymity on the Internet making people freer and bolder to display rudeness in public? Is every issue in society increasingly going to be approached like an in-your-face Internet chat room free for all?

Or has such public rudeness always been there? Or always been there and just not caught on camera like it tends to be these days?

What do you think?

 

[3113]

Well, it's certainly always been there. I think that we humans have trouble restraining our knee jerk reactions unless we're taught to--and our culture mandates it. But historically speaking, we have been plenty rude before. You read letters in newspapers back in the 18th century in the U.S. and it's very like reading an internet flame war. Including the fact that many such letter writers used pseudonyms.

I think what the internet does is get people into the habit of saying whatever pops into their head, however rude, mean, obnoxious or stupid--giving into their knee jerk reactions as it were. As they can't see anyone's hurt face, and don't risk getting a punch in the mouth, or being yelled at by someone with a louder voice, or even having their mother say, "I'm ashamed of you! Apologize at once!"--as all they risk is mean words back that they can read or not--they start, I think, to lose their cultural conditioning.

But I think what really contributes to it is the news media making use of it as well. They post twitters (which are knee jerk reactions), rather than asking for thoughtful observations and censoring those that aren't. And they allow anyone to be a pundit and to speak rudely, and don't censor them. In fact, they show you that the more outrageous you are, the more likely you are to gain a moment of fame--to be heard rather than ignored. THIS, I think, is more dangerous than internet "training" in rudeness.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

A front-page commentary in my paper today tackles what it sees as rising public rudeness in American society as hallmarked by the recent on-camera celebrity rudeness times three: Congressman Jim Wilson's outburst in a presidential address to Congress, Serena Williams volunteering to operate on a lineswoman's throat with her racket and tennis ball, and KenYa West's tromp on Taylor Swift's music award.

The commentary centered on the nasty innuendo increasing in the polarized political sphere. It occurred to me, though, that even behind that might be the posting behavior in Internet chat rooms on sites like this one, which develops (or festers, maybe?) as the Internet ages and sinks ever deeper into every-day life. Is the ready rudeness employed in anonymity on the Internet making people freer and bolder to display rudeness in public? Is every issue in society increasingly going to be approached like an in-your-face Internet chat room free for all?

Or has such public rudeness always been there? Or always been there and just not caught on camera like it tends to be these days?

What do you think?

It probably always been there...but being rude used to be a punishable offense. Rudeness usually got you a punch in the nose but, now a days you don't really know who's packin' and violence has become oh so politically incorrect and camera's are so prevalent that being rude is more often caught on camera.

My personnel opinion is that rudeness should be punishable by death. Back when everyone carried a gun...the old west...people were much more polite as the guy you were facing just might be faster than you.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

SR71PLT

It's always been there, I mean, Julius Caesar's assassination was THE UNKINDEST CUT OF ALL. Senator's have been beaten senseless by colleagues, and this state has witnessed violence between politicians on numerous occasions. During this state's secession convention in the capitol, my ancestor, a pro-Union minority member, told the delegates to their faces that they were GODDAMNED TRAITORS and GOING TO HELL! My Harvard educated great-grandfather taught school in the INDIAN NATION at Vinita, and kept a loaded 45 on his desk.

 

[trysail]

... Or has such public rudeness always been there? Or always been there and just not caught on camera like it tends to be these days?

What do you think?

The levels of rude boorish behavior, incivility and coarseness that occur today were not imagineable and, almost needless to say, would never have been tolerated fifty years ago.

In fact, it wasn't a question of toleration; it was a matter of good manners, humility and modesty. "Nice people" simply didn't behave that way— the expression for bad behavior used to put it, "That's low class." Good sportsmanship was taught and practiced.

Fifty years ago, one didn't see professional athletes "showboating," doing "victory dances" or gloating. If somebody had tried that stuff on Sam Huff or Gino Marchetti or Artie Donovan or Sandy Koufax or Whitey Ford, retribution would have been swift and sure. A Serena Williams-like outburst would have been met with a banned-for-life sentence. The irony of John McEnroe's comments on Serena's tirade is too rich for words; the origins of this kind of behavior are directly traceable to McEnroe's childish behavior and poor sportsmanship.

