O P I N I O N
NOT THAT PROFOUND
By Nathan Graziano
One of the most loathsome forms of the human species—in my estimation, at least—is the craven Keyboard Warrior, and any person who has ever surfed around on social media or perused a comments section knows exactly who I am talking about.
The cowardly Keyboard Warrior typically belongs to one of two tribes—the Trolls or the Vigilantes. While the Trolls post their comments online for the sheer joy derived from others’ anger or agitation, the Vigilantes are there to uphold their own myopic worldviews.
From behind a screen—safe in the confines of a bathroom stall, a coffee shop, or their parents’ basement—the Keyboard Warrior attacks any person and idea that they ideologically oppose with the hunger and tenacity of a starving bear.
In the olden days, before their anonymity was protected by a screen, the Keyboard Warrior was a Rock-Thrower, someone who would throw stones at unsuspecting targets then turn tail and run away before being spotted.
Now the Rock-Thrower-turned-Keyboard-Warrior can continue throwing the stones, ad infinitum, denting their target’s reputations by attacking their characters, or ridiculing them for their writings and opinions, while never having to show their own face or look into the eyes of the people that they’ve hurt.
Recently, former-professional golfer turned internet influencer Paige Spiranac came forward with a candid post regarding the cruel messages she received following her appearance at the Barstool Sport’s Internet Invitational Golf Tournament, revealing the extent that the Keyboard Warriors’ online bullying and hateful comments had distressed her, which has been a reoccurring theme throughout her life.
“This hate for some reason has just been really hitting home for me,” Spiranac wrote. “It’s just been really hard to see this reaction to being disliked and hated. I know there are more important things in life than wanting to be liked and I want to fit in, and I’ve tried for a lot of my life to find places where I can fit in.”
Right now, I’m sure, the Trolls are chomping at the proverbial bit. Spiranac is a talented athlete, a successful marketer and a beautiful woman who has made a ton of money off her presence on the internet, so why shouldn’t she be subjected to the bile of the Keyboard Warrior?
The answer is relatively simple: She is a human being with human feelings and she doesn’t deserve the wrath of these nasty Trolls looking to make her feel small.
And once the Keyboard Warriors start their tirades, the Internet Lynch Mobs will join in, but you only have to go back to Mark Twain’s novel “Huck Finn” to realize that the mentality behind any lynch mob has always been the same.
In Chapter XXII, a character named Colonel Sherburn holds a lynch mob at bay with a single rifle from his rooftop, telling them:
“The pitifulest thing out is a mob; that’s what an army is—a mob; they don’t fight with courage that’s born in them, but with courage that’s borrowed from their mass, and from their officers. But a mob without any man at the head of it is beneath pitifulness. Now the thing for you to do is to droop your tails and go home and crawl in a hole.”
There is nothing courageous or admirable about the Keyboard Warrior, and most of them and their Internet Lynch Mobs, as Twain wrote, are “afraid [they’ll] be found out to be what [they] are—cowards.”
While we will never be able to put the genie back in the bottle and contain the Keyboard Warrior, it is important to keep in mind that they are—at their core—a coward and a rabblerouser and, ultimately, a mean and despicable human being.
We should all try to be better than them and practice empathy and decency and thoughtfulness when posting and commenting online. We might not be able to kill the Keyboard Warrior and the Internet Lynch Mobs with kindness, but we can try to mute their noise.
You can reach Nathan Graziano at ngrazio5@yahoo.com