WRITING
An Oasis Where You’re Safe From Trolls
Come for the stories, stay for the comments
Do you remember when you found out how much people suck?
For me, it was when the daily newspaper where I used to work first began allowing people to leave comments after stories. Until then, I had completely overestimated people. I thought most were fairly decent.
Boy, did anonymous commenting change my mind in a hurry! Some people had something nasty to say after every story. One troll was so brutal that I looked up his real identity through the back end of the website. He ended up being a local politician, and I called him out on it.
“How did you find out my real name?” he challenged me, as if I’d uncovered the identity of Deep Throat or Batman.
“You know I’m the editor of this paper, right?” I answered. The funny thing is, I’d had a generally positive view of him until I saw his secret dark side.
People mostly pretend to be decent
Or at least they did at one point. I’d argue that people are much more comfortable displaying their dark side now.
Twitter or X or whatever you want to call it is so nasty I treat it like a port-a-potty — if I have to go there, I hold my…
