(Frank's) Q: Can't we all just get along? (My) A: No?

Frank Bruni bodies forth in one of those backward-looking, end-of-the-year, Dickensian pleas for greater civility, everyone, in these, our increasingly uncivil times. It seems we're all suffering from a particularly nasty case of intolerance exacerbated by technological opportunity--chiefly that of hot-tempered Tweetdom and Facebook ferocity and almost comically insensitive comment sections.

On social media, on many blogs and along other byways of the Internet, the person you disagree with isn’t just misinformed but moronic, corrupt, evil. Complaints become rants. Rants become diatribes. And this tendency travels to cable news shows, Congress and statehouses, where combatants shout first and ask questions later.

Horseshit. Congressman Preston Brooks didn't read about Sen. Charles Sumner's insults to family relations on Twitter. And since Satan's expulsion from Bliss, moronically evil corrupt little fucks have demonized their ideological enemies in alehouses, town halls, churches and caves, just as their virtuous enemies have.

It's only human nature, to which I prefer the Shakespearean, as opposed to Dickensian, approach: heaps of detachment and no little acceptance of our unalterable condition. 

That's not to say I reject the potential of human evolution; any way you cut it, we are, fundamentally, I think, a more decent species toward one another than when Carthaginians were breaking POWs' legs and hurling their hacked, broken and still-breathing bodies like cordwood into open tombs, which was something of a world standard, hardly exceptional. Today it is the exception, and we take condemnatory note--indeed global wars have even been waged against such unfathomable evil.

Given that bit of perspective, some assclown losing his temper on Twitter doesn't really chuck me into Brunian depths of despair. What does leave me rather despondent is the collateral intellectual damage of Twitter and the like, which Bruni addresses.

Socio-political debates are, it seems, (and this is only my unverifiable impression), increasingly reduced to 140 characters or less, which means we don't actually debate a damn thing. We simply spit at one another, which is less intellectually taxing and thus, for most folks, a lot more fun. This modus operandi of contemporary debate has so swamped online discussions--i.e., blogs, so this is personal--I detect decreasing readership on virtually a monthly basis. 

Right now this post consists of less than 500 words, and yet most readers, I'd wager, have long since bailed out. They either haven't the time to finish it, or, more likely, they read something 300 words back with which they disagreed, so they clicked off.

But here's the real kicker. A few won't return, because reading anything with which one disagrees is an intolerable online rub. There's plenty of comfortable pandering out there--and I could easily protect and even grow this blog's readership by practicing just that: I could offer, say, unvarying Obama idolatry, or issue endless Democratic hackery, or sidle up to some version of identity politics, and therein would lie a steady readership base. They'd all come back, to be soothed--to be reminded they're right, because they just know I'm right. One big happy family. Otherwise, fuck it.

Anyway, that's my challenge for 2014: building that most exceptional of readerships--thinkers (and engaged commenters) who don't crap temper tantrums and scoop up their toys at the first written signposts of uncomfortable territory. You've made it this far, so you're one of them. I hope you'll invite your like-minded friends and family to join you--to join us, here.  

So there's my Brunian plea. I reject that most of us suffer from some newfound incivility, but finding the civil crowd is no easy task.

 

Comments

[ren]

There are a lot of us who read every word, every day, including the comments, and we just don't feel we're erudite enough to comment ourselves. But we do so appreciate this blog. I know I speak for many. Thank you.

[Exurbanmusings.blogspot.com]

And there are those of us who can't shut up! And will keep reading you even when we disagree.

[Janicket]

And that exurbanmusings critter is me, Janicket, trying to find a way to sign in as such. Lessee if I can do it this time....

[S. Holland]

Perfectly stated!!

[japa21]

Let me second and third earlier comments.

There have been times, quite honestly, that I have been furious with some of your statements, PM, but I read every day because I know you are honest to yourself in what you write and NOT trying to placate or pull in readers.

I am a twitter addict but one thing I don't do is get into sustained arguements with people who have different views simply because one can't do so in any kind of efficacious way.

So yes, I will continue to read and occasionally comment as well.

[Peter G]

If you were to give in to the temptation to build readership through ideological purity you would certainly lose me as a steady reader. That's not why I read and comment here. Mind you on other sites I am considered something of a pain in the ass and my absence no great loss. But that is due my acute sensitivity to bullshit which coupled with an obsessive compulsive drive to disturb complacent undisturbed bullshit often results in unpleasantness. And it's more than a little fun.
This place, on the other hand, is a fine whetstone for sharpening one's thoughts, learning a few things and enjoying acute observations. Oh and the laughs. I particularly enjoy those. Leave the tweets to the twits.

[Peter G]

By the way, just so it can't be said I cannot appreciate a fine tweet, I will suggest the best this year consisted of exactly three words from Ricky Gervais. He tweeted, "Spot the typo."

[RM]

One of the reasons I read this blog most days is that you make me think AND that your commenters are almost unfailingly civil, even in disagreement. I find your blog enlightening and refreshing, so thank you!

[Jason]

I have to admit: among the many reasons I enjoy this blog is that one of my favorite pastimes is "recreational annoyance." In other words, I find great pleasure in being annoyed at our culture, and P.M. is a master of getting me really annoyed--whether it be at cold-hearted Republicans or clueless Democrats or lazy teenagers or whatever. Hell, that's one reason I'm still a devout Christian. Because few things are as annoying as church. Anyway, keep up the great thinking and writing. I look forward to being even more annoyed in 2014!!

[Turgidson]

My aimless projectile vomit-type comments seem tolerated, and sometimes even enjoyed, here. I'm grateful for that.

As long as this blog uses the vapid musings of phonies and carnival barkers (in glasses and bowties) like David Brooks and George Will as jumping off points for conversations, and does not treat them as the well-reasoned thoughts of a serious or important mind, all will be well and I can stop paraphrasing driftglass and Charles Pierce so often. Cheers!

[Jason]

P.S. I also appreciate the book recommendations. I received a copy of Bloom's "Best Poems of the English Language" for Christmas and have already come to treasure it. Thanks, P.M!