I try not to get too political on this site since I have friends and family members on all sides of the aisle. I like to leave politics to the professionals. But if you are on any kind of social media at all you have probably noticed the hate that gets thrown around like beads at Mardis Gras. It is completely unavoidable unless you block everyone you know.
I like to peruse social media for photos of friends and family, sports, inspiration and for funny videos or stories. No matter what I get on social media for, I am always inundated with stories, political or otherwise, that have hateful and divisive comments attached to them. It is commonplace now to see people berate the character of complete strangers and roll everyone on the opposite side of the aisle from them as this or that. Apparently everyone in America is either a Nazi or a socialist.
I try to be fair in my judgment of people, but if you begin a statement with “everyone who believes (insert opinion or politician here) is a (insert nazi or socialist or other insults), then I question a few things about you.
- Do you even know what a nazi or a socialist stands for? My guess is you don’t.
- Do you really believe that everyone in the country with a differing opinion than you is one of those things? If so you probably are too narrow minded to be in the conversation.
- Would you be willing to go to everyone’s house on the thread and tell them in person what you think of them? No one in their right mind would do that.
I am absolutely certain about one thing. Every single person in America has a collection of life events that sways their opinions on everything. No two people will have the same opinion on every issue, so if you are living by the rule that everyone that believes different from you is pure evil, than everyone else on the planet except you is pure evil.
I will not comment on political posts on social media for a plethora of reasons, the main one being that I don’t want to. Another reason is that I get insulted enough in my job and my writing that I don’t need more complete strangers adding to it because I have an opinion on a certain subject. I have never voted straight party anything on a ballot. I vote for who I believe is the best candidate for the position, from president all the way down to local city council. I don’t care about their political affiliation. I care about what kind of person the candidate seems to be. Have I been fooled? Absolutely. Have I ever hated a political or sports figure so much that I would stop at nothing to see him or her ruined? Absolutely not.
The social medial hate is vile and it is part of our society now. It is not easy to deal with, and it is something we are going to have to deal with as long as social media is around. My hope is that our children are smart enough to know that only one thing happens when you wrestle with pigs. You get muddy, and the pigs enjoy it.