Is pettiness an epidemic?

• By Alison
• 3 January, 2009
• 5 Comments

I was reminded yesterday of one of the things I was not sorry to leave behind when I stopped working for yuku, and that is the incredible childishness and self
absorbed behaviour of a small number of the member base.

Someone “anonymously” tipped me off about a thread that had disturbed her. She didn’t like to see people portrayed in a negative light, and
wanted me to be aware of it. My first reaction was “don’t look!” I’ve seen so many topics about me on and off yuku in the past 5 years that I
know better than to bother reading someone’s less than well informed opinions about me. But I didn’t recognise the board url at all, so I ended up
clicking the link.

It’s never an uplifting moment to read a bitter, ranting diatribe aimed at yourself. Not alluded at, or disguised as the actions of yuku, but individually
villified in vitriolic terms. I was momentarily taken aback. I paused briefly to look at the rest of the board, since I still didn’t know who’s it was.
Nothing worth reading – more rants, a total of only 4 people posting on it (probably). And it seems to belong to the profile seeing fit to libel* me. But all
in all, stuck in the backwater of the internet – not really likely to affect me.

The first reaction when you read something that is so utterly wrong about yourself is to reply and put the record straight. But I’ve had too much
experience with that type of person to think that they even care about the facts. In her sad little head I deleted some of her posts, so therefore I was on a
vendetta to erase things that she said just because I didn’t like her. I’d hate to rain on her parade and say that she didn’t really make much of a
blip on my radar in the first place! What really happens when you reply to them, is that this kind of person replies and twists your words out of context, or
just screams unreasonable abuse back. Or – which is ironic (I think) – just removes your comment. The very thing that they are complaining about in the first
place.

Anyway, the topic was made back in March. That’s a long time ago in internet terms. She’s probably forgotten about it completely right? Actually no –
she’s proud of it. Seeing me in her who’s online, and maybe using her tracker to see where I’d been, she actually replied to some of the topics I
looked in. I wouldn’t have even known that unless one of the people I shared the link with had told me – so I went back to have a look (yes, silly, right?
Breaking my own rules?) and what I discovered wasn’t an apology or embarrassed admission that she’d been angry at the time, but a defiant “enjoy
reading this?” comment. Oh my. I have a feeling this woman is old enough to be my mother, but she’s acting like my 7 year old might – in 6 years when
she hits her teens! Sulky and sullen, with no consideration for the feelings of another.

This is a common internet problem. Some people don’t seem to be aware that others are real human beings. They are unable to deal with others in a face to
face manner like they would in real life. Or at least – I hope they would. Prior to her parting comment I partially felt like I could explain things to her –
but now I couldn’t care less what she thinks. And anyone who knows me won’t care either.

Footnote:


* libel – yes, it was libel. Defamation is defined as: “the communication of a statement that makes a false claim,
expressly stated or implied to be factual, that may give an individual, business, product, group, government or nation a negative image.” She claims I
lied to her, that I deleted posts and topics from a personal dislike. Of course, to prove that it is defamatory, I need to prove that it’s not true – which
I could. Or to prove that it isn’t libel, she needs to prove that her statements are true – which she can’t
.
She could, of course change it into her “opinion” rather than facts, since that’s all it is.

The funny thing is that although I wrote the Code of Conduct, I was rarely the person who put it to use. On one occasion prior to its implementation I had to
undelete 10 topics in order to see why 3 members had been banned by a staff member. I unbanned all three after finding nothing more than angry members
complaining that a bug remained still unfixed. That was one of the reasons I wrote the Code of Conduct in the first place – to ensure that members and staff
alike had a clear outline as to what was acceptable.