Sarcasm, rudeness and personal attacks on social media

By Teo Kueh Liang

TODAY/VOICES

23 November, 2017

In today’s context, technology has made it instant and convenient for people to get information and news.

Everyone is able to read news online, and readers may express his or her views on any particular issue or topic on social media.

However, on these platforms, including Facebook and Twitter, the common but unhealthy experience for anyone reading or taking part is that when online users do not agree with someone’s opinions, they often resort to personal attacks by using sarcastic comments and vulgarities on the other party.

[That's because your opinion is STUPID! Oh. Was that rude?]

To me, it is not necessary and meaningless to use such an approach in any discussion or debate. It only reflects the person’s character, personality and his or her level of civility.

It seems that people have lost their emotional intelligence (EQ) or even just their intelligence (IQ) in these public spaces.

[No. I suspect they lost their patience with unthinking boors who have an over-inflated sense of the importance and intelligence of their half-baked opinions and who think nothing of inflicting their ignorance and ignorantly-conceived opinions on others and expect others to be unthinkingly grateful for their "pearls" of swine droppings. Oh. Was that rude too?



Let this FaceBook comment respond:

If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.

If you think you have a point, make it as articulately and logically as you can.

Regardless, you will still get hateful and irrelevant comments.

If you cannot handle them, ignore them. If your comments are reasonably argued, no amount of vulgarity will reduce the content of your argument. No amount of personal attacks will reduce your credibility.

BUT, hateful, personal, irrelevant, and vulgar response to your comments is a reality. You are not in school anymore. You are not on the debate team anymore. Deal with it.

If you say vulgarity reflects the person's character, I say how you deal with vulgarity reflects your maturity and character.

If you say the solution is MORE control and MORE restrictions, I say you should continue to lurk for a few more years. Or stay away from the Internet. Or you might want your parents to sit with you when you surf the internet.

And if you have been a "victim" of sarcasm, I am inclined to believe your comments are so uninformed that the best way to show how uninformed they are, is to show how absurd they are via sarcasm.

Here's another thing. Very young children are unable to "detect" sarcasm. Also the PAP. (I may be over-generalising). If you do not like sarcasm, I would question your intellectual maturity.

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