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| Kinda puts "combox martyrdom" into perspective, don't it? |
Originally published on October 10, 2011, I may find myself re-posting this reflection every year or so. Not because it's so gosh-darn well-written or witty, but to remind myself that those who won't be polite to others should not expect politeness for themselves.
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On October 1 on The Impractical Catholic
I posted the news out of Rockford, Illinois that the state Department
of Public Health had suspended the license of the Northern Illinois
Women’s Center, an abortion mill most notable for the anti-Catholic
antics of its owner and employees, and now established as completely
uncaring of their patients’ health. After making some grimly celebratory
remarks, especially on how access is far more important to the hard-core pro-aborts than is women’s health, I added a YouTube clip of Queen’s video “Another One Bites the Dust”.
The only comment I got was this piece of whiny snottiness:
I find it quite ironic that you use a song that was written and performed [by] a *gasp* HOMOSEXUAL to celebrate this.Why do I even waste my time, we all know you are going to keep on trying to keep others down ....
I
no longer make any attempts to prove I’m a nice guy with plenty of
friends both straight and gay, conservative and liberal, Catholic and
non-Catholic. For one thing, people like “Poosy” don’t listen, don’t
care, and won’t believe me anyway. For another, it reminds me too much
of the old Jewish joke about anti-Semites: “Some of my best friends are
Jews.” So of course “Poosy” finds it ironic: in the cramped, angry
little box of her ideology, I’m not allowed to have gay friends or to
appreciate good music performed by homosexuals because it would detract
from my all-encompassing homophobia.
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| ©United Feature Syndicate. |
Many
of us middle-aged dinosaurs can remember with fondness the pre-Internet
“good old days”, when you could count on the opinions editor of your
local newspaper to separate the weeds from the wheat, the thoughtful —
or at least the civil — from the viciously hysterical. And occasionally
you can still find chat boards, discussion forums and newspaper blogs
where moderators kick trolls to the curb. But considered in the vastness
of Western history, such consideration is a mere blip, less than a
second on the clock of Man’s existence.
But
still and all, is it really worth it to have a combox? I’d like to say
“yes”, because there have been a couple of times thoughtful readers have
caught me out in errors and misstatements. And yes, I do get a little
bit of comfort when people compliment my writing.
The
real danger, though, is in the ego boost you can get from the whiners,
the jerks, the trolls and the wild-eyed zealots. They don’t puncture
your self-esteem at all. No, they simply confirm your intellectual
superiority by their foot-stamping dogmatism, as well as their nasty
speculations about your intelligence, sanity, benevolence and sexual
health. They feed your ego with generous slices of their contempt,
self-pity and ideology-driven delusions. How clever you are, to be able
to tell a straw man from a genetic fallacy like a hawk from a handsaw!
And
speaking of hawks from handsaws, I’m reminded of another line from
Shakespeare: “The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose” (The Merchant of Venice, I:iii:93). And so Satan can, as he quoted Psalm 91:11-12 to Jesus in the wilderness (Mt 4:6). “For even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light” (2 Cor 11:14).
So
when the combox fills up with steaming mounds of enlightened, inclusive
tolerance and sensitivity, the temptation is for us Christians to
comfort each other (and ourselves especially) with the Beatitudes: “Blessed
are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the
kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute
you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so men
persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Mt 5:10-12).
And
it’s right at that moment that you’re no longer really writing for
Christ. You’re just too busy throwing yourself to the lions to notice.
Because behind the adolescent whining, the jerky snottiness, the provocative trollery and the over-the-top zeal is a person, a soul. You don’t really
know why they stopped to read your post, let alone why they bothered to
snark in your combox. It’s always fun to speculate, and God knows I’m
as guilty as the next blogger, but it’s as much lemonade-stand
psychiatry as is their nasty speculations about your intelligence,
sanity, blah-blah-blah.
Like the senator is supposed to have told young Lyndon Johnson:
Telling a man to go to hell and then making him go is two different propositions. First of all, it is hot down there and the average fellow doesn’t want to go. And then when you tell him he has to go, he just bristles up and he is a lot less likely to go than if you hadn’t told him anything. What you better do is get out the Good Book that your mama used to read to you, and go back to the Prophet Isaiah and read what he said. He said, ‘Come now, let us reason together’” (Is 1:18).[1]
So from here on out, I’ll try to remember that I am a nice guy. “I do none harm,” Sir Thomas More tells the court in A Man For All Seasons.
“I say none harm. I think none harm. And if this be not enough to keep a
man alive, then, in good faith, I long not to live.” If I can’t agree
with you, I can at least not mock you.
Come, let us reason together.
[1] Valenti, J. (1975). A Very Human President. Cit. in Boller, P. F. Jr. (1981). Presidential Anecdotes. New York: Penguin Books.
