Hey...You're Doing It Wrong, Vol. 2

In connection to my previous post on internet conduct ("Hey, you...you're doing it wrong."), I felt compelled to add something:

I just wanted to take a moment to say that if we are friends—even by the most casual, electronic definitions of friendship that we settle for today—I will never demand that you agree with me completely, dissolve your own beliefs entirely, or ascribe to my philosophies as a measure of your worthiness to be my friend.  For some reason, for some purpose, for some cosmic joke, you and I were brought into one another’s lives and I, personally, would like to see where this journey takes us.

I have watched some pretty awful exchanges on my facebook newsfeed of late [not to mention what I see on the news or hear in the teachers’ lounge or witness coming from the kids’ mouths] and I can only shake my head and sigh because it is getting more and more difficult to be a humanist on this shitball we're all riding through the galaxy.  Call me naive, but frankly, I just can’t believe that that which makes us our own individual selves is tearing relationships apart so swiftly, so fiercely, and so publicly.  Being passionate about something is one thing—but being dogmatic about it is entirely another.  Also, intentionally stoking the flames by poking at another’s beliefs is a grotesque waste of time.  This is the internet, for fuck's sake—there IS no last word.

Whether it’s about your presidential candidate, your god, your opinion about Aniston vs. Jolie, or your views on the national gun debate, your hateful invective has to stop.  I am a believer in healthy, constructive exchanges about our differences if the objective is to create a safer, sounder, more productive world to share—but if it’s just about the “battle”, I have to ask you to examine your opponent and your impact upon them…and the world around you.  You already think your “adversary” is making the world a bad place—but are YOU doing anything to make it better???

You’re not convincing anyone of anything on either side—the only way to live your life is the way you can live with yourself when you go to sleep each night.  Did you do the most good and the least harm with the breaths you took in the moments you had today?   Did you make more people smile…or roll their eyes?  Did you make more people ponder your words and reflect on their meaning…or did you create such a dead space of hostility with your persecution of another’s perspective that they were too busy preparing their counterpoints to your rants and stopped listening halfway through?

Friends, be the best YOU that YOU can be…and if people are in your life that you care about, encourage them to be the best THEY can be—but that DOESN’T have to be a carbon copy of YOU.  Stop the hate.  Stop the diatribe.  Stop pretending you’re making a difference on here—in fact, get your asses off the internet and go volunteer with animals or kids or the elderly—hell, they need you more than your “friends” need to argue with you.

And yes, I’m fully aware that you don’t need my permission to feel or think or behave any way you damn well please—but I just wanted to remind you that someone out here in this cold, bleak cyberspace loves you [or at least likes you as friend] very much, just the way you are, even when I don’t agree with everything (or anything) you say. 

You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one…