The bratty internet

This is, of course, a trivial problem compared to many that afflict us.  But it does affect the quality of interaction on the internet and probably even the willingness of many people to participate in it.  To a startling extent, the default mode of self-expression on the internet has become vulgar, insulting, juvenile, coarse, even obscene.  It's not universal, but it's pervasive.

There is, to start with, the widespread casual use of profanity -- fuck this, fuck that, fuck you, "fuck your feelings" -- it's completely routine in some cases, like punctuation.  I use profanity occasionally, as does nearly everyone, but its proper function is to express serious anger or agitation, not to be a normal mode of speech used most of the time (if you actually are in a state of serious anger or agitation most of the time, that's a "you" problem for which you should seek professional help).  Profanity can sometimes be creative or amusing, but that's rare, and even rarer among those who use it frequently.

There's the exuberant embrace of a stance of truculent pre-emptive hostility toward the world, exemplified by the frequent use of imagery featuring an upraised middle finger and by the endless proliferation of "memes" tediously elaborating on the phrase "I don't give a fuck" -- "Behold the field in which I grow my fucks, for it is barren" and the like.  The first two or three of these you see can be mildly entertaining.  By the time you've seen a hundred of them, they have the same effect as a toddler repeatedly shouting "poo poo pee pee" and then giggling at his own cleverness.

There's the acronym BFYTW, regularly seen on some far-right blogs.  It stands for "Because fuck you, that's why" and is regularly used when doing or saying something pointlessly nasty.  It's a red flag for the kind of mentality that would encourage one's dog to shit on the neighbor's lawn just for the sheer hell of being a petty, shitty person.

There's the proliferation of coarse put-downs specifically targeting women -- the "shut up and go make me a sammich" stuff on the right, the Karen-calling on both "sides", the gross use of words like "cunt" and "pussy" as insults for men (being branded with something female is treated as degrading to a man).  To a disturbing extent, such put-downs are sometimes explicitly sexual, with an undertone of sexual aggression and menace.

There's the silly over-indulgence in insulting nicknames for public figures.  Nicknames can be funny or on-point if used sparingly -- I've occasionally used "Agolf Twitler" for Trump and "Moscow Mitch" for McConnell, for example.  But some people use the nickname in place of the real name almost every time they refer to the person, which rapidly becomes irritating and tedious.  If the nickname is substantially longer than the real name, as is often the case, repeated use of it can be really aggravating.  The essay looks un-serious and even becomes difficult to read.  And some right-wing nicknames are deliberately disgusting, like "Pedo Joe" for Biden and "Buttplug" for Buttigieg.

The blog "Nick Here and Now" recently posted on some of these habits, attributing them to the broader problem of erosion of filters and of self-restraint, leading people to simply blurt out whatever comes into their heads without any consideration of what it will sound like.  If that's the case, some people's heads must be real sewers.  He also includes the frequent use of death threats and rape threats on social media as part of the same problem, though I'm more inclined to see that as a serious and pre-meditated strategy to intimidate opposing views into silence.  It's noteworthy, however, that the kind of people noted for making such threats are often the most performatively hyper-sensitive people on the net, constantly declaring themselves to be terminally offended at any opposing viewpoint no matter how politely and carefully expressed, shrieking that any resistance to the most unreasonable demands is "literal genocide", etc.

Nick may be on to something, though, given that the overall impression given by all this swearing and rudeness and vulgarity and name-calling is one of immaturity.  Those filters and self-restraint are among the defining features of adult behavior, after all.  It's only online that all this performative rudeness is even possible.  An adult who, in the real world, constantly said "fuck you" and gave the upraised middle finger and used irritating nicknames and so on, would quickly be fired from his job and disinvited from family events.  People just don't want to deal with that kind of thing.

Donald Trump undoubtedly helped normalize such behavior, at least on the right -- he's one of the few people who really can get away with talking and behaving like that in the real world, because all his life he's had wealth and power to insulate himself from the kind of blowback most people would get for it.  And it's noteworthy that Trump is often compared to a toddler.  But the problem existed before Trump ran for president (this and this date from 2011), and it isn't limited to the right.

I don't have a solution to suggest.  Censorship isn't the answer (it's never the answer), and the misbehavior I've been describing is too trivial and petty to merit most substantive sanctions of any kind -- and most people have higher priorities than dealing with it, anyway.  That's why it persists -- it carries no obvious costs.  It does, however, make writing harder to take seriously, and it may be losing some potential readers.  I tend to drift away from reading sites which consistently indulge in this kind of stuff, not even because I'm trying to "punish" them for it, but simply because I find it irritating and there are always plenty of other sites to read that don't do that.  And, of course, one can try to set an example by not being bratty in one's own writing.  Others who find the trend wearisome will make their way to you.