Goodbye, Viral Vitriol! (#GoodbyeVi)

You know those posts that go around that make you want to scream, banshee-like? No, not the dumb-n-dumber home videos, the cats-on-catnip cartoons, or the “You’d better or ELSE!” chain letters. Those are all great runners-up, but I mean the worst of all: Vi-posts, as I will call them, standing for posts that carry viral vitriol. In these posts, someone is shaming people of a given point-of-view for something that their “team” did, which caused some kind of controversy. Only…it’s not always entirely clear who did what, who told the interweb about it anyway, and why. You can find out more here.

What is clear is that these posts pack a wallop of US and THEM in matters of politics, religion, or both. In the land of viral vitriol, your team is either the shamer or the shamee. The doses of shame are dealt with a steely eye and a heavy hand. They are rooted not only in “I am right; you are wrong” but also in “Remember when you shamed me last time? Well, look at you now. How does THAT feel?”

So you post something to position yourself in the midst of all this. Only…things are never as simple as expected. The FANTASY is…You post a brilliant rhetorical take on said issue. Your team cheers! Your team concedes that you are brilliant and right. The other team concedes that you are brilliant and right. Your team takes a point. RAH!

But the REALITY usually goes something like this…The same three people from the opposing team who ALWAYS comment on your posts tag-team you yet again into the wee hours of the morning, your own teammates nowhere to be found. -OR- Your friend whips out a Snopes reality check on you, and you have to concede “Yup, this dog got wagged!” The controversy was some goofball’s idea of a joke. -OR- A dysfunctional family moment (aka shaming within your own team) mysteriously follows YOUR post: “How COULD our team care about THIS that the other team does when THAT that they do is so much worse?” Clearly, you offended one of your own.

In the world of Vi-posts, then, only one thing can be counted on: No matter what the real outcome turns out to be, it is NEVER the fantasy.

Then comes the remorse phase aka the hangover. This involves…Figuring out how to restore order in the universe of your identity and your relationships with your own teammates and, oh yes, with members of the other team which, in the heat of battle, you had forgotten are your real-life friends; Giving up the mental space and sleep you are desperately needing for that huge project due tomorrow to figure a way out of this mess; And ultimately, facing the “Ground Control to Major Tom”/alcoholic-hitting-bottom feeling of existential angst as you ask, “God, how DID I get HERE again?”

So here was my catalyst for this post…

After this week’s Starbucks’-not-Christmasy-enough-red-cup incident (yes, those of you who are living through it will NEVER forget, I am SURE…haha…ugh), I found myself AAAAA-nnoyed by the countless tribbles this viral beast had birthed and their colonization of my feed–and even more annoyed at myself for having posted something about it.

So…I went on a walk. The outside world–blue skies, chilled air, toasty sun–reminded me how asinine the whole thing was. It reminded me I have a body. And a brain. And a heart beat. It reminded me what smiling is, so I did that. And I actually felt a sense of deep liking for the random people I saw walking their dogs, working on their yards, commuting to work. It was…remarkable.

While I walked, I thought on this odd phenomenon of the digital age that causes true (if not particularly lasting) angst among us. As Jonathan Haidt and other social psychologists explain, human beings are “groupish.” Whether we like it or not, we naturally and continuously position ourselves in such a way as to get some kind of response from other humans. In many ways, such interactions become fairly predictable and, therefore, reassuring. However, in the world of all things gone viral, these interactions become a house of mirrors, or worse yet, a dirty bomb, hurting us all. This is why the fantasy and reality part ways so regularly.

Then a rather unexpected thought entered my mind. Because self-righteousness so predictably back-fires, perhaps it is good that such targeted posturing does not often get us what we want. A small dose of pain and/or shame is a great teacher of humility. Once we realize the knee-jerk nature of the whole thing, once we let go of the need to defend, once we reassure ourselves that we will do our best to avoid these situations in the future–the universe is restored.

Still, it is intriguing and a bit shocking how readily we humans can be wagged by this tail of viral vitriol. I have been working over the years to use social media as a platform for promoting understanding, respect, and consensus-building. So how did I find myself here AGAIN ? The answer lies once more inthe realm of human nature. Haidt explains in his book, The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion, that “[i]ntuitions come first, strategic reasoning second.” I understand this to mean that my emotional mind gets tapped by a Vi-post (perhaps by the original issue, perhaps by what someone on my team said about it) and chooses my course of action so quickly that I do not know that it has already decided for me. By the time my slower reasoned mind becomes fully cognizant of what has happened (and even then, it is so used to lawyering for my intuition that it will write the post anyway), my hand is already clicking “POST.” And thus, I am in the muck one more time.

So I say all of this to ask…”Is there a way OUT?” Posting more on the given controversy just makes me an ongoing part of the problem–even when my intention if to reflect, defuse, go meta, provide insight, etc. No matter my intention, I am still giving IT attention. So a wordless gesture of some sort seems more promising.

My little solution, then, is to replace my profile picture for one day, maybe two, with a picture of something amazing I saw (out in nature or in the broader world of humanity) when I exited the echo chamber of viral vitriol. I will post it as my mark of having exited the fight. Even if I never entered the fight at all but I find it colonizing my inner universe, I will post my little picture and maintain silence on the matter to make a statement that there is a bigger world out there, filled with nature to be savored and action to be taken and other people (who are, like me, like you, doing the best they can) to be valued as individuals rather than as members of two monolithic opposing teams that the beastly Vi-post of the week hath spawned. 🙂

If this resonates, please like, share, comment, follow my gesture, or create one of your own. I don’t know much about tags, but maybe let’s tag this #GoodbyeVi ? …Happy rehumanizing, all!

Heather