I’m still sick today but feeling a little better. I should feel better tomorrow, but I always over-estimate my body’s ability to heal up fast so I’ll probably be less than well until Friday or so.
I was thinking about social media while laid out on the couch earlier and how easy it is to be cruel to one another over the internet.
Years ago, I remember reading a psychology piece on murderers and rapists (I read everything I can get my hands on.) In this report one of the things they say makes it more difficult for your soon-to-be killer or rapist to do his evil deed is to look him in the eyes and do all you can to force him to look into your eyes.
Why? Because it forces that monster to confront the humanity before his own eyes and it’s impossible for our human nature to ignore that connection at that moment.
This face-to-face (eye-to-eye) connection is nowhere to be found online and it has made it very easy to be cruel to folks whom we’ve never met and probably have no business hating.
Some people think all the cruelty comes from the ability to be anonymous online, but that’s not true because just think of how many times you have had a terrible thought about somebody just based on seeing something they post online. We all do it. We don’t all post publicly about it, but we’re all afflicted with the depersonalization of our fellow humans across the broad expanse of the internet.
Other humans are reduced to IDs, “handles”, or lifeless words they choose to post. We let the social media presence shape the way we look at people instead of actually seeing the people themselves.
It’s a cruel world as it is, but if we lose touch on our humanity, as we’re seeing, it can get pretty brutal out there.