Hello again. Something recent happened that made me think about this claim.

Basically, the claim is that when a person has access to the Internet, has access to anonymity, and has an audience to speak to, that person will use that opportunity to be an idiot or a douchebag (eg. say very offensive or stupid things).

Here is a pictorial version of this claim: http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19

As of late, I have been questioning that claim. I would like to offer 3 examples as a counter-claim. All 3 examples have one thing in common: Facebook. On Facebook, anonymity is discouraged and relatively rare. They contain real people with real portraits with real names with real opinions. We can also see those opinions via Youropenbook: http://youropenbook.org/

Remember, these are real non-anonymous people (you can see their real-life faces):

Example 1: Japan experiences a tsunami and multiple earthquakes.
The responses:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/awesomer/idiots-...ese-tsunam
http://failbook.failblog.org/2011/03/11/...ignorance/

Example 2: The Japanese women's soccer team beats USA in the World Cup.
The responses:

http://failbook.failblog.org/2011/07/21/...world-cup/

Example 3: US President Obama's children eats Asian food (including Japanese) on December the 7th (the same day many years ago Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese Army).
The responses: Click the comments section below.

http://wusa9.com/news/article/178399/158...Harbor-Day

The links above speak for themselves. I don't think these people are trolling, I think most of them are genuine opinions, not opinions deliberately said to offend. In fact, if they were trolls, that would be a much better scenario.

I don't need to say anything more except to express my wishes to weep for humanity (while attempting to stop myself from beating random people on the street due to the rage inflicted on me by these links).

What do you think?

Do people become idiots when provided with anonymity?
Or do idiots remain idiots?

You writing a thesis or something?

I don't agree with the claim, case in point: this forum.

thecite Wrote:You writing a thesis or something?

No, but thanks for the compliment.

thecite Wrote:I don't agree with the claim, case in point: this forum.

I would like to make a counter-claim: The YouTube comments section, which is arguably the worst (best) example of internet anonymous douchebaggery.

Having said that, I do agree that this forum is surprisingly civil and mature but it's only surprising I guess because most other forums are not (which includes other Japanese language learning forums).

I think the YouTube comments are for the most part fine, it's just the occasional douchebag that ruins it.

thecite Wrote:I think the YouTube comments are for the most part fine, it's just the occasional douchebag that ruins it.

I've seen far too much racism, nationalism, grammar nazism, religionism, and other ideology -isms to agree, but to be fair, most of the comments that I've seen with the most "thumbs up" that get raised to the top of the other comments are generally sane and reasonable.

It is also heartening to see that Rick Perry's (American 2012 Presidential Candidate) official commercial has almost 150,000 dislikes and only 3,000 likes (as of writing):

It shows that at least 80% of the viewers of the ad are sane, and that there is hope for America yet.

I'm more bothered by the non-functionality of Youtube's reply to comment feature. When someone replies to a comment there's a useless little @Name link, which doesn't actually take you to the original comment. Why can't they properly implement something so obvious? It can't just be me who thinks about this...

dizmox Wrote:I'm more bothered by the non-functionality of Youtube's reply to comment feature. When someone replies to a comment there's a useless little @Name link, which doesn't actually take you to the original comment. Why can't they properly implement something so obvious? It can't just be me who thinks about this...

In general, the entire comments section is screwed, when there are multiple conversations going on, you can't tell which comment is replying to which comment. Direct replies and conversations need to be threaded like e-mail does.

That's all besides the point anyway since most YouTube comments are useless and for popular videos like Justin Bieber's "Baby" music video which has 1 million comments, who wants to read it anyway.

qwertyytrewq Wrote:I've seen far too much racism, nationalism, grammar nazism, religionism, and other ideology -isms to agree, but to be fair, most of the comments that I've seen with the most "thumbs up" that get raised to the top of the other comments are generally sane and reasonable.

I've seen some really bad comments on there too, but it's like a few comments out of a few hundred (depending on the video, some videos are asking for it).

qwertyytrewq Wrote:It is also heartening to see that Rick Perry's (American 2012 Presidential Candidate) official commercial has almost 150,000 dislikes and only 3,000 likes (as of writing):

It shows that at least 80% of the viewers of the ad are sane, and that there is hope for America yet.

Ha! That ad's hilarious.

dizmox Wrote:I'm more bothered by the non-functionality of Youtube's reply to comment feature. When someone replies to a comment there's a useless little @Name link, which doesn't actually take you to the original comment. Why can't they properly implement something so obvious? It can't just be me who thinks about this...

