You see it more because it’s on the internet. In real life people keep a lot of thoughts to themselves.
Can you believe this guy? So fucking annoying. All the time…🙄
Oh hi u/disregardable! How are you!?
For some reason people act like they score points from being snappy to people online. That’s the biggest difference I think.
I gave you +1 online points for this comment 👍
People want to feel superior to other people.
Easiest way to do that is to dunk on someone else, especially if you can ID them as part of an ‘inferior’ group.
Also, as a superior person, you don’t have to acknowledge the legitimacy of the humanity of inferior people, you can ignore them and deny them any emotional weight or sympathy. You only put your energy towards your equals and betters.
Endgame capitalism is squeezing harder since the 2008 crash and then Covid. They predicted polarising of politics and ideologies. We’re seeing tribalism as a reaction to fewer resources and harsher conditions, all of which are down to greed and oligarchy. They’ve succeeded in getting us to fight amongst ourselves instead of them.
We’re seeing tribalism
Not exactly “tribalism,” but “individualism,” at least in the States.
Classic tribalism has many fine features, and is in fact how we got here as a species, across millions of years. FUN FACT: did you know that the human species (“Homo” and relatives) goes back about 2.4million years, and through ~99.9% of that time, we successfully existed in a tribal / clan state?
IMO individualism also had great features, but when you mix in the concept of money… oh dear.
The only reason the human race survived is empathy. Not clans and tribes killing other clans and tribes.
The only reason the human race survived is empathy.
That’s a fine, simple-minded and idealistic thought, and the downvotes upon fact & reality above are hilarious to me. But nah-- empathy is a MAJOR component upon tribalism, which in various ways was the original “Democracy.”
Study it more, and you’ll see it over and over again, my lad. With respect.
If the majority of your interactions with the world are through the internet, yes. If the majority of your interactions and in person, nah, shit is the same it’s always been.
Disagree. In real life the past few years I’ve had more people flip out at me, and at each other than I have through all of my 20s and 30s. People are very much losing it. Also just look at the massive uptick in road accidents and road rage in the past 5 years.
Last time anyone tried to fight me I was like 15. I’ve had 3 incidents where someone tried to random fistfight me in the past 4 years. Numerous others where people were screaming at each other, often using slurs. I’ve also had random people approach me and scream in my face. These are rarely homeless or mentally ill folks, they are well-dressed people who are just insanely angry and go off on me about my ‘face’ or what I am wearing.
Pandemic and social media broke a lot of people and they are on a rampage of rage and hate. I also noticed a huge uptick in self-pity in my city. 10 years ago people were optimistic and felt good and positive, now they are miserable and cry about how poor they are, even when they are objectively wealthy.
It’s the second half of your question. People have always been jerks online, but the older we get the more we seem to notice it.
When I was a kid and connecting to people online was slowly becoming more and more common i thought everyone was nice. Then i found out what “chatrooms” were and realized that’s a whole different crowd of people… Then i found out about forums and how certain ones had very nice and helpful people, and some had very know-it-all-call-you-stupid kind of people.
Now as an adult i see assholes everywhere online but have learned that if someone says something that doesn’t settle right with me it’s probably bait, and not going to get better if i engage 🤷♂️
Great insights
I imagine its getting to people. Every week theres another threat, another escalation, another price hike. Every week we get less and less, while influencers are flaunting how easy it is to just be wealthy, while we’re trying as hard as we can and failing to provide what our parents provided us, despite living in the future.
A lot of people are constantly at their limit and it only takes a minor unexpected obstacle to set them off.
I only meet hateful people online. I deal with strangers for living and the vast majority of them are super nice and unreasonably reasonable.
I’ve been attacked for having a foreign accent. Check your privilege, I suppose.
Hate is getting more and more acceptable.
This is a very intentional goal, and conservatives have been pushing for it basically since Reagan. For a while, saying that you where a white supremacist was generally not acceptable socially, being too racist was considered bad.
Now, conservatives are proudly bigoted, and that gives cover to everyone else. Every time somebody makes a racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic “joke” and gets no pushback, it makes it a little more acceptable to keep making those jokes.
Every time a conservative pundit or influencer goes on a racsist tirade, or homophobic one etc, it tells the people watching that its ok for them to be super bigoted.
And so they are.
Internet.
Neither. It’s more and more propaganda of hate, trying to prevent the working class from waking the fuck up.
It isn’t working, so they’re spamming more.
Surely there are a lot of bitter people on the Internet. My opinion is that it doesn’t matter if you’re right and they’re wrong, hating them only hurts you while they dgaf, if anything it just makes them stronger. Don’t engage the hater, love on.
I try to be better here than the/my tone was on reddit.
I hate what rampant capitalism and conservatism has done to my world.
I hate key players that forge that reality.
But I try not to hate the people. We feel powerless, and that is why so many of us lash out. I can forgive some of that.
Excellent statement! I share the same sentiment.
Yes
Is it wrong to say that I can blame Donald Trump for almost everything in the last ten years?
It’s a treacherous intoxicant. People love recreational outrage but for many people it turns into active, seething hate that colors every interaction they have. It’s the lens through which many view the world and it becomes self-perpetuating. People will have angry and hateful interactions with others, begetting more hate, begetting more hate, begetting more hate.
The fury feels good in a moment. Makes you feel strong. Find some like-minded people angry at the same things and you get to feed off each other’s rage. You’ll not only get more reasons to hate, but you’ll feel justified in the hate. You are in the right. The others are wrong. How dare the others be wrong. You must hate them because they are evil. See how they respond to your hate with more hate, further proving how justified you are in your own hate. It warms your chest, it rushes through your veins like the best alcohol you can imagine and you’re not feeling so helpless. It makes you feel like you’re accomplishing something. It masks the feeling that you are just one, small person faced with an impossibly complicated world, that is often filled with incredible injustice. It keeps you from realizing that you’re a tiny little cog in the same machine that causes both all the suffering and all the joy in the world. It tricks you into thinking that you are both apart from the world, yet powerful enough to impact it.
Every hateful comment you leave adds more hate into the machine. Every act of kindness adds more kindness. But hate is easier. Kindness feels weak. It’s vulnerable. It’s fragile. Even if you’re kind, the hate that others keep adding may reach you and bite you. Most people can handle having their teeth kicked in only for so many times. It’s easier to shut down and hate. But that doesn’t mean that commitment to kindness is impossible. It’s just harder.
And so it goes, and so it goes.
Don’t forget the self-pity.
