How Can I Say It on Face-off book?

How innocent we were just a few short years ago when we cautiously signed up for Facebook, and how thrilled we were to see our very own images and comments on the Internet. Photographs of our families and friends were welcomed and enjoyed, so much so that we actually looked forward to logging on every chance we had to see if something new had been posted, or if someone had commented on one of our priceless posts. How proud we were to first endorse our political candidates, naively and blissfully thinking our Facebook friends felt the same way.

Facebook is now an unexpected, and often unwanted, display of the current state of rudeness and ignorance that dominates our popular American culture. In fact, there is no better medium to judge the current state of American callousness than the popular free Internet service used by just about anyone with a Personal Computer or a Smart Phone. If you have ever posted any political viewpoints or supported a political candidate on your Facebook page, you know what I'm writing about. It's rapidly becoming Face-Off book.

Just like the old CB radios, the lowest common denominators quickly rose to the top with personal insults and soon made it impossible to post a political or social view without someone wanting to pee on your pant leg. The first time it happens you can't help but be shocked. “Why am I being insulted, if not actually verbally assaulted by someone I thought was a friend?” The answer is easy: They never had Personal Effectiveness Training.

The company I retired from spent a considerable amount of time and money sending every employee to a PEP, or Personal Effectiveness Program so we would learn not to call our customers stupid. Customers have a nasty habit of throwing your products out in the street after a frustrated employee ignominiously calls them untrained or incompetent or even worse, an idiot. Company revenues always suffer from that response, no matter how accurate it may be.

That's how I ended up in the seventies in the Admiral Bimbo hotel in Atlanta with a roommate who drank a 1.75 liter bottle of vodka in just two days. We were sent to Atlanta from all over our region to attend the mandatory civility class to learn not to tell anyone to go stick it in their ear. I'm not sure how much my roomie absorbed, other than the 90 proof Smirnoff, - yes, in those days it was 90 proof - but I did my best to benefit from the course. I learned to listen carefully when confronted with people who were their own worst enemies, at least technically. I was once coached by a manager who advised me to get my point across without swinging a bat. She actually said a 2x4, but there are many who don't know what that is. 

The training helped me through the years with more than just irate customers who had inadvertently unplugged their own machines or created situations that were occasionally hazardous. I learned to suffer the sting of uninformed Khans who dared not lose face in front of their collective hordes. But I never expected the training to be as important as it is today, thanks mainly to Facebook.

After someone belligerently or insultingly contradicts something I post on Facebook, I go to that person's homepage to see where they stand politically or socially. Not surprisingly, many dumpers don't post their viewpoints on their own pages, but they don't hesitate a second to pollute your page to show you the errors of your ways. I call these types “snipers.” They shoot at you from unseen positions and you have no idea how they picked you as a target. After all, they're on your friends list, aren't they?

If on the other hand, the comment they post on my page is an intelligent, factual comment or viewpoint, I'll leave it up, and comment on their post. All too often though, the comment is at best inaccurate, at times irrelevant, and at worst, slanderous.

So, what's up? You didn't intend your personal beliefs or opinions to be posted in a sports bar full of rowdy customers upset their team just got the devil beat out of them, but face it, these are new times and, unfortunately that's what has happened. Your beliefs and opinions are no longer for just your friends. In reality, Facebook, and just about anything else on the Internet is as impersonal as texting. People who wouldn't insult you to your face have no reservations about discussing the error of your thinking in front of a room full of people they don't know. That “room” is rather big as it encompasses everyone who can see your Facebook account. You know, millions and millions of "friends."

Responding to a contradictory post is balanced on the question of how much you value your friend. If they really can't refrain from attacking you or others who comment on your positions, I simply delete them as friends. It's all self explanatory, isn't it? If they don't care about my feelings, why should I bother about theirs? Their statements show who they really are, not who they think they are. Or, you can indignantly defend yourself and argue your point. If you paid close attention to the PEP training, you can adeptly tell them to stick it in their ear and make them look forward to the experience. Arguing, though, is a waste of time. You aren't going to change anyone's mind. As William McAdoo said, "It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument." Here's where I think back to my PEP and wonder if it's even worth a response.

When someone posts offensive or incorrect responses on my page, I can't help but think they never heard President Abraham Lincoln's quote, “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.”

Sometimes I have to remember that myself.

George

Muse

When transferal of thought occurs through a mechanical process known as "writing," regardless of the medium, a permanent record is made of that thought. No longer ethereal or undefinable, it becomes an entity that can be debated or argued, praised or denounced. Often that thought is subliminal or subconscious, not by design or deduction. Whether the thought appears on paper through primitive muscular contraction and expansion, pushing and pulling a stick or ink-stained quill, or on a computer-controlled glass panel illuminated by electricity directed by human manipulation, that thought distinguishes human intelligence from all other forms on our planet. I often look back at my typing and read what I wrote in absolute awe. I have no idea how it got there. I never know what will appear on my computer screen. Well, maybe you do when you sit down to write, but I certainly don't. I often open my word processor and start typing and don't know why. 

The inspiration to transfer thought to a permanent memorial often emerges from an undefined state. Some call it the work of a muse, like “my muse wanted to say...” But my muse just sits there, probably on Facebook and not paying any attention to the fact I'm trying to write! The result is I'm constantly surprised by what pops up. So are you, probably, if you bother to read my nonsense. I'm sure if I had a muse, it would be surprised, too. You might think I don't recognize when the muse is typing for me, but I know better. I've read what muses write for other people, and it's nothing like what pops up on my screen. Muses write beautiful poetry, or involved, mysterious stories with incredibly interesting characters, not the mundane nonsense that shows up on my computer screen. No, no self respecting muse would own up to this stuff. 

Rarely do I have what is called “writers block,” the condition muses are supposed to lead writers through. More often than not, I have something to write and don't have any paper, or a computer to key into, as the case may be. Frustrated, I scribble on napkins, invoices, bills, and envelopes that I invariably, and unconsciously, throw away. Yes, they usually get thrown out well before I go looking for them, trying to piece together the great idea that I had two or three days ago. Or, two or three hours ago. Some days are like that.

Petey - Prime suspect

Writer's block only happens when I have to write something I don't want to write about. You know, something distasteful, or even worse, boring. Boring is the worst. I would rather read something really stupid I wrote as long as it isn't boring. Do I argue with myself? Constantly. Especially when I go back and reread something I wrote then put away for some reason or other. Where was my muse then? I really do put stuff away after I write it. Stephen King taught me that in his mandatory reading for any aspiring writer, “On Writing.”

How writers summon their muses baffles me. I have a hunch where mine might be. It's sitting in front of a PC somewhere checking Facebook. I know once I'm on Facebook, I'm done for the night. Tuck me in when you unplug my PC, I'll be sitting there glassy-eyed in a catatonic state waiting to see how many people like my last posting describing the amount of ear wax I successfully removed by using ear-candles.

My muse is undoubtedly just addicted as I am, I can't seem to get its attention. Wait! Is that laughing I hear? Why did I write this? Where did all this nonsense come from? Oh, Facebook is down. Aah! No wonder!