The danger of online friendships
There are at least half a dozen people in cyberspace whom I have felt forced, at various times, to defriend: kennahijja, threeoranges, _redux, webbapettigrew, curia_regis, and now ani_bester. This is a subset of the much larger grouping ot people whom I defriended or got defriended by; but a subset with an important difference. I do not feel particularly bad about defriending or being defriended by the likes of rhiannonmr, straussmonster, theregoesyamum or ariss_tenoh. These are people in whom I was decidedly mistaken, and who revealed some very negative qualities - incontrollable and selfish rudeness, hysteria, duplicity, mendacity, to name a few - in the course of our acquaintance; revealed them with a sort of naive simplicity that makes me feel that, in losing them, I lose a lot less than I thought I had.
This, of course, is my view, and my feeling. If someone wants to write to me and say that one of the people I mentioned - or even anyone I did not - is a wonderful person and a true friend, I will not argue. She may be, to you. To me, she has shown attitudes I reject. You may be glad and grateful of her friendship - I am glad and grateful I escaped it. There is no point debating the matter.
But in the case of the subset, things are different. These are people whom, as human beings, I like, often whom I admire. I am on record no more than a couple of dozen times calling kennahijja a genius, and she also has a great deal of native sweetness and lovability. ani_bester once blushed because of the way I described her; for _redux I wrote a praise poem. threeoranges was once helpful to me personally in a way I had no right to expect, and for which I certainly did not ask. curia_regis sought my friendship and got it over more than a year. And I put in a semi-serious demand that my friends should go and encourage webbapettigrew when she felt that her dreams of becoming a professional writer were turning to dust, because I had a high opinion of her. These are good people, people of natural quality and distinction, people one would be proud to know. And yet, not only have I broken with them, but I have been thinking and thinking, and I honestly cannot see any way to mend the breach unless one of us alters fundamentally.
There are few things I resent more than the charge that I de-friend people I disagree with; and in most cases, de-friendings and bannings have been over matters of misbehaviour, insults, or, even worse, the abuse of people and things I love. I do not regret those things in the least. But there can be no doubt that in the case of these six - and perhaps of one or two more that I cannot remember right now - the issue at hand was ideological. I do not deny that in a couple of cases, behaviour had something to do with it; the hysteria of threeoranges towards the end of our final IM debate, which led me to delete the whole thing, and the arrogant condescension of kennahijja when I was trying to set her right about my reasons to do something, are things I do not like to remember. But with them and all the others, the issue is ideological. I defriended webbapettigrew, curia_regis and _redux over their support of various kinds of murder - euthanasia, partial-birth abortion; kennahijja over her nihilistic relativism, that denied the very possibility that someone might take a view just because he thought it right; and threeoranges and ani_bester, not so much for their support of "gay marriage", as for the assumption that anyone who disagreed with them on the matter was, to use the elegant vernacular, "batshit insane".
This clarified my mind. All my defriendings fell into two fundamental categories. The first three supported what I regard as murder. There the objection is immediate and fundamental: I will not even argue that there can be any reason that justifies euthanasia or partial-birth abortion. The tone did not matter; curia_regis was angry and disappointed because she did not feel she had been particularly provocative or aggressive. She does not realize, poor woman, that, if anything, her dismissive tone - as of anything too obvious and simple to need defending - revolted me even more than an aggressive assertion would have. On the primacy of the right to life, I do not accept argument. In the case of the other three, however, it was not so much the argument, as the attitude, that repelled me. kennahijja's calm and unquestioning acceptance of the revolting notion that people only argue because of personal desires or interests - and that therefore the important thing in argument is not to answer your opponent's points but to detect his/her bias and then nail it, so as to disqualify his/her reason to argue - makes, in my view, any further argument with her impossible. How can you argue anything with someone who is always on the look-out for your secondary and irrational reasons for your arguments? And by the same token, I am always disposed to argue on all things to do with sex; it is not I, but threeoranges and ani_bester, who start from the principle that anyone who disagrees with them on "gay marriage" is ipso facto "batshit insane".
