Facebook is shatteringly stupid, and we as a culture are too stupid to maneuver it’s stupidity. We think it’s one thing when it’s another thing altogether. I don’t care about your stupid pet video, until I do. I don’t care what you think about my stupid uploaded photo until you don’t tell me what you think of my stupid uploaded photo. I want you to care about the righteousness of my opinion unless you don’t agree, then I’m going to wheeze and bluster because you didn’t celebrate my astonishing ability to drill down to the essence of the issue. An essence that you, with your blazing stupidity, have obviously missed.
Of course by “I”, I mean “you”. I’m quite sure all of you wait breathlessly for my next ephemera.
But honestly, FB is not the place for discourse. Opinions don’t get changed there. FB is the internet’s main place for Road Rage. We yell and and insult one another from a safe place. We hide behind our screens and take swipes at each other from our hiding places, then walk away proud of ourselves for having beaten back the stupidity. We’re not the brave warriors keeping the wolves at bay. We’re the asshole cat hiding in a shoebox.
It’s ridiculous.
Now, I’m going to continue to post my opinions on FB, and you should as well. Because I can. Because you can. But I’m going to make you a promise. I promise, right now, right here, that nothing you say on FB will change my mind.
You want to know why? It’s not because I’m stupid, or intransigent. It’s not because I think you’re stupid, uninformed or evil. It’s because FB is stupid, and the wrong place for discourse.
You want to change my mind? Talk to me. Text me, call me, write me. Ask me questions and I’ll do the same. Try to understand my point, and I’ll try to understand yours. I promise.
We’ve become a country insulted by opposing beliefs. We don’t listen, we don’t empathize. We don’t do our homework and we listen only to the people who say what we want to hear. We demonize debate and discourse and then lament the dearth of those things in our public squares.
And Facebook isn’t a public square. It’s a urinal wall, it’s the window we give people the finger through when they cut us off. It’s stupid.
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