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Does the Internet Create Lynch Mobs?
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Post by
Aimsyr
My guess is, with behavior this bad, that the parents are probably not much better than the kids, so I doubt they are going to have much to worry about there.
I actually wanted to redact this statement, at least in the case of one
parent.
But Klein was moved by the gesture of one boy’s father, Robert Helm, who showed up at her doorstep to apologize and then received a hug from the bus monitor.
When she referred to the boy, Helm said, “There’s no excuse,” and he proceeded to apologize some more.
I also have to say, now seeing now the story is playing out, that while I don't agree that threats are a good way to handle a situation, in this case, it may have had a positive impact. Since it has not resulted in any actual violence (and I pray it does not), it may have not been all bad. I think these kids have gotten "a taste of their own medicine", and it may turn out to be enough to make them, and others, think twice about their actions. The question is now that the point has been made, and it appears that apoligies and punishments are comming, will the threats and harrasmant stop. If it does, than it may have been a good way to show them how it feels. If it doesn't, than it will soon cross over to being no better than what the boys did.
Agreed, however I would expect the child to go and apologize - not the parent.
In the end, while the parents could be blamed for bringing up the children incorrectly - which may or may not be true for all of them, a large portion of the blame still falls upon the shoulders of the kids themselves.
Post by
331902
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Post by
1000947
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Post by
331902
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1000947
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Post by
Squishalot
El, I know I will sound cold and cruel for saying this, but does the saying "Have a taste of your own medicine" rings any bells?
Don't expect me to feel any kind of sympathy for the kid who got 1000 threatening text messages. He's reaping what he sowed, and if this kind of response was given to every bully in the world, we would get rid of bullies permanently. Have them feel what its like to be verbally harassed for a change, and see if they keep it up.
Nothing deters crime more than turning the tables around.
Lawful Evil
I'm a bit late to the party, but I think Chaotic Neutral is more correct.
1) Willingness to operate outside / flaunt laws / regulations. Definitely not lawful, possibly neutral, but the type of response would suggest chaotic.
2) Eye for an eye (as in, vigilante justice of sorts), as opposed to committing evil for the sake of causing fear / unhappiness / profit. Not 'good', because of the methods associated with doing so, hence neutral.
Post by
Rankkor
El, I know I will sound cold and cruel for saying this, but does the saying "Have a taste of your own medicine" rings any bells?
Don't expect me to feel any kind of sympathy for the kid who got 1000 threatening text messages. He's reaping what he sowed, and if this kind of response was given to every bully in the world, we would get rid of bullies permanently. Have them feel what its like to be verbally harassed for a change, and see if they keep it up.
Nothing deters crime more than turning the tables around.
Lawful Evil
I'm a bit late to the party, but I think Chaotic Neutral is more correct.
1) Willingness to operate outside / flaunt laws / regulations. Definitely not lawful, possibly neutral, but the type of response would suggest chaotic.
2) Eye for an eye (as in, vigilante justice of sorts), as opposed to committing evil for the sake of causing fear / unhappiness / profit. Not 'good', because of the methods associated with doing so, hence neutral.
this guy gets it :P
I never said my solution would be nice, and personally, if I had to rank my own alignment as I said before I consider myself Chaotic Neutral.
Edit: For clarifications on what exactly Chaotic Neutral is (And why its not like Lawful Evil at all) read
this article
from TVtropes.
I'd be a type 4 Chaotic Neutral.
Type 4 are those who are overly cynical, and hold no allegiance to anyone and decide for themselves what is right or wrong, and whether or not they want to do anything about it.
They are often the disillusioned types who once held onto an ideal or have lost their family or friends, and often belonged to a completely different alignment
.They can be dragged into The Quest or bought for their services, and may battle the forces of evil if they come across them or they get in the way, but they lack conviction beyond basic self-interest, and
if they still aspire to better themselves they are usually their own worst enemy
.
How true is the second underlined part =(
Post by
Aimsyr
Firstly how are the parents to blame?
While I personally disagree the parents are fully to blame, as it is possible for good parents to have bad kinds and the other way around, they are certainly to blame to an extent.
You'd be surprised just how much most people take after their parents, whether they like it or not.
It is up to the parents to ensure their children are brought up well and to take action when their children do bad thing. Parents need to set a good example for their children.
I do agree that most of the blame should go to the children though, as after all they were the ones who actually insulted and bullied the bus monitor.
As for the death threats, as long as no one takes action they aren't that much of a problem - while it is an overreaction in my opinion, that kind of thing happens all the time and as long as the children aren't actually harmed I wouldn't pay much attention to them.
It might be a good idea for the kids to lie low for a bit though, considering the fact there is bound to be someone who is actually willing to physically harm them.
Post by
588688
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Post by
OverZealous
As for needing religion to be moral, I think without an objective measure of morality, kids will learn that subjective morals are ok. If they learn that, then subjectivity will be the definition of right and wrong for them. All religion is, is a "set of beliefs and/or traditions". If you don't teach kids to believe anything at all, then I'm quite sure they will believe anything at all, even the most heinous stuff.
I have to point something else out that's wrong with this statement, you shouldn't use a book to base morality off of, right and wrong should be a gut feeling. If you need a book to tell you that verbally and physically harassing an old woman is wrong than there's something really wrong with you. Also being moral just because the bible tells you to wont get you into heaven.
Honestly, does it really matter where your morals came from, as long as you fully believe that they are right. I mean, if the Bible teaches me that theft is wrong, and I believe that - that's all good, right? If your parents teach you that theft is wrong and you believe that, as well - what difference does it make?
