Comments on: Testing our morals for forgiveness http://www.semanticoverload.com/2010/08/20/testing-our-morals-for-forgiveness/ The world through my prisms Sun, 14 Oct 2012 15:46:55 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5 By: Semantic Overload http://www.semanticoverload.com/2010/08/20/testing-our-morals-for-forgiveness/#comment-443 Semantic Overload Sat, 21 Aug 2010 17:03:06 +0000 http://www.semanticoverload.com/?p=683#comment-443 @Patrix: The more I think about it, the more I am of the opinion that this exaggerated outrage is an artifact of the long memory. In the real world, you might be offended by something and even make a passing comment about it. But that’s all it is: a passing comment. People including you realize that it’s just a passing comment and so soon forget it. But in the online world, even passing comments are treated with the same perpetuity as well thought out commentary. So now, even your passing comments end up beig viewed as an outrage (albeit exaggerated) and you are now forced to defend such indefensible passing comments because they are now there forever! Very few actually have the self-respect to correct themselves when they realize they are wrong. Ego often gets in the way, and the result is this irrational flamewar/blogwar/whatever-you-want-to-call-it. The sensible thing to do in those cases is to think twice before posting comments, but if only people had such self-discipline.

So there you have it. In my opinion, the whole disproporationate outrage is a combination of lack of self-respect, lack of self-discipline, and the long memory of the Internet. The first two were always a common place, and the Internet is a new entrant into this equation.

]]> By: Patrix http://www.semanticoverload.com/2010/08/20/testing-our-morals-for-forgiveness/#comment-441 Patrix Fri, 20 Aug 2010 19:29:03 +0000 http://www.semanticoverload.com/?p=683#comment-441 Not just documenting the things we like to forget but also getting outraged disproportionately is largely to blame. The delicate sentiments of the most-easily-offended are often taken as the standard and applied to wide swaths of population who otherwise could care less.

]]>