{"id":5371,"date":"2015-10-20T06:19:38","date_gmt":"2015-10-20T10:19:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/intramuralist.com\/?p=5371"},"modified":"2015-10-20T06:19:38","modified_gmt":"2015-10-20T10:19:38","slug":"keystroke-mentality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/?p=5371","title":{"rendered":"keystroke mentality"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"awhCbhLqRceCdjcPQUnn_IMG_0249\"<\/a>\u201cI fear we might be close to teetering on total, civility failure. The idiots are getting far too big a voice nowadays,\u201d<\/em> said Joe Tessitore of ESPN.<\/p>\n

Tessitore spoke this weekend in regard to the college gridiron. He was speaking of how fans reacted to a student on the University of Michigan football team, whose error led directly to a win by the opponent in the closing seconds of the game. I wonder\u2026 where else are his words applicable?<\/p>\n

\u201cFueled by irrational hate, and numb by a far too easy to kill by keystroke mentality,\u201d<\/em> continued Tessitore.<\/p>\n

So many of us sit behind the cowardice of our keyboards \u2014 as opposed to meeting and dealing with people face-to-face \u2014 and we make all sorts of bold statements\u2026 except\u2026 the statements are not always factual and true \u2014 and while they may be factual, they may also be pointedly disrespectful of other people.<\/p>\n

Our society continues to too often assert opinion in such a bold way, believing that what we say is good and true and right \u2014 and then justify insult if others\u00a0feel differently. Friends, if our opinion evolves into the justification for insult, there is no such thing as equating to, at least the \u201cgood\u201d or \u201cright\u201d part. We must quit using our perspective as a weapon. Such is the harm of the keystroke mentality.<\/p>\n

Just because\u2026 I can type it\u2026 say it\u2026 post it on a placard\u2026 doesn\u2019t make it true nor necessarily wise to post or say. Ah, yes\u2026 the cowardice of our keyboards. I\u2019m reminded of the insight from one of our summer guest writers\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026 Turns out Facebook confrontations are the same thing as real confrontations-go figure? Those arguments I was typing with the distant relatives of my best friend from nursery school? Turns out they were actual people and not just dialog boxes and the \u2018discussions\u2019 we were having were being read and judged by all of our friends. And you know what else? The only opinions any of that critical closed-minded dialog changed were of me and the others who participated in it. No one suddenly changed their entire belief system based on a Facebook argument. Shocker right?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Shocker. Joe Tessitore made his statements this past weekend in regard a punter who is only 22 years old. It matters not; the young man has been verbally eviscerated on Facebook and elsewhere\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cI fear we might be close to teetering on total, civility failure. The idiots are getting far too big a voice nowadays.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The reality is that the words said about the Michigan punter are the same words said about many in office or running for office. Friends, the 2016 Presidential election is over a year away; the thought of this keyboard cowardice continuing for another 385 days is exhausting!<\/p>\n

Said again by my trusted friend\u2026 \u201cAnother Presidential election is upon us\u2026 Editorials are being printed in our newspapers and opinions, lots and lots of opinions. And slowly but surely, those one sided political posts are starting to make their way into my newsfeed. I shudder to think how this one will go. After all, we\u2019ve had years to sharpen our blades and our social media skills. How many of us will let our passion trump our reason?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

I share in the shuddering \u2014 allowing our passion to trump our reason. When did we become a country that justifies such disrespect? When did we become a country where so many of us began either intentionally or unintentionally fueling this culture of irrational hate? When did we become a country where we couldn\u2019t see the big picture? \u2026 where we couldn\u2019t recognize that a game is just a game? \u2026 that political opponents are not enemies? \u2026 that we are called to love our neighbor? \u2026 and when we justify such disrespect?<\/p>\n

I close with the recognition that the Intramuralist, for one, is thankful for the many fancy-dancy techno gadgets of this information age; I love my iPad, MacBook, and all things Apple. But when any of these impersonal keyboards provide the place for us to hide behind and the impetus for disrespect, something is wrong not with the gadgets \u2014 but with us.<\/p>\n

Respectfully\u2026
\nAR<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI fear we might be close to teetering on total, civility failure. The idiots are getting far too big a voice nowadays,\u201d said Joe Tessitore of ESPN. Tessitore spoke this weekend in regard to the college gridiron. He was speaking of how fans reacted to a student on the University of Michigan football team, whose … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “keystroke mentality”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-event"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5371"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5371\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5378,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5371\/revisions\/5378"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}