Edit: That isn't to say
all
morals should come from the same place and never be subject to change, and to what you believe yourself. But I don't think your core set of morals should necessarily have to come from anything or anyone in particular.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
Well- according to the bible, it's kind of the only thing that gets you into heaven. The vast majority of people who believe in a heaven do so because it's in the bible, or another religious book. If the only reason they believe in it is because of their religion, then telling them that they shouldn't believe their religion will get them into it is kind of a logically false argument. If they don't believe in their religion, then it doesn't exist. If they believe in it because of their religion, then they probably believe it exists according to the rules their religion describes.
Post by
Adamsm
Also being moral just because the bible tells you to wont get you into heaven.
Well duh; being a good person is what gets you into Heaven, so not sinning is a big part....though, you can do a death bed recantation and get in as well.
But none of this has a single thing to do with the topic at hand, and should be raised in the actual thread for that.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
I agree Adams- back on topic.
I've just noticed that moral outrage on the internet draws extremists who will step way out of bounds of what is appropriate to the situation, sometimes. My theory is that when a story reaches a broader audience, you have a greater chance of it being latched onto by nuts. Also, when there's a larger audience, those who crave that kind of attention find it more rewarding to engage in these kinds of activities.
Again, I totally think these kids deserve punishment, sanctions, etc. But I don't think that they deserve death threats, or to have their families lives put in danger.
An example I can use with far less moral implications would be the anger over the Mass Effect 3 endings sucking. They did, in fact suck. People got on forums and complained. They wrote comics about how they sucked, and some of those were quite funny. They went on YouTube and made "real ending" videos, some of which were pretty funny. They did, in fact, have a point.
But some people really got out of hand in terms of how much effort went into it. They spent thousands on a billboard to face the company to tell them the endings sucked. They sent hundreds of snarky cupcakes to them. They went to the press. They started a charity to donate money to in the name of not buying things from Bioware so they could show them how much money they lost by sucking.
Clearly, writing a bad ending is not a highly moral issue, and none of these responses were violent (though some of them I am sure were harassing, and possibly even threatening). But the amount of response vs. the gravity of the initial issue was just very disproportionate, because people got on forums and whipped each other up into a storm of rage.
In issues where the person who is being targeted is clearly in the wrong (like with these kids), it seems that there are a number of people who lose sight of the fact that usually we work on a scale where worse transgressions require worse punishments, and lesser ones require lesser punishments.
Have any of you ever flipped someone off in traffic, wrote a nasty customer service e-mail or review, gotten into a heated argument and said something horrible, etc? Do you think that if someone had videotaped it, and had published it with your information, you'd deserve death threats, to have your family harassed and to be scared to go outside for fear of violent reprisal? Because it's quite possible that if your hissy fit went viral, you'd be in that situation. I'm not saying you were right- but were you wrong enough to warrant something like this?
Post by
Adamsm
Well it's not just things like the ending of games; look at the utterly insane wars that simple shipping(pairing of characters) can create, to the point that some forums end up as just massive flame wars between group A and group B, with death threats, vulgar comments and other more unsavory things being thrown around like party favours.
Even here on Wowhead: Try to say anything about pretty mcuh any character and you could have a mass war in a matter of minutes.
It's really about the autonomy of the Net that pulls out the worse in people 90% of the time.
Post by
588688
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Ksero
I fail to see anything morally wrong about beating up a bunch of jerkwads who would treat an old lady like that, they deserve to be beaten up for it, not killed, not beaten to within an inch of their life, just beaten up, subjected to a degree physical pain. There's your punishment right there. And no mods, I'm not telling people to go beat up these kids (because I seriously doubt anyone will read my post and go beat up those kids because I, some complete stranger on the internet, told them to), I'm saying they deserve to be beaten up, and I'd see nothing morally wrong or questionable about doing so. Treat people like dirt and you get treated the same way.
Really, you see nothing wrong with beating kids. It's not like they went and beat up the old lady, and even if they did they're still kids, they got what was coming to them through the 1000 missed calls and messages they received. They don't need to be beaten, beating people doesn't teach them anything, you are no better than those kids for condoning violence against them.
Say someone is insulting my parents, i beat the crap out of them, they charge me with assault, my defense is that they were insulting my parents, how do you think that's gonna stand up.
Post by
Adamsm
'Eye for an eye and the world goes blind'; so what happens next: Someone beats up these kids, then their family members beat those people up for attacking children, then the family members of the mob beat up the family members who were attacked etc etc etc; when does it end.
Violence never solves anything, and just cause more violence: Humans have proven that ever since we got kicked out of the Garden/fell out of the Trees.
Post by
588688
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Post by
MyTie
you shouldn't use a book to base morality off ofSays who? Says you?right and wrong should be a gut feelingReally? Many things probably should, but empathy just isn't that common. I feel that doing right should feel good, but you can't use this as a basis for morality for society.If you need a book to tell you that verbally and physically harassing an old woman is wrong than there's something really wrong with you. Also being moral just because the bible tells you to wont get you into heaven.The Bible isn't my sole reason for being moral, but it is the foundation for my morals. I don't know why you think yourself an authority on morality, or some sort of judge as to what I should and shouldn't feel.I fail to see anything morally wrong about beating up a bunch of jerkwads who would treat an old lady like that, they deserve to be beaten up for it, not killed, not beaten to within an inch of their life, just beaten up, subjected to a degree physical pain.Quite the authority on morality, I see. Perhaps
you
should read the Bible and attempt to derive some morality from it, as your current morality appears flawed
to me
.
Post by
588688
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
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