The behavior of crowds at basketball games is another example. When I witness a crowd in front of a foul shooter screaming and waving in an effort to disrupt the shooter's focus I am appalled by the lack of good sportsmanship. Where did those people learn to behave that way?

Children and adolescents were taught that you cheered FOR your team and that it was poor sportsmanship to cheer AGAINST the opponent.

While some may dispute my focus on athletics as one of the primary underlying causes, I assert that this is where children and adolescents are first exposed to and learn the behavior.

On the flip side, "All's fair in love and war" [ and politics ]— always has been and always will be.

 

[Stella_Omega]

Public political rudeness arose before the Internet. Two words; Newt Gingrich.

I remember being astounded and shocked that the man could say the things he did without any qualms. That was the first time the phenomenon came to my attention, at any rate...

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

TRYSAIL obviously never watched GORGEOUS GEORGE the wrestler on tv.

 

[Handley_Page]

I liked Winston Churchill's comment when he caught someone in the Commons, lying.
"He is guilty, Mr Speaker, of a terminological inexactitude"

It seems a pity that such educated put-downs are so seldom heard.

 

[rgraham666]

It's always been there. But there were customs and cultural mores in place to keep it under control. Plus that inevitable punch in the mouth.

On the other hand there is freedom of speech. Propriety as long been a way to keep people from saying and thinking things that are considered dangerous to the status quo. As I found out recently some people can't tell the difference between rudeness and dissent.

 

[Safe_Bet]

Is the ready rudeness employed in anonymity on the Internet making people freer and bolder to display rudeness in public? Is every issue in society increasingly going to be approached like an in-your-face Internet chat room free for all?

Or has such public rudeness always been there? Or always been there and just not caught on camera like it tends to be these days?

What do you think?

Just so I'm clear as to exactly the type of "rudeness" you are talking about, is it something like this?

I tend to agree--but only because a real "guy" probably isn't interested in a whining effeminate closet boy who would yap yap his ear off all evening.

I could see him spending the evening with you, though.

or more like this?

Ah, I see that someone got up on the wrong side of his closet again today. Didn't read the posts, of course; they are so redundant and meaningless.

 

[sr71plt]

Just so I'm clear as to exactly the type of "rudeness" you are talking about, is it something like this?



or more like this?

You were my first choice of the one who would flip on here with personal attacks, safe_bet. Arrived right on cue. (Interesting that my second choice has posted here and been civil). Also interesting and typical that you do not quote what transpired on these threads earlier.

I took no sides, claimed/claim no separation from the issue posed in this thread.

I was pretty sure you couldn't help yourself. And you couldn't. The proud personification of in-your-face rude.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

SR71PLT

HE GOT UP ON THE WRONG SIDE OF HIS CLOSET.

I'm still laughing. It's a prize winner!

 

[Safe_Bet]

You were my first choice of the one who would flip on here with personal attacks, safe_bet. Arrived right on cue. (Interesting that my second choice has posted here and been civil). Also interesting and typical that you do not quote what transpired on these threads earlier.

I took no sides, claimed/claim no separation from the issue posed in this thread.

I was pretty sure you couldn't help yourself. And you couldn't. The proud personification of in-your-face rude.

Nah. I just think it's funny that you say things like I quoted and then start a thread full of "holier than thou" implications, innuendos and "superiority". I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy, is all.

BTW, if it's "in-your-face rude" to quote your own words back at you, ya might want to think about how rude they were when you said them in the first place, sweetie.

 

[freshface]

Nah. I just think it's funny that you say things like I quoted and then start a thread full of "holier than thou" implications, innuendos and "superiority". I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy, is all.

BTW, if it's "in-your-face rude" to quote your own words back at you, ya might want to think about how rude they were when you said them in the first place, sweetie.

I know you didn't miss the vicious gay bashing that sr71 was responding too with your out-of-context quotes. Leads me to conclude that you're just fine with gay bashing aimed at men, especially when you don't like the man in question.

 

[Safe_Bet]

I know you didn't miss the vicious gay bashing that sr71 was responding too with your out-of-context quotes. Leads me to conclude that you're just fine with gay bashing aimed at men, especially when you don't like the man in question.

I find it facinating that you always manage to show up the same time SR does...

BTW, are you really BFW?????

