Are You Cut Out for Social Media?

you're a skilled critic and writer, you can see right now the difference between how things are expressed, and how they're meant or how they're taken; so why assume that everything that looks like an absolute must be regarded as such?

because they are clearly intended to be regarded as such? when 1000 people all reply saying, to choose another day's new rule, "you're disgusting if you don't wash your chicken and I hope I never have to be around you," it seems like an enormous stretch to interpret that as "it's OK not to wash your chicken"

K do you think everyone here is a jerk for not responding to other people's opinions like you do? Do you think every "morally upright" person agonizes over this stuff like you do? Or is it possible that there's another way to be a caring, loving, respectful, considerate, "good" human being?

(example chosen because there is an equally adamant counter-rule of "why would you wash your chicken, you're unsanitarily spreading it all over the sink, a bad cook, and disgusting if you do")

yeah people do speak in absolutes (incl. here on ILX obviously) because they think strong-arming people into agreeing with them is the most effective method

xp -- I don't necessarily think everyone here is a jerk, but I do think that those people, if they knew what you were saying about them, probably would

because they are clearly intended to be regarded as such?

Except this isn't always true, is it?

xp that would put us back in the territory of people's intentions not being prima facie sufficient to back the moral force of what they say. you might be right about how to interpret words like that, but you should also consider the seriousness with which the words are being published to the world. people in public fora adopt personae and stances that are determined by the ambient conditions, or by the fact that they are precisely NOT the usual contexts for some communication (like concerned moral speech between people who can be accountable to one another), so not everything with the appearance of serious, well-intentioned speech ought to be received as such by all who encounter it.

Well, ILX does need some new blood

xp -- I don't necessarily think everyone here is a jerk, but I do think that those people, if they knew what you were saying about them, probably would

well those people are jerks!!! (sometimes)

"intention" doesn't totally capture it; someone tweeting the reaction gif of people pointing and laughing at someone might be "intended" to get likes or make people laugh, but it only works because there is an underlying and strong moral imperative of "this is wrong, don't do it" toward the person it's directed at.

… which can be carelessly invoked and exploited by people for any number of reasons, such as the likes or laughs you mention. which does not signal any significant attachment to the moral judgments that are involved, as it were merely for their functional role.

Literalism isn't the be-all and end-all of human communication, thank Christ. We must account for ambiguity, irony and the like, as they are always looming in the background. These also provide us with the wiggle room we need to breathe and play and think and create.

am i right in understanding katherine's argument that you should take any anonymous person on the internet seriously no matter what opinion they express if they express it with a tone of moral absolutism? what about all the obvious counterarguments like people who make obviously immoral arguments with a tone of moral absolutism? you wouldn't treat a neo-nazi seriously just because they seem to truly believe their holocaust denialism, or feel bad about believing the holocaust was a real event just because they told you you're a naive idiot asshole jewdiazed collaborator for doing so. ok obviously that's an easy case but once the principle is set that just bc someone says something sincerely online doesn't mean you need to accept it (or even treat it seriously) you can move onto edge cases like should you feel bad for liking shallots when some idiot online said liking shallots is racist?

I have a question: Are people on Twitter expressing these opinions to you directly and saying that YOU specifically are a bad person? Or are you seeing a bunch of Twitter replies and interpreting them as a party line that you now must adhere to, lest someone possibly think of you as a bad person?

If it's the former, then I get feeling defensive and confused when things like that happen (even if I rationally know that I shouldn't take it so personally, and that I shouldn't care so much about what others think). If it's the latter, then it feels like you're going out of your way to feel guilty and bad about yourself.

If some people say washing chicken is bad and some say it's good, how do you determine who is correct? Just add up the numbers on each side, majority wins? And more importantly, how does your own, uninfluenced view on the subject factor in?

there's this enlightenment idea of judgement

it's hard

and necessarily compromised

that's why kant's motto is in latin

xp -- I don't necessarily think everyone here is a jerk, but I do think that those people, if they knew what you were saying about them, probably would

I think I'll live.

am i right in understanding katherine's argument that you should take any anonymous person on the internet seriously no matter what opinion they express if they express it with a tone of moral absolutism? what about all the obvious counterarguments like people who make obviously immoral arguments with a tone of moral absolutism? you wouldn't treat a neo-nazi seriously just because they seem to truly believe their holocaust denialism, or feel bad about believing the holocaust was a real event just because they told you you're a naive idiot asshole jewdiazed collaborator for doing so. ok obviously that's an easy case but once the principle is set that just bc someone says something sincerely online doesn't mean you need to accept it (or even treat it seriously) you can move onto edge cases like should you feel bad for liking shallots when some idiot online said liking shallots is racist?