In other words, here we have the duo that Socrates denounced long ago: hatred of argument - misology - and hatred of humanity - misanthropy. The one, in his view, led to the other. But I do not have to demonstrate that misology leads to misanthropy here; all I am saying is that this is the point where I instinctively feel I cannot go on with someone, that there is not enough in common. All these defriendings have been instinctive, done on the basis of immediate unthinking revulsion; and it is just now, reflecting on them, that I have understood what they have in common. What made a breach inevitable even with people I like and admire, is that they either showed toleration for murder, that is implicit rejection for human life, or else an irrational refusal to defend their views and argue according to reason. Of course, none of these ladies will recognize any such thing in them. Those who threw off the very attempt to build a rational argument, will say that they did so because they were impelled by love, rather than hate, of at least one group of human beings, namely homosexuals. And those who support murder have been taught from the cradle to identify humanity with happiness, so that the status of someone senile or in inescapable pain - or of an as yet undeveloped human being, a foetus - strikes them as not human at all, and therefore not deserving of love or protection. That is how they no doubt perceive their position; but, to me, it is a position for the killing of human beings.
I also feel that the peculiar nature of online friendships have something to do with this. It is a wonderful thing that online we meet as much of each other's minds, and as little of anything else, as possible. We meet as debating, talking, thinking, narrating, joking, inventive minds. In real life, to make friends with the likes of kikei or goreism would have been all but impossible. But, by the same token, we are a great deal more exposed to each other's basic views and attitudes than we would be in real life, and a lot less protected against them. Also, everything we place on our LJs is there for years, perhaps for life. Every time I were to revisit my friends page, I would find pages written in the name of views or attitudes I detest. That, as much as anything, made defriending over such matters inevitable.
I have neither f-locked nor lj-cut this article, because I want it as accessible as possible. And that not only because my reasons to take such serious steps should be clear, but also to put on record, and in no uncertain terms, that defriending these persons, at least, implies no change in my high esteem for them. I still regard them as fine people. I still am at their disposal in the unlikely case that they might need any help or anything at all from me. I may still lurk on their LJ from time to time, to see what is going on. I do not approve of certain of their ideas or attitudes, but I still am glad for having known them.
This, of course, is my view, and my feeling. If someone wants to write to me and say that one of the people I mentioned - or even anyone I did not - is a wonderful person and a true friend, I will not argue. She may be, to you. To me, she has shown attitudes I reject. You may be glad and grateful of her friendship - I am glad and grateful I escaped it. There is no point debating the matter.
But in the case of the subset, things are different. These are people whom, as human beings, I like, often whom I admire. I am on record no more than a couple of dozen times calling kennahijja a genius, and she also has a great deal of native sweetness and lovability. ani_bester once blushed because of the way I described her; for _redux I wrote a praise poem. threeoranges was once helpful to me personally in a way I had no right to expect, and for which I certainly did not ask. curia_regis sought my friendship and got it over more than a year. And I put in a semi-serious demand that my friends should go and encourage webbapettigrew when she felt that her dreams of becoming a professional writer were turning to dust, because I had a high opinion of her. These are good people, people of natural quality and distinction, people one would be proud to know. And yet, not only have I broken with them, but I have been thinking and thinking, and I honestly cannot see any way to mend the breach unless one of us alters fundamentally.
