Civility Was Lacking Yesterday on Facebook and I Took Action
My Facebook page is my online living room. Behave yourself or face eviction.
Civility, politeness, it’s like a cement in a society: binds it together. And when we lose it, then I think we all feel lesser and slightly dirty because of it.
Jeremy Irons
My Facebook friend list is one name shorter this morning. I am not happy about it, but it needed to be done. My boundaries are firmly in place and someone stepped over them.
The over-the-line comments were about politics. Politics, however, are not why they were deleted and the author removed from my page. Polite disagreements are fine.
We rubbed along for many years, ignoring each other’s political posts.
The person has been on my page for years. They were a friend of a friend and we had a hobby in common. I accepted the friendship request.
A glance at their page showed me that their politics leaned conservative. A glance at mine shows that I am very liberal.
That is no reason for me to refuse to friend anyone. It is a reason to not discuss politics if we find ourselves getting too heated.
None of that was the issue for me. We rubbed along for many years, ignoring each other’s political posts. The problem arose this week when my friend of a friend decided to break the unspoken social contract.
A news story I shared concerned our President. It inspired them to leave a trail of single sentence comments. Each one an angry exclamation. All adding up to a furious rant.
I didn’t think twice. The ‘sort of’ online friend was removed, and the ranting comments deleted.
No one wants to be stripped of their free speech.
I believe in free speech. Those aren’t just words. My father and maternal grandfather fought in WWII for all of us to have certain freedoms. One of them is freedom of speech.
The thing is, my own Facebook page is my online living room. I have invited people in there, but I expect them to be polite. When they are not, my invitation is withdrawn, and they will not get another.
I behave politely on their pages. I say nothing when conspiracy theories are banded about. I scroll past and comment on the photo of their cat. Or quilt. Or mosaic.
There are a lot of posts about the incivility of the Internet. People agree about it. No one knows what to do about it. No one wants to be stripped of their free speech.
But like in the real world, I can be choosy about who is allowed to hang out in my living room. I also get to choose not to visit theirs, if I won’t feel welcome.
I am at a loss as to why, after years of being online “friends,” she felt the need to rant at me. It felt unhinged. Unpleasant. Rude.
If people can’t speak respectfully to each other about their disagreements, how will they repair the mess our country is in?
It felt like a cliché of a Trump supporter. Perhaps in removing her from my “friends list,” I have fed the snowflake cliché.
Do I care? It doesn’t feel like it. Not when I sit and consider my feelings. I am talking about it, though, so it must bother me on some level.
The level may be the sense of hopelessness these sorts of interactions engender. If people can’t speak respectfully to each other about their disagreements, how will they repair the mess our country is in?
How will I? How will you?
Did I contribute to the mess with the swift removal? Should I have debated her? For my own mental health, the answer has to be no.
I grew up with ignorant, racist ranting. The five years my mother spent married to an alcoholic with anger issues burn in my memory.
No longer do I stand tall, never losing eye contact, and endure. I show them the door.
His were worse than most ranting I read on the Internet. It was in my face, up close and personal. It was nasty. Words were weapons.
The lesson I learned back then? There is no conversation when one of the parties is angry and ranting. Nothing can be said in response that will be helpful. The best avenue is to avoid the situation.
If that isn’t possible, stand tall. Don’t break eye contact. Don’t show any emotion. No visible fear or weakness. Wait it out. Endure. Eventually, when your mother can’t take it anymore, run.
No one ever asked me if I could take it. I just did. That’s what some of us do. When forced.
I am no longer seven or ten or even twelve. Now that I am grown, I find that I am done with that.
No longer do I stand tall, never losing eye contact, and endure. I show them the door.
Having lived through much worse, I find I have no patience for that bullshit now.
I have lived through a lot worse than someone telling me I’ve drunk the Kool-Aid and my politics are naïve. That I am of limited intelligence.
The person’s words weren’t enough to make me cringe or internalize the dislike. I assume that was the intent.
Having lived through much worse, I find I have no patience for that bullshit now. I am not a child, watching the complete, violent meltdown of someone three times older. I don’t refuse to flinch as words are thrown, wondering if a fist is next.
If there had been an Internet back then, I imagine I would have taken it without comment. I was used to doing that in the real world, what was another avenue for angry words?
It isn’t good if we refuse to be friendly or talk to those who disagree with us. Our country will never get back to the messy but working towards a better atmosphere we had a couple of decades ago. I know this. Still, I refuse to be bullied in my living room.
We need to find a way to meet politely to discuss our differences of opinion. The heat needs to be taken from the equation.
There is an answer to this somewhere. I hope we find it.
I get a choice every time I have to open my mouth: that it can be with civility and dignity and grace — or not.
Dana Perino
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