Leonard Pitts Jr.: Technology Enhances Beer Muscles

[babylonsister]

http://www.nationalmemo.com/leonard-pitts-jr-technology-enhances-beer-muscles/

Leonard Pitts Jr.: Technology Enhances Beer Muscles
June 1st, 2012 5:14 pm Leonard Pitts Jr.

snip//

Professional athletes have this expression. When the doughy guy in the stands, fortified by the overconsumption of hops and barley, yells abuse to some chiseled giant down on the field, he is said to possess “beer muscles.” The aforementioned revolution has produced its equivalent. Call it “Internet courage.”

It does not always manifest itself in death threats. Sample the message boards attending your average opinion column, blog or controversial news story and you will find Internet courage by the bucket — people flaming the writer and one another with gleeful abandon you know they’d never dare display in the flesh and mortar world.

snip//

One imagines the twisted sorts who do that kind of thing regard it as fun. The communications revolution empowers them to commit acts of emotional terrorism on the cheap, a species of abuse whose cruelty is exceeded only by its cowardice, which is in turn exceeded only by its laziness. You can now frighten and alarm someone without leaving the comfort of your bed.

snip//

You always think the new technology is going to liberate something shining and profound in humankind. And sometimes, it does. But it also, invariably, becomes a medium by which we release the malignant droppings of our lizard brains. Instead of liberating our best, it liberates our worst.

Gauzy TV commercials and futurist essays, you see, tell lies of omission. Every year, there’s an upgrade. Every year, there’s a shiny new doodad. Every year, the hardware changes. Every year, it is supposed to make us better.

But the only piece of hardware with the power to do that lies between the ears and its upgrades are the work of a lifetime.

Technology will not make us better. There is no app for that.

[2on2u]

1. A chiseled down version for the men..... "netnads". n't

[sofa king]

2. I dissent!

What I want to be in the real world is a polite, thoughtful, tolerant person. I want my inner monologue to be tightly controlled.

The Internet is my inner monologue, the place where I get to spell it out to myself and everyone else in a way that would be publicly disruptive, rude, and perhaps even obscene.

It works for me, and it works for millions of others. This is only a belief, but I believe that eventually a causative link between violent video games and the decrease in violent crime across our nation will be established.

I further believe the naked id life I lead on the Internet has improved my teamwork skills, my research skills, problems with shyness, and my overall ability to discern between that which is real and that which is crap (hint: it's all crap).

I am not so easily deceived in real life, and I find it easier to spot liars, cheats, and bullies, and to deal with them. My assertiveness has improved as well, which has made it easier for me to stick to my personal code of ethics, which in turn has allowed me to improve the lives of those around me.

All because I can fulminate like a volcano emerging from underneath a nuclear power plant whenever I feel like it. I'm sure that technology will make bad people worse, but it will also make people who wish to do good better at doing good.

So there!

[babylonsister]

3. Hahaha! Righteous!