 

[sr71plt]

BTW, if it's "in-your-face rude" to quote your own words back at you, ya might want to think about how rude they were when you said them in the first place, sweetie.

In the original thread, I was turning BOSTONFICTIONWRITERS prolonged gay bashing (which you were joining in--makes you a great supporter of gay rights, huh?) back on him. If you don't agree with me, feel free to link the thread for all to see.

Hope this thread can get back to the original discussion after, as they say, it was so rudely interrupted.

 

[Liar]

People have said rude things to each other since they discovered language.

Before that they just screamed and hurled smelly stuff.

 

[freshface]

I find it facinating that you always manage to show up the same time SR does...

BTW, are you really BFW?????

Naw, I'm six hours ahead of SR71 and nine hours ahead of you. I'm rarely here later than this. Just cause you don't like him doesn't mean every one agrees with you. Doing a great job of proving his point though, so I'll just leave you to it.

 

[bronzeage]

I have always seen rudeness as a character flaw and a sign of personal weakness. Rudeness as a public display is even more so.

There is nothing new about either, but the internet lets people express their rudeness without the danger of the usual reactions.

 

[Liar]

I can accept rudeness, as long as it's witty.

The only thing that truly gets to me, is pettyness.

It's often one and the same, but there are differences.

 

[sr71plt]

I can see the "it's always been with us," but I think Trysail must be right that there have been cycles, with periods where is just "wasn't done" without nasty consequences.

Do folks perceive we are in an upswing now? Do we get outraged for twenty minutes and then move on? If so, is that the result of technology or are we just getting worn down as a people?

I can see where Jim Wilson will just shake it off--his base is pleased. But how long will the story linger with Serena (in her case, revealing a basic attitude toward "the little people" when she was understandably stressed out. It wasn't like the foot fault business was new. She'd been called on it several time earlier and shown video proof)? Or with West, who has established himself as a jerk and will surely do it again (the OJ approach)?

No comment about the commentary's link to the political climate?

 

[lesbiaphrodite]

I guess I'm as guilty as the next person for saying rude and uncivilized things in the heat of the moment. I've always been hot-headed though. It didn't start with the Internet. It started when I was a wee lass on the playground defending myself against whatever came my way. Granted, I've learned to press the "control" button as I've aged, but periodically, I still get mad as hell and speak my mind to whomever pisses me off badly enough.

As to the question of whether the rudeness and incivility demonstrated in recent news events is symptomatic of a larger social problem, I am not sure. I think that people are definitely more inclined to say hostile things to each other than ever before in my lifetime. But, then again, I grew up in the South where respect, good manners and discretion were and remain the bread and butter of the culture.

 

[SixtyMinuteMan]

I think the only one of the three examples that we can lay at the internet's feet is the rudeness in the political arena. Athletes losing it the way Serena did has always been there; look at John McEnroe. What gets played is the "You cannot be serious!" bit, but the truth is that's the mildest of the things he said to judges and linesmen, he could be both obscene and blasphemous for five minutes at a time.

And Kanye is just a jackass. We've always had those, too. Maybe the internet enabled his ego, but I don't know. Guys willing to bully girls isn't anything new, nor is attention-whoring.

The political arena, now... I think you might be on to something. Despite the absolutely vitriolic hate we've had in Washington at different points in our history, no one has ever been so inexcusably rude as to heckle a President. Not ever, not even during the leadup to the Civil War. It's unprecedented. And as recently as a generation ago, Wilson's political career would have been over. The fact that he was dead wrong and knew it, making him the liar, wouldn't even have been part of the equation, it's the idea of heckling that office that's so unreal.

(And no one needs to read anything into my politics behind that last statement. I'd have been just as appalled if someone had heckled Bush, and just as ready to point it out if they'd been a liar when they did it.)

I don't think there can be any doubt that the mutual support network that the internet supplies the extremists on both sides plays a part in some of what passes for political discourse right now. It doesn't matter how ridiculous what you say is, someone will cheer you on. Ann Coulter, Jeremiah Wright, doesn't matter. People will crawl out of the wordwork to defend you.