Youtube comments used to be threaded! Replies would appear indented below the message they were replying to; they only added the @ crap a few years back, when twitter became popular.

Agreed total mess; now they've redesigned the look of youtube *again*, but not fixed this simple feature.

I don't think that posting on the internet gives rise to flamewars and such, but it's more like it's easier for some people to post hateful comments because they can't see the reactions on others' faces. Anonymity doesn't seem to have much to do with it, since I know people who were bullied on Facebook (though I don't use the site myself).

As for Youtube, the comments can add more information about a video (usually only the high rated comments), but other then that they are mostly pretty random.

Bokusenou Wrote:I don't think that posting on the internet gives rise to flamewars and such, but it's more like it's easier for some people to post hateful comments because they can't see the reactions on others' faces.

Certainly, behind every user name, behind every computer on the internetwork, there is a human being.

Many people forget that.

I believe anonymity simply brings out people's true character.

Facebook is seen as a way of connecting with friends.
You can see a lot of stories about people posting things like pics of themselves getting wasted at a party on facebook, and how that can come back to haunt them if the wrong person sees it. So why would people post something like that on facebook to begin with? Because facebook is them and their friends. The same friends that they were at the party with. So why would they hesitate to post a compromising photo like that, if its for their friends who are comfortable with that sort of thing?

Along those same lines, assume we see someone writing something racist, insensitive, or hurtful on facebook. Does the internet just somehow bring out all of that animosity? No, this is likely that person's true character. If they would say such things on facebook, then they would probably also say those same things in real life among their friends.

However, most people put up a filter when they are around certain groups of people. Strangers, superiors, parents, etc. Most of us want to be seen as good people in society. So we filter what we do and say most of the time.

I think a lot of people don't really get facebook.
They post the picture of them getting wasted at a party on there, and suddenly one day "oh crap, my pastor saw that picture! I'm so embarrassed!"
The picture was intended for their circle of friends who knows about that side of them. Likewise, I believe if someone posts something, for example, that's insensitive about the Japanese earthquake, its not that they were trying to show the world what a douchebag they are, it was probably just intended for their audience of friends who accepts that part of them. They most likely wouldn't go out in public and say that. They just don't REALIZE that they are saying it in public.

qwertyytrewq Wrote:I've seen far too much racism, nationalism, grammar nazism, religionism, and other ideology -isms [...]

I think douchebaggery is the wrong word. internet comments sections are a cesspool for uneducated uncultured people who have vile opinions to share them without responsibility or significant challenge.

i'm ashamed to admit that i have a guilty pleasure in lurking among the yahoo news comments section... probably worse than youtube from what i've seen. these people should be ashamed of themselves.

i get the feeling that if you're a redneck in the middle of the country who hates his job/doesn't have one, and hates his life, and hears that white privilige is ending bc of obama, and hears that we're losing competitive edge to china, etc... these are the people who clog up these forums like cholesterol in an artery. they are so thick there and disproportionately represented that no one else gets heard, hence the virtual train wreck at every bulletin board even remotely touching on politics.

that's why obama's bitter comment was so rough for them... these people ARE really angry... and because of the vile nature of their opinions no one is willing to listen so they flock to places like that. since the original premise of this board is self-sacrifice in the pursuit of education and multiculturalism, they will (for the most part) avoid it like kryptonite.

dtcamero Wrote:

qwertyytrewq Wrote:I've seen far too much racism, nationalism, grammar nazism, religionism, and other ideology -isms [...]

I think douchebaggery is the wrong word. internet comments sections are a cesspool for uneducated uncultured people who have vile opinions to share them without responsibility or significant challenge.

To be fair to arrogant douchebags, I don't mind if they are arrogant douchebags, as long as their opinions are right.

So it's not really douchebags I have a problem with, it is with, as you say, uneducated, uncultured and WILLINGLY ignorant (they don't aim to become less ignorant) people with worthless opinions (opinions formed from ignorance, not facts or evidence).

We have free speech in America and everyone is entitled to an opinion, sure. But let it be known that some people's opinions are worth less than others.

dtcamero Wrote:these are the people who clog up these forums like cholesterol in an artery. they are so thick there and disproportionately represented that no one else gets heard, hence the virtual train wreck at every bulletin board even remotely touching on politics.

