WT# Is Wrong With You?

I peruse several Facebook Fan Pages for various television shows, authors, movies, and such that I enjoy. I like reading articles and comments, and yes, sometimes spoilers. Last week, I absently clicked on a link for some spoilers for the second season of a television series…and was gob-smocked to discover these spoilers, instead of being of the vague “a beloved character dies,” “a couple faces a threat,” or “a mysterious newcomer promises answers” variety were excruciatingly specific. But that’s not all they were, either. They were the entire plotline of the second installment in the story, including all the major plot points and surprises.

Given that I already knew all this, the revelations didn’t bug me, but I found myself cringing anyway. Since I’m somewhat of a spoiler aficionado, I know what spoilers usually are, and this wasn’t it. So I found myself feeling REALLY BAD for the people who clicked on that link expecting regular vague spoilers, but who instead had the entire second season of a popular show ruined for them. True, true… they clicked on the link so it was their choice. But I couldn’t help but think a lot of people who were clicking on that link weren’t expecting to read what they did.

So…I commented. Now, I’m not a confrontational person. At all. I’ll go out of my way to avoid just about any confrontation of any type. I’m much more of a peace making type of person. And that’s what I was trying to do. I commented something to the effect of “wow, careful there! those are a lot more than spoilers!”

And the slamming began.

All sorts of people started jumping on me, as well as the few others like me who dared to mention that these spoilers were a little more specific than regular spoilers. People pointed out the thread said Spoilers (true), so what did we expect? But they didn’t stop there. It was a regular pile: Only an idiot clicks on Spoilers if they don’t want to see spoilers. Quit crying over something you did yourself. What kind of stupid person are you? Could you be any more of an idiot? What part of the word SPOILER did you not understand? And, my favorite: WTF is wrong with you?

And I just sat there reading all this, going…wow. At first I responded, trying to explain WHY I commented, but that only made the slamming worse. Random people started posting pictures with pithy little sayings on them, one after the other. Labels were tossed about, stupid, moron, and idiot among the most common. So…I disconnected from the thread and went on my merry way. I wasn’t upset personally… but on more of a macro level I found myself scratching my head, wondering what possessed people to be so ugly? Why would you talk that way to anyone—someone you know, but maybe even especially to someone about whom you know nothing? A complete absolute stranger (who could be the nicest person in the world, or could be unbelievably fragile, or in the middle of a personal tragedy, or, or, or…you just don’t know.)

A few days later there was another Facebook discussion on my local community’s page about a certain parental behavior, something some are comfortable doing, but others aren’t. And again the judgment started to fly, with those who had opted against something referring to those who opted in favor as stupid, careless, dumb, idiots, and criminal.

And again…I found myself going wow.

It’s not just on Facebook, either, although Facebook represents a nice tidy microcosm of society. It’s everywhere. The judging. The slamming. The hate-speak. There’s the big stuff like politics and religion, abortion and gay marriage, gun control and the death penalty, but the ridicule doesn’t stop there. People get shamed and shredded for whether they use plastic or paper, which light bulbs they buy, if they believe in global warming, what time they choose to put their kids to bed, if they choose to shop on Thanksgiving or…whether they choose to read spoilers.

I don’t know. I think back ten, twenty, twenty-five years ago, and it feels like we’re less tolerant than we use to be. It feels like we’re less okay with people thinking and behaving differently than us. We say we are, but then we turn around and ridicule/blast/shame them for doing so, then defend ourselves by saying hey, it’s your right to say/do what you want, but it’s my right to say/do what I think about it. And…well, yeah. It’s hard to argue with that basic logic, but it also feels like something’s getting lost there. Passing judgment/ridiculing does not equal accepting differences—and being cool with each other anyway. (And yes, as I say that, I find myself wondering if I’m being a little hypocritical…if calling out those who pass judgment is, in its own way, passing judgment…)

All I know is I find myself shaking my head, wondering…when did we quit caring about other people? Where did our basic compassion go? And civility. When…did we get so mean? We give all this lip-service to bullying, telling our kids how horrible it is and running news stories about it, but it seems to me that we, the adults, are as guilty as, if not more so, of bullying as our children.

Hmmm. Could it be our kids are learning more from us than we realize?