I addressed this upthread but they generally are not neo-nazis and are on the right side of history

I have a question: Are people on Twitter expressing these opinions to you directly and saying that YOU specifically are a bad person? Or are you seeing a bunch of Twitter replies and interpreting them as a party line that you now must adhere to, lest someone possibly think of you as a bad person?

the former has happened to me, not to as great a degree as some people I can think of, and not always on twitter. but mostly it's the latter. which makes sense, it has even been stated as such: "every day on twitter there is a main character and your job is to never be that person"

We are all the main characters in our own personal dramas

"I addressed this upthread but they generally are not neo-nazis and are on the right side of history"

Yeah so you've found moral guides (in the form of a nebulous grp of ppl who have "enlightened" humanistic views) and once you had that you completely offshored/contracted out your own ability to engage in moral judgments to them.

for the last fucking time they aren't "nebulous," they have names and faces, which makes them less anonymous than a person who goes by "Granny Dainger"

i just want to echo what ll is saying, it's really hard to see you struggling like this. i get where you're coming from on this. i have my own beliefs but i don't know that expressing my beliefs would help here. i hope things get better for you soon. :(

It's not unreasonable to assume the people posting here are more familiar with each other than with the people on your Twitter feed that we know next to nothing about.

K it's nebulous because it's not an actual organized grp, not because they're not anonymous. The members come and go, have differences of opinion among one another, etc

Not because they're anonymous

But my point still stands of you remove the word nebulous there

rarely do you hear "this article is awful and the writer is the worst, but it's OK if you don't think so"

Because the “but it’s OK if you don’t think so” is implied in nearly all situations by virtue of being an adult who can think for themselves

It would be like requiring “imo” appended to everything before having your own opinion

have you ever noticed how ppl who grew up in families where ppl didn't listen to each other often talk louder

Because the “but it’s OK if you don’t think so” is implied in nearly all situations by virtue of being an adult who can think for themselves

― some vast airy pantaloon is required (PBKR), Friday, May 22, 2020 11:55 AM (three minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

not when saying something is right or wrong

Yes, even then.

like, for instance, very few participants in this conversation seem to be implying that. otherwise you'd imply "yes, even then (but it's OK if you don't think so)"

You and you alone get to decide, no matter how hard it is. That is life.

I hope you find a way to live more comfortably with this aspect of life.

No such thing as right and wrong fortunately

starting to get some loud & clear answers to the question posed by this thread title

Um, cautious lol at that.

And sending positive thoughts, etc.

I hope you find a way to live more comfortably with this aspect of life.

don't be such patronising wee fucks

lol

Can't help but notice the contrast of dismissing everyone's opinion on this (ppl who want you to feel better about yourself) vs accepting whole hog the opinions of ppl that has the consequence of making you feel bad about yourself

"right"

"wrong"

ne'er the twain

FTR, plenty of moral philosophers have published pseudonymously, if we're gonna grant arguments more or less weight based on whether the person making them attaches their "real name" to them...

this seems like a sort of window into the reactionary personality where i can imagine if you entrusted yr moral decision making 100% to the group then left-wing pieties in particular are extremely hard to meet in total and are extremely demanding and so there are tons of opportunities to feel bad. if you are more comfortable making yr own moral decisions (or have a moral tree outside contemporary Western social media liberalism) or good at ignoring inconsistencies btwn yr personal ideas/behaviors + the canonical social norms, then you can be a lib and still enjoy shallots. but if you can't avoid these inconsistencies and have given over moral decision making to the collective you're practically forced to either hate yourself or realign with reactionary politics just to escape the gravitational force of all the judgement

As the great Danish philosopher Victor Eremita once put it, 'I do not create myself – I choose myself. Therefore, whereas nature is created from nothing, whereas I myself as immediate personality am created from nothing, I as free spirit am born out of the principle of contradiction and am born through choosing myself.'