Despite the ready availability of information, the internet can support a lot of insularity. Want to hate Bush? Obama? There's a forum for that. My dad goes to a site where everyone accepts as gospel that Obama wants to set up euthanasia panels and ration health care and blah blah blah. All the lies of the right, basically. And you can't penetrate that belief, they have a few thousand members ready to shout down any voice of reason. And I'm sure forums exist on the other side that are just as dogmatic. It breeds the kind of emotional, anger and fear based response to any challenge that we saw from Wilson. He's an informed man, or anyway it's inexcusable if he's not given his job, he certainly knew that none of the proposed health-care plans provide coverage to illegal aliens. But he, personally or in the form of his party and allies, have been selling that swill to his constituents. So when the PoTUS gave with some truth, he had a knee-jerk reaction. "Wait, if he tells people that they'll know I'm full of shit!" And so he took political discourse to a new low.

And now we're seeing the enabling power of the internet. Wilson's made himself a burgeoning icon of the right, meaning we will see this kind of thing repeated. Those who are selling tshirts and cheering him on are basically saying "I don't like Obama, so I don't care how out of line Wilson was." Imagine if Nancy Pelosi had yelled "You lie!" at Bush during a speech about the war. Imagine what the same people supporting Wilson would have said.

Maybe there'll come a day when the ready availability of facts on the internet raises the level of discourse. Back in my naive youth, I really thought that was the future. That the hate and fear-mongers would lose traction when a couple of clicks could show people the truth.

Alright, this is long enough. Excuse my rambling; the direction of political discourse frankly frightens me and so draws some copious verbiage.

 

[Verdad]

I'm kind of too young to write jeremiads about the appalling behaviors of today, but I do wonder.

Yes, I would say hostility is on the rise. Aggression and plain old rudeness, too. I'm not sure what's the chicken and what's the egg, though.

The internet does allow people to act the way they wouldn't dream of acting in the flesh. As always with that kind of argument, though, some will say the impulses were already there and the net merely provides a relatively safe outlet—better than say, going to a bar and kicking the crap out of someone.

I'm not so sure that's true, though. "Opportunity creates the thief," as they say, and I don't think a fraction of online nasties would ever bother going to the bar, or even feel the urge to do so.

'They' also say "good fences make good neighbors", and the net abolishes the fences. We see into others more closely than ever. No smallest disagreement can go unnoticed or unaired. Even where the intentions aren't bad, the medium spurs us toward conflict. We're awash in info about others, the info we, frankly, don't need, and we have the dialogical format at hand. What's to come out of it if not arguing?

Especially at the lack of restraint, and we've already covered that.

Thus, I believe the net creates new patterns, rather than merely expressing them, and I'd also guess the things that happen on the net don't just stay on the net.

The emotions are real. The anger, as one of the most common, doesn't get 'purged' through indulging in it. It rather breeds more of the same. Behaviors are learned, too. A heightened level of hostility is practically a survival requirement online, hard not to learn even for those who don't relish it. It's not unreasonable to wonder how much of it spills over into the meat-space.

On the other hand, though, I was recently wondering about the same issue from the other side. A lot, though not all of the animosity we see in our little corner of the net, seems to mirror the political rift in the American society. Everything, but everything, is about 'left' and 'right'. If you don't fit your words in that dichotomy, by God, they will be fitted for you. The topic doesn't matter; if it's favorite pizza toppings, it's no reason not to polarize it along the party lines. If truly it is a mirror of reality, the US might truly be heading toward disintegration.

However, as above, do people really feel that strongly about 'left' and 'right', or is it just the old "I'm right and you're wrong", latching onto the most convenient vehicle? Personally, I think there's a lot of that at the root. The banners are as much an excuse as a reason for fighting. The feedback loop closes, though, the polarization cements itself, and it doesn't look vey good.

 

[TxRad]

Rude behavior in public isn't new. What is new is the lack of self control by many, many people. Some of the things I hear kids say to their parents and their elders would have gotten me and my generation a trip to the woodshed at the very least.

Today that doesn't happen so the younger generation has no respect for their elders or better yet, their betters. One day they will get a rude awakening.

Also the stress levels in almost all parts of life are up from what they were even twenty years ago. Road rage is just one example. too many people and to little space. Too many cars on highways not built to handle the load and people in a hurry to get nowhere. I used to be one of them until I realized that my cruise control was my best friend. No tickets, best fuel economy, and a lot less stress.

Just my humble opinion and some observations over the years.