Like you, I have a guilty pleasure but instead I browse political/current news and events forums or forums with a politics/news sub-section.

If I ever need to lose even more faith in humanity (I'm already in the negative values), these kind of forums are where it's at.

My heart loses hope when I realise that the forum troll, even though he is a troll who posts vile and offensive opinions and who doesn't really believe in his own opinions, might as well be impersonating a real person who DOES believe in those same vile and offensive opinion.

The troll has an excuse. The non-troll does not.

Anonymity means no one takes responsibility of what they write.
So for some people it gives them the opportunity to state their weird or not openly accepted opinions and for others it allows them to show their "chaotic" part, like for example some people might not have any opinion about the topic and they would write some offensive/silly/sarcastic stuff, maybe because of some mental insecurity?
Of course there's those who write what they would say in real life.

And about YouTube top comments, some are rational comments that represent the general opinion of the majority of the video audience , or some silly joke or notice that people find funny.

Edit: Giving it some more thought, I see what you point at with "Douchebag".
I guess that's a third type of people who "enjoy" anonymity, those who write things that they never give a second though (if any!). As someone here said that those comments on "failbook" (lol) are supposed to be read by their closed circle of people or a stranger to whom the poster is somewhat anonymous.

There are now more than 7 billion people in the world.

That's 7,000,000,000 - not the american billions.

some of them are going to be douchebags. There are probably more douchebags than there were 30 years ago, because there's twice as many people. But there's lots more non-douchebags than there were too.

How many douchebags on youtube would it take to lose your faith in humanity?

ps. btw, there are only around 4000 tigers and 650 mountain gorillas left in the wild now though. difference in numbers is pretty sick... and Japan's actually worried about a declining population?
..... sorry, totally offtopic.

Zarxrax Wrote:I believe anonymity simply brings out people's true character.

It's very hard to find some one "true character" to begin with, which is another discussion I suppose, but I just wanted to point out that even on the internet and even if you're anonymous, you are influenced by others just as in any other kind of human connection. "Jumping on the bandwagon" etc. are phenomena that happen even with groups of people that know nothing about each other on the Internet, especially with children that don't understand the concept of anonymity very well (and when it comes to Youtube comments and the like, a lot of that is definitely written by <18yo). So some of the hateful comments you see on the web are the product of the same kind of deindividuation that can happen when big groups of hooligans/demonstraters/etc gather. Not saying all of it is, I just think it's wrong to assume that anonymous people on the 'Net would always be acting in a way that is not influenced by others at all. We're all humans using the computers after all, and as humans we tend to adjust ourselves to the people we interact with, even when it doesn't really make any sense to do so.

Edit: Re "I think this forum disproves that claim": The anonymity the Penny-Arcade strip is referring to is the kind of total anonymity you can get with for example online FPS games, where you only engage in quick interactions, there is no logging of your past chatting history(usually) and so on. The kind of 'anonymity' that you get here on the koohii forums and in a lot of other communities isn't the same, because here your activity is logged and unless you only only post here once or twice, you build up a kind of identity and it is possible for you to, as that identity, lose face. It's not a totally loose system where you can barge in and say whatever you want without your reputation somehow worsening.

(speaking of Penny Arcade and forums, I haven't really been posting there but I used to pay a visit to the Penny Arcade forum every now and then to read a few posts, there's plenty of good people over there. unfortunately the rating system in the 'Awesome Posts' forum disappeared when they upgraded the forum software so now it's much harder to find the best the forum has to offer)

IceCream Wrote:That's 7,000,000,000 - not the american billions.

Kinda off-topic, but I was under the impression that 10^9 was the American billion, with 10^12 being the (former?) British billion.

I believe the reference you're looking for regarding this thread is here: http://www.unc.edu/depts/jomc/academics/dri/idog.html

Besides, doesn't it defeat your point to link to instances of douchebaggery on Facebook? FB is definitely not anonymous.

harusame Wrote:Besides, doesn't it defeat your point to link to instances of douchebaggery on Facebook? FB is definitely not anonymous.

Not really, I don't think.

On Internet forums and other more public internet venues, it is easier to pretend to be someone else.

The whole point of Facebook is to connect you with people you know in real life and pretending to be someone else is discouraged.

