TOXIC TALK

 

Rightly or wrongly, I took the decision some years ago to stop reading newspapers, or to listen to the news. To be honest, the main reason was that I just did not have the time. I felt that if the topic were important enough, its content would find its way to me somehow. In addition, I found that much of what was said or reported was inaccurate, repetition or irrelevant; little more than gossip.

At that point social media had not yet taken hold in quite the way in which it has since.

There are of course benefits to using social media in as much as it gives the man on the street a voice, and rightly so. There is also the counter argument that those who choose to use social media to get their message across often choose to do so in an inappropriate and counter-productive way.

The term trolling, ‘creating discord on the Internet by starting quarrels or upsetting people by posting inflammatory messages in an online community; someone who purposely says something controversial in order to get a rise out of other users’, first came into use in the early 1990s, and we hear often of those who have been victims of it.

What we are dealing with here is basically little more than tittle-tattle, rumour or hearsay, driven by those who have their own agenda. What is not made at all clear in their communications, these throw away lines and off-the-cuff remarks born out of ignorance, is where they have obtained their information from, how accurate it might be, and what their purpose is in exposing it to the public domain.

Such gossips are fuelled by casual, unconstrained conversation or reports about other people, typically involving details that are not confirmed as being true

By indulging in such conversations we are buying into the views of others who have their own agendas, and feel justified in making comment with no hard facts to back up their assertions. Sadly, we have seen much of this locally in recent weeks and months, particularly in a political context, which is to be expected as the battle lines are drawn. As members of the public, we owe it to ourselves to treat such comments with the disdain they deserve, challenge their veracity and, for an accurate account of events, go straight to the source. It is funny how the people that know the least about us always have the most to say. Shoring up their own insecurity and feelings of worthlessness at the expense of others perhaps?