[Posted by E&C on 01 Jan 2011 03:49 pm]

While it's no longer fair to describe C as a Luddite, it's also unlikely anyone would mistake him as 1337.  I don't believe he has pwned a single noob in his entire life.  The chances that he will even understand that sentence seem slim to me.

So when we launched our little comic here a few months back and C went a'whorin' around the interwebs he was, let's say, surprised at the negativity he found in certain places. 

There was one board in particular that I won't name but things there went very quickly in an ugly direction when he tried to drum up a little traffic for the site.  People invited him to die in a host of ways and to perform physically impossible sex acts and things of this generic, cliche' and overtired manner.

In short, they behaved like the internet.

As a cat who spends waaaay too much of his life on the tron I saw the whole thing coming six clicks away.  I saw and I still see it but I don't understand it.  I don't understand the desire to be horrible to one another.  I don't understand the blanket statements of opinion as fact or the the absolutes people believe they are dealing with.  I am terrified by the pack mentality on display at many of these places and feel it gives a horrible window into many of the greatest tragedies we've seen and read about from the crusades to the nazi's to al qaeda and on forever in both directions.  Don't misunderstand me, I'm not saying what these people did and continue to do on message boards is in any way even remotely similar to genocide, I'm just saying it gives me pause when I see people treat each other as if they are inhuman, as if they are less-than because they are separate and then to see dozens of others follow the lead because they can and because they don't want to stand out.  They don't want to be made different.  Made vulnerable.

When the really shitty nature of their behavior was brought up one cat on this board actually said something like, "These people can't be held accountable for their actions because they're having fun."

That, I feel, is a kick-ass defense for any murder or rape or even for littering.  Being awful doesn't count if it's fun.

I always leave these sorts of things to C because I refuse to wallow in the shit with these people.  I have not engaged a single one of them and, I hope, I never will.  I am worse simply for having observed them, were I to interact with them shit could go sideways in a hurry.  But I do applaud C for the way he handles the flames and the hate and the hate and the hate.  He isn't fighting fire with fire, he's fighting fire with water and that is both commendable and entirely reasonable.

I would imagine these are largely broken, sad men and women who despite their online personas are more or less decent people.  And I hope they find whatever it is they're missing.  I hope in the new year they are made whole.

May whatever god they believe in hold them and keep them and bless them in all the days of their life.

And may they remember the words of one of the most brilliant and wise men to yet walk the earth.  May they remember Russell Brand.  May they remember that "more than an outlet for our rage, what we really need is a structure for our love."

Get a beverage of your choice and love thy neighbor, on the real,

E