If 100 people on Facebook all said variants of "Japan deserves the disaster as karma/payback for Pearl Harbor", I would say that 90% mean what they say and not saying it simply to rile up readers (definition of troll). The sheer amount of people saying these sorts of idiotic things (as shown on YourOpenFacebook and Twitter Trending) means you cannot simply discount that they don't mean what they say, you cannot simply discounting them as trolls, and you cannot simply discount them as being someone other than who they are.

My point is, they aren't the canine species behind the computer screen. They are actually humans in reality.

Does anyone older than 12 actually "troll"? (ie. write bullshit just to get a response)
Mostly troll is just a label that people who are poor at arguing apply to those who disagree with their opinions.

I think for the most part people online write what they think, and when they have anonymity they don't need to filter what they write and don't hold back.

Well, I suppose if your point is to disagree with the formula, then FB would, in fact, reinforce your point. Something I would have grasped if I'd read more carefully.

>.<

My bad.

If i had to guess, i'd say most of those people were probably terrible people to begin with. the internet's only an exponent to the nature of a person. if they're a douche online, they're probably thinking mean things about you in person. j/s.

if you really wanted to prove your point, what good things were said about Japan via the internet and through anonymity? i think the comparison would be interesting if it could be done.

dtcamero Wrote:Internet comments sections are a cesspool for uneducated uncultured people who have vile opinions ... I get the feeling that if you're a redneck in the middle of the country who hates his job/doesn't have one, and hates his life, and hears that white privilige is ending bc of obama ... these are the people who clog up these forums like cholesterol in an artery. they are so thick there and disproportionately represented that no one else gets heard, hence the virtual train wreck at every bulletin board even remotely touching on politics.

You imply that this sort of behavior is somehow specific to rural white conservatives. They just happen to be who is angry and loud at the moment. Look at the archives of bulletin boards remotely touching on politics from a few years back and you will find just as much of an uncultured, uneducated cesspool from the other side of the political spectrum whenever George W. Bush or Sarah Palin come up in conversation.

dtcamero Wrote:since the original premise of this board is self-sacrifice in the pursuit of education and multiculturalism, they will (for the most part) avoid it like kryptonite.

I could just as easily claim that since the original premise of this board is bettering oneself through hard work, that the vile types on the political left would avoid it like kryptonite. Actually I hope we're both right, I can do without douchebags regardless of their political affiliation.

nadiatims Wrote:Does anyone older than 12 actually "troll"? (ie. write bullshit just to get a response)

Trolls come in all shapes, sizes, and of course, ages.

nadiatims Wrote:Mostly troll is just a label that people who are poor at arguing apply to those who disagree with their opinions.

Yes, that is the incorrect definition of troll: "You disagree with my (or the majority's) opinion, therefore you are a troll".

To use an analogy, the difference between a troll and a stupid person is the difference between manslaughter and murder.

The main issue is INTENT.

Corodon Wrote:You imply that this sort of behavior is somehow specific to rural white conservatives.

I'm sure he means people from all lower-socio-economic spectrums, not just rurul white conservatives (rednecks). This includes but is not limited to: c***s (lower-socio-economic white surburban British), n*****s (lower-socio-economic African-Americans), s***s (lower-socio-economic American-Mexicans) and *** (lower-socio-economic Asians).

Note that I do not know the correct equivalent derogatory term for Asians.

The point I'm making is that there is an unfortunate negative function between the following two variables: "low-socio-economic person" and "level of education and culturedness", which leads to what we call "tyranny of the majority" or the "great unwashed" occupying our internet forums with their stupidity.

Again, I'm not blaming them (most of the time anyway) for the way they are.

I blame rich people. The very very rich ones that is, who actively seek to dumb down society for their own benefit. I don't like stupid people but I like people with sinister motives even less. But that's a whole other topic.

Corodon Wrote:They just happen to be who is angry and loud at the moment. Look at the archives of bulletin boards remotely touching on politics from a few years back and you will find just as much of an uncultured, uneducated cesspool from the other side of the political spectrum whenever George W. Bush or Sarah Palin come up in conversation.

I'm not particularly a fan of American politics or discussing American politics but in Sarah Palin's case, I think the vitriol against her was well-deserved 100%. Even the Republicans themselves disowned her.

Corodon Wrote:I could just as easily claim that since the original premise of this board is bettering oneself through hard work, that the vile types on the political left would avoid it like kryptonite.

I need more info: Could you explain in what way is the relationship between the "political left" and "hard work" like kryptonite? Even if you yourself don't believe it, I would like to see how this claim be justified.