you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

[–][deleted] 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

Very few people actually take the internet seriously, imo. But we are real people (except for the bots :P), and words have weight. To me it's real karma: my actions and words have momentum, and anything I say online will have an effect. So I try to think about how my words might have affected somebody. My mind will usually run on auto until I've mapped out enough possible scenarios, like a tongue worrying a sore. In fact, simply posting online is an exhausting affair.

It's all fun and games until it's not. I think people have been indoctrinated to believe their words and actions have little weight, but the truth is that we all share the same noosphere. We are in an enclosed system.

edit: went a bit too far ot.

[–][deleted] 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

If I can argue and be antithetical here, I would conjecture that we are tiny and irrelevant to the general operation of things. All the things we say here may go beyond a filter or two but true categorization will file it as irrelevant in the long run. Like everything in life, things can get blown out of proportion or misinterpreted to be such until equilibrium returns inevitably. My perspective on internet posting, is that it should have humor or levity along with creativity for community stress relief, so if that means coloring outside the lines; then you may just have the freedom to do so. But violence or vitriol should be contained and minimized over a period of time.

Basically, a lot of posters will be attention seekers and do different things to try and get everyone's attention for politics and giggles. Don't take it all so seriously if possible.

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

What fun would life be if everyone agreed? ;)

I would conjecture that we are tiny and irrelevant to the general operation of things

I agree in part, but I'm also a believer in the butterfly effect in which wildly different results can be obtained by the slightest of nudges. I feel this is especially true when it comes to human cognition: some tiny thing can be a precipitating factor that leads a person's mental health to decline. If this happens to enough people, then you start having larger-scale events that make it to the news.

Like everything in life, things can get blown out of proportion or misinterpreted to be such until equilibrium returns inevitably.

I guess I sometimes have the bad habit of only looking at first-order effects, not how a system returns to baseline over time.

My perspective on internet posting, is that it should have humor or levity

Wait... do I know you? :) I agree with this in theory, but I all too easily fall into a poor outlook at the merest provocation. But humor is a better... carrier wave than the alternatives.

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Yep! Nature tends to up-churn some volatility from time to time before settling down for the better. Just ask those guys at Pompeii!

But to elaborate my point on humor better with an example. is how reddit fostered this quirky-geek culture with cats and commenting, before hostilities became the "up-voted" form of conversation and then getting censored/ban heavy. So after reddit sank, other sites followed suit and became predominantly hostile in favor of that hostile politics due to the mad Geo-political take over agenda. But perhaps humor was the base-line that things need to return back to, that equilibrium? It is what made the site so popular to begin with even though you do have to be a little careful with humor in keeping jokes somewhat intellectual, impartial or goofy.

But overall, the winds will change and so will how things blow.

Just remember... pompeii!