TOP 5 Idiots on Social Media
If you've ever failed to resist joining a heated comment thread, you know how easy it is to waste valuable hours of your life in discussions that go nowhere. You write a long comment where you try to explain everything as rationally as possible, choosing every word carefully and double-checking everything before you start throwing around facts or figures. However, the very first response to your elaborate post calls you either a genitalia, a demented patient or some kind of farm animal. The world of social media discussions tends to be black and white. Let's take a look at the top 5 idiots you'll encounter sooner or later in the online world.
1. Extremist
This type is sure. Always and about everything. If he's a musician, he can immediately tell quality from sh**, and he always points it out. He knows exactly which brand of guitars is the best, and he doesn't buy anything from China (or, on the contrary, he only buys things from China, because after all, even the biggest brands make their instruments there, so why pay extra). He will explain how things work, how the music business works, how to run a club, how to arrange a world tour and why you need to sing in English. It's not the content that matters, it's the strength of conviction.
The extremists can be found in all genres of music and they always passionately support their team, i.e. certain bands, artists or music styles. Communicating with them is very easy because you know where you stand. So you can either join their opinion (by the way, they may not always be wrong) or gracefully leave the discussion if you disagree. By "gracefully" I mean tell them to shove it up places that only a proctologist knows intimately and wears rubber gloves while getting there.
2. Tunneler
This type of person was already known to Plato in his allegory of the cave. There he described people who watch the shadows of a fire but think they see reality. But if someone pointed it out, they would be able to kill them in a fit of rage. In The Matrix, the tunnelers were described as machine-controlled people who prefer convenience, lies and conformity to the arduous, sometimes painful pursuit of the truth. However, who cares about the truth these days? In a postmodern world filled with metadata and reactions to reactions, the search for truth resembles the proverbial needle in a haystack.
Great artists create their own imaginary universes that serve as a beautiful escape from the wasteland of reality. However, in the case of people with tunnel vision, it is not about healthy and soul-filling artistic dreams. Their existence and purpose are based on banalities and pettiness. They believe in consumerism, they don't understand complex social systems, sheet music or the circle of fifths. People who use strange unfamiliar words are suspicious. The tunneler has no taste in music, reads magazines with big pictures, disregards grammar and social etiquette, believes the news on weird websites and shares even weirder videos. They are confused because they feel that there is something wrong with the world, but they look for answers in the wrong places and at false prophets.
3. RCG (Random Comments Generator)
They love paradoxes. They come into a discussion about strings and write: "Arsenal!!! Champions!!!" or "May the force be with you!" It's not about what's being discussed in the thread. It's about the catchphrase. They shout Dadaist slogans from movies, TV shows or the world of sports. Often they feel the need to ask for support and post comments asking for a like to their RCG Facebook page or YouTube channel.
These are largely fake profiles from click-farms in places so far away from us that we can't tell their script from the names of death metal bands. RCG are weeds and should be treated as such. So put on your gloves, take a shovel and pull it up by the roots.
4. Pharmacist
The pharmacist's approach consists of constant counterbalancing. The pharmacists never express themselves clearly, never stand up for their opinion and relativize everything to the point of what I call "potato soup". After a discussion with them, you feel like an untuned piano on which someone is trying to play "Ode to Joy". You feel like slapping that person in the face and your fists are twisting like the hands of a Lego doll.
The pharmacist will always offer a counter-argument to whatever point you are trying to make. The sun is shining, but it's also dark. War is bad, but not when you're on the winning side. Fender may have invented the bass guitar, but that other guy was doing much better stuff way back in World War II. The pharmacist is evil, but he is also good (his words), so leave as fast as you can or they will entangle you in their web of ambiguity, relativistic emptiness and stupidity that is hiding behind a compulsive need to contradict everything just on principle. My father never worked in a pharmacy, but he always made me furious with this behaviour.
5. Crybaby
Classics in the online world. Everything is wrong. The good times are gone and nothing makes sense. This category is very popular because all of us are sometimes miserable. It is a natural human need. Everyone needs to cry, complain or slander someone from time to time. You will feel relieved and you can move on. But if you become a professional whiner, you have a problem. Nothing will be good enough for you, no one likes you and in the end, the whole world is against you.
I remember the wise words of my friend Michal Pelant (a great guitarist by the way) when I would come into the rehearsal room and complain about this or that. He always replied: "Don't whine!" And that was the end of the problem. Don't be afraid to vent, feel free to whine, but don't make a business out of it. And certainly not in the world of social media.
If you have found an error or typo in the article, please let us know by e-mail info@insounder.org.
