PART OF THE PROBLEM OR SOLUTION?
Albert Einstein
spent his life looking into space and atoms trying to prove what is now
referred to as M-theory and the existence of multiple-realities. If he had
payed closer attention to how people see the world and behave, he would have
found his answers. People appear to exist in their own realities, observing and
interpreting the world in different - often deluded - ways. Fortunately, he
provided us with some great words of wisdom to help us function and co-exist.
A while
ago I came across this little gem (see link below). This idiotic rant was
posted by someone who claims to have been a moderator for Facebook’s
Administration team. It reveals some important points. First, Facebook is
understaffed when it comes to administration duties. Second, meritocracy
appears to play no part in employment of individuals for that role, Lyn herself
being evidence.
Read what
she wrote, and any sane person will go from feeling empathy for the hardships
she and her fellow moderators experience every day to suddenly realising that
people like her are part of the problem. She doesn’t even appear to realise
that she crossed the line from being one of the defenders of Community
Standards to becoming a huge part of the problem – she herself is a troll.
We get
it. It’s a horrible job. You encounter idiots on Facebook every day. As a
consumer, we see their vile and stupid comments whenever we read a news feed
and the responses. We have no power to stop them or remove the anti-social
things they have posted. We rely upon the Administration team to do that, but
clearly that is beyond the abilities of Lyn and her ilk. While Lyn is busy
bitching about the things she has to deal with, better, more capable staff have
to carry her load. People like her could benefit from some sound advice in
regards to this kind of situation.
If you
don’t like your job, shut your mouth and leave so someone else can do it. As
long as you are there, inflicting yourself and your self-centred narcissism on
others, you are adding to the problem. Yes, a child being brutalised by someone
is horrible, should be stopped, and being delayed in finding that and
responding to it because you have to deal with someone else’s problems is
frustrating, but dismissing their concerns and blaming them for inadvertently
getting in your way is not acceptable.
Sadly,
Lyn is not the only person affected by this attitude. To us, a problem someone
else is having may seem petty and pointless, but how do we know how that is
affecting them? How do we know it’s not just one more problem in their life
added to a whole slew of others that could eventually push them over the edge?
What if, when we unleash our nasty attitude on them because their ‘petty’
problem interfered with what we believed could be of greater importance, they
lost the plot, snapped, and got all stabby? Are we responsible for causing
someone else harm.
I’ll
bet we’re not so quick to attribute blame upon ourselves. We cannot solve all
the problems on our own. That’s why we have a team. If we don’t trust them to
do their job, that’s our problem. In Lyn's case, it looks like they can’t trust
her to do her own. Yes, there are a lot of petty complaints. One of my pet
peeves is morons that post comments like “why are you posting this?! It doesn’t
interest me! Stop wasting my time!!!! I’m removing you from my feeds!!!”
This
may seem like an odd comment, but the link below takes it to a whole new level.
What the author wrote was amusing, but the simple solution to her problem was
not to read those posts. In fact, if posts make you so angry you suffer a bout
of keyboard-rage leading to a desire to punch someone in the throat, then maybe
it’s time to take a break from social media. That and visit a shrink because
you need a good dose of something supplied in a little bottle obtained with a
prescription.
Tim Urban
also seems to suffer from the same problem. His article was also rather amusing
but failed to take into account the subjectivity of what constitutes ‘boring’ –
what doesn’t interest you may be of interest to someone else. Assuming someone
is boring because what they share doesn’t interest you speaks volumes of your
own narcissism and or envy. Don’t like it? Don’t read it. Sick of getting a
feed you don’t want? Then block it. Not hard to understand, even easier to
implement.
I've seen
a lot of people suggest this very obvious solution only to be blasted by the
nut they make the mistake of engaging. Apparently the over-complicated nuances
of the suggestion to not read posts they don't like eludes them. Some people
are simply too intellectually deficient to learn. They repeat the same actions
that lead to situations that cause them distress and seem oblivious or
unconcerned by interests, needs or wishes of others.
This
problem will increases exponentially if said nut has a position of authority
and the power to inflict their own flawed personality on others (eg, a member
of an Administration team unsuited). In Lyn’s case, she has accused others of
offensive behaviour she herself is guilty of committing in her rant and,
clearly, her job. Her lack of concern for issues she considers irrelevant may
have actually escalated to something worse because – as she herself stated –
“fuck you.”
Charming.
We got lectured on morality, who deserves help, and how petty our collective
complaints are, by a troll. Awesome. Yes, some people don’t really get that
what offends them is something they (a) seem more than happy to
inflict (and worse) on others, and (b) suffer as a bi-product of a
lack of funding in good public education and mental health services. But does
this give someone like Lyn the right to judge the vast majority for the sins of
a few? No. The responses to her post reveal a lot of different opinions on her
rant, and demonstrate how entrenched her kind of flawed thought process has
become.
Lyn and
her little following of bobble-heads failed to consider the most obvious factor
in her “the real story behind Facebook moderation and your petty reports” is
people like Lyn. Facebook is a business created by a sociopath. It is
frequented by far too many other sociopaths and moderated by too many more of
the same. It is not there to look after the users, it is there to make money.
The only thing that will change the attitudes of a sociopath is one that
financially cripples them.
Do you
have several billion dollars? No? Then it looks like you won’t be able to
purchase that legal outcome to change the attitudes and behaviour of Facebook.
Instead, you, like the rest of us, have the wonderful benefit of that ‘block’
function. Use it like you’re playing Whack-a-Mole and just block every troll
you encounter. It will deplete your news feeds and posts of their presence. It
will also prevent them from trolling and blocking you, leaving their nasty
remarks where you can’t see them but where they will continues to cause you
harm.
A wise
man who sees a pile of excrement in his path finds a way to avoid it. Those who
do not will discover it works its way into their soul, causes them distress and
anger, and the stench follows them wherever they go even after they have tried
to wipe it off. You see a troll, block a troll. Do not engage them or so-called
‘moderators’ because, under the vast majority of circumstances, you will find
the situation only becomes more unpleasant. Drop them in your wake, and sail on
by without a backward glance. Life is too short to waste on idiots, and you have no right to be adding to their number.
Note: This blog entry was originally published on the
19th of September 2016 under a different blog post I’d been
making but seemed more appropriate added to this one due to the nature of the
points it raised about flawed socio-cultural attitudes.
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