Mentalechoes

People are funny; but doubly so when they are on a chat forum typing away in the complete safety of a physical location far far away from the virtual place you exist for that moment in. Face to face people are mostly polite, respectful of others feelings and conform to - some kind of - social norms. However take away this face to face element and put people behind a computer and let them say what they will without having to look you in the eye, and that same respectful person will most likely turn into a right prick quite deserving of a kick in the nuts. Well a portion of them anyway.

I don’t know what it is in the human condition that removes the social centers of etiquette when you can’t see the person you’re talking to, but instead must abstract an image of them in a virtual environment. It could be that you don’t have to follow any social pretense of conforming to rules of social conduct. Or perhaps there is no need to worry about having to deal with the repercussions of upsetting someone who is in the same room and may call you out. Maybe there is a another center of the brain that becomes active in a virtual setting that operates in a very different way from the I-can-see-you social part. It seems age exacerbates this behavior and compounds the effect of etiquette loss, turning young people into trash talking little monsters.

Whatever it is, I hope they find a drug to cure the really bad cases of this, because I had to spend some time in a virtual community tonight, and the amount of abuse some of the people there were handing out, I happily would have thrown a few of them into a volcano. Oh stop being so sensitive, I hear you say! Well yes, you’re probably right, maybe I should just let all the trash talking slide off me like water off a ducks back. But you know, doesn’t that seem like it encourages bad behavior? So I’m actually endorsing trash talking by not taking a stand.

Where will it all end? Today, trash talking in online forums; tomorrow, chaos and the end of the world! This is how wars start you know!

Andy!

Tags: trashtalking, online, communities, etiquette