There are few things I resent more than the charge that I de-friend people I disagree with; and in most cases, de-friendings and bannings have been over matters of misbehaviour, insults, or, even worse, the abuse of people and things I love. I do not regret those things in the least. But there can be no doubt that in the case of these six - and perhaps of one or two more that I cannot remember right now - the issue at hand was ideological. I do not deny that in a couple of cases, behaviour had something to do with it; the hysteria of threeoranges towards the end of our final IM debate, which led me to delete the whole thing, and the arrogant condescension of kennahijja when I was trying to set her right about my reasons to do something, are things I do not like to remember. But with them and all the others, the issue is ideological. I defriended webbapettigrew, curia_regis and _redux over their support of various kinds of murder - euthanasia, partial-birth abortion; kennahijja over her nihilistic relativism, that denied the very possibility that someone might take a view just because he thought it right; and threeoranges and ani_bester, not so much for their support of "gay marriage", as for the assumption that anyone who disagreed with them on the matter was, to use the elegant vernacular, "batshit insane".
This clarified my mind. All my defriendings fell into two fundamental categories. The first three supported what I regard as murder. There the objection is immediate and fundamental: I will not even argue that there can be any reason that justifies euthanasia or partial-birth abortion. The tone did not matter; curia_regis was angry and disappointed because she did not feel she had been particularly provocative or aggressive. She does not realize, poor woman, that, if anything, her dismissive tone - as of anything too obvious and simple to need defending - revolted me even more than an aggressive assertion would have. On the primacy of the right to life, I do not accept argument. In the case of the other three, however, it was not so much the argument, as the attitude, that repelled me. kennahijja's calm and unquestioning acceptance of the revolting notion that people only argue because of personal desires or interests - and that therefore the important thing in argument is not to answer your opponent's points but to detect his/her bias and then nail it, so as to disqualify his/her reason to argue - makes, in my view, any further argument with her impossible. How can you argue anything with someone who is always on the look-out for your secondary and irrational reasons for your arguments? And by the same token, I am always disposed to argue on all things to do with sex; it is not I, but threeoranges and ani_bester, who start from the principle that anyone who disagrees with them on "gay marriage" is ipso facto "batshit insane".
In other words, here we have the duo that Socrates denounced long ago: hatred of argument - misology - and hatred of humanity - misanthropy. The one, in his view, led to the other. But I do not have to demonstrate that misology leads to misanthropy here; all I am saying is that this is the point where I instinctively feel I cannot go on with someone, that there is not enough in common. All these defriendings have been instinctive, done on the basis of immediate unthinking revulsion; and it is just now, reflecting on them, that I have understood what they have in common. What made a breach inevitable even with people I like and admire, is that they either showed toleration for murder, that is implicit rejection for human life, or else an irrational refusal to defend their views and argue according to reason. Of course, none of these ladies will recognize any such thing in them. Those who threw off the very attempt to build a rational argument, will say that they did so because they were impelled by love, rather than hate, of at least one group of human beings, namely homosexuals. And those who support murder have been taught from the cradle to identify humanity with happiness, so that the status of someone senile or in inescapable pain - or of an as yet undeveloped human being, a foetus - strikes them as not human at all, and therefore not deserving of love or protection. That is how they no doubt perceive their position; but, to me, it is a position for the killing of human beings.
I also feel that the peculiar nature of online friendships have something to do with this. It is a wonderful thing that online we meet as much of each other's minds, and as little of anything else, as possible. We meet as debating, talking, thinking, narrating, joking, inventive minds. In real life, to make friends with the likes of kikei or goreism would have been all but impossible. But, by the same token, we are a great deal more exposed to each other's basic views and attitudes than we would be in real life, and a lot less protected against them. Also, everything we place on our LJs is there for years, perhaps for life. Every time I were to revisit my friends page, I would find pages written in the name of views or attitudes I detest. That, as much as anything, made defriending over such matters inevitable.
I have neither f-locked nor lj-cut this article, because I want it as accessible as possible. And that not only because my reasons to take such serious steps should be clear, but also to put on record, and in no uncertain terms, that defriending these persons, at least, implies no change in my high esteem for them. I still regard them as fine people. I still am at their disposal in the unlikely case that they might need any help or anything at all from me. I may still lurk on their LJ from time to time, to see what is going on. I do not approve of certain of their ideas or attitudes, but I still am glad for having known them.