Are you as sick of the trash talk as I am?

[leftyladyfrommo]

We don't seem to be able to just have conversations any more. People just fling around these rude, condescending one liners. It makes any kind of discourse impossible. People go on the defensive after the first salvo and it just goes straight downhill


I am so tired of it.

[Walleye]

1. The vitriol is exhausting

[WiVoter]

27. It Sure Is

😞

[Boomerproud]

2. Yes.

[femmedem]

3. Yes.

I frequently see people who are attacked on DU and either say that they are done here or I check their profiles and see that they've quietly stopped posting. Sometimes I message them and say that the way they were treated was cruel, and I get responses about how hurtful it was.

Often the cruel responses are just this side of alertable: innuendoes, carefully worded to stay within the terms of service.

I think people forget how isolated many of us here are, either due to being retired, health issues, poverty or the pandemic. Sometimes people come here for their main social interaction and find themselves attacked when someone could just offer a different opinion without making it personal.

I come here primarily for news and I occasionally post articles or tweets, but I rarely offer my own opinions anymore. And I interact in areas where odds are everyone will be kind: humor, pets, artists, the lounge--although someone felt hurt enough by lounge interactions to leave DU today after being here for eighteen years.

[KS Toronado]

9. Very well said.......I agree

Ones that I dislike C-ing are the spell checkers.

[Magoo48]

15. And, the grammar police are tiresome as well.

[PatSeg]

18. Yes, all the trivial nitpicking

tends to shut down any meaningful dialogue. It often means that some people aren't really listening to what others are saying (writing), but to how they are saying it. Meanwhile, many of us are doing the best that we can and just want to participate in discussions on things we care about.

Being this is all online, we do not know the posters' life situation or how vulnerable they may be. When in doubt, it is best to take the high road.

[Raine]

12. TOTALLY Agree. The world is ugly enough, I come here to get away from

it. I don't want to deal with the same type of thing here when we're all on the same side with a few minor things we differ on. We shouldn't take out our frustrations on each other.

[Sherman A1]

4. Yes, indeed I am

[murielm99]

5. Yes.

[betsuni]

6. I often don't bother to check replies to my comments because half the time

it's snark telling me I'm an idiot and I already know I'm an idiot, so what. Was called an "ugly American" because of a pizza preference.

[Raine]

11. Same here. It often depends what my comment was regarding as

to deciding whether I'll even read the other poster's response. I've been shocked sometimes to get a rude response, it bothers me. Sometimes I'm just not up to dealing with those type of things and never ever read the comment.

[betsuni]

13. Funny thing is when comments I think will get heat don't and what I

think is a casual light comment do. Surprise! And posting facts and quotes are seen as attacks.

[Raine]

14. Yup, had that happen too. Something I fear might be controversial and

and nothing. I've had a casual light response that draws a nasty response. 😲

[bucolic_frolic]

7. Everyone's an expert which leads to a lot of gaslighting

and half the flames are inane.

[treestar]

8. too many logical fallacies and ad hominem

too much resort to that when someone can't think of a real argument immediately.

[scarletlib]

10. Unfortunately they aren't wrong in this case.

Justice, fines and restitution apply only to the little people in this country .

[Laura PourMeADrink]

21. You are right. Realization that no one gets held accountable

A friend and I were just talking about Corey Lewandowski. Remember when he sat before house committee and occasionally declared executive privilege when it wasn't warranted. Everyone was screaming to hold him accountable and he never was. And the big scheme of things it's not important but actually it was a building block.

People have started to realize that nothing will become of most of it. Hell I posted that FG was held in contempt yesterday and ordered to pay a fine and only six people responded

[leftyladyfrommo]

28. People are exhausted with all this stuff.

I know I am. I won't fight with people. I'm done. I don't talk religion or politics. And my customers know that .

If they don't like me they can just hire their own people. The weird thing is that i don't lose customers because I am honest and I try to take the best care of their houses and pets when they can't be there. They know I won't leave them in the lurch and I won't steal their stuff.

They know I am probably one of those awful Libs but I don't fit their preconceived notion of a terrible Lib so they leave me be. It also helps that I am nice to them even though our politics don't jibe. Being hateful gets you nowhere.

[Mister Ed]

16. Aye. Ideas may be attacked, but posters should not be.

Avoiding use of the word "you" in our replies would help keep DU from deteriorating into a toxic waste dump.

[vlyons]

17. yes I'm sick of it too

Very childish. Schoolyard bullies abound.

You know how RWNJs accuse us of being pedophile groomers? Well the real groomers are Fox News and the RW hate media, who groom people 24 x 7 to hate and be fearful of change, of "others". I find that if a whiff of craps blows my way that I have to rinse out my mind with some Mozart of Chopin or some refined beautiful music to calm me down and elevate my spirit.

[XacerbatedDem]

19. I agree.

As I've said before, when you attack the person, that's hateful, but when you attack the idea, that's helpful, for it helps people make up their mind about the idea itself.

[Laura PourMeADrink]

20. Part covid pent up anger.. Part paid disruptors.

[leftyladyfrommo]

25. I have noticed that of the Dalai Lama is mentioned

there will immediately be a comment saying horrible things. I think it's probably the Chinese bots. They hate the Dalai Lama.

[llmart]

23. Agreed.

Sometimes for the life of me I can't figure out how someone could take such great offense to something I've posted which is rather benign in the face of what often gets posted on here that is a hundred times worse. I had someone reply to a post of mine with only a finger wagging emoji like they were my superior chastising me for what I posted. I don't believe I've ever had a post hidden or alerted on, so the responder took it upon himself to "scold" me like some self-appointed arbiter of what is good or bad.

Usually I make a mental note of who these people are and don't engage with them any more. I just figure they've got issues that really don't affect me one way or another in my "real life".

[leftyladyfrommo]

29. I ve had that happen, too. I was completely blindsided.

People took what I commented on and proceeded to get vicious. And then I got blocked. Totally unexpected .

And then a couple of days later someone posted the same thing and it was fine.

[Hotler]

24. It helps to have thick skin when visiting GD on DU. nt

[BlackSkimmer]

32. This.

Anyone who gets their feelings hurt by some rando on a message board is probably better off staying away.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

30. I hate degrading, condescending, one-liners, ...

... unless it's George Takei tweeting about Donald Trump. Then I usually appreciate the degrading, condescending, one-liners.

[leftyladyfrommo]

31. Maybe we should alert on certain words: Moron. Stupid

Idiot.

[scipan]

33. I wholeheartedly agree.

I just decided not to post on a thread that I disagreed with all the rest of the posts because I didn't want to get jumped on. I love good discussions where people disagree and put forth their best arguments and it used to be like that but not much now.

Some are definitely trolls.

Thanks for posting this.

[roamer65]

34. The whole world is heading to war, IMO.

We are in 1914 now.

It’s gonna get worse, sadly.

btw lefty lady

[BWdem4life]

35. ...

[tavernier]

36. Sometimes I feel like I'm in Dr. Seuss land

when two people dig in their heels and go back and forth and back and forth until they’ve created a five inch long secondary thread. And rarely is it in response to the OP.
I never had siblings so I never learned how to have these fruitless arguments, but I did have children so I know enough to ask myself, “ WHY the hell am I still reading this?“

[Torchlight]

37. Patterns emerge

and it was my obvious choice last week to act on those patterns and block anyone who is consistently disagreeable in almost every post of theirs I come across-- from chiding simple typos to a steady drumbeat of bitterness.

Maybe I'm losing out, and they are making some really great, cogent points somewhere right this very minute; but I tend to think I'm not missing much I couldn't hear in some ugly podcast.

My experience here became immediately much better.