OP/ED: We Are More Alike Than Different

I guess I'm in an OP/ED mood today, so I hope you don't mind.

I'm poking my nose into some nagging issues on ATS, like nation-bashing and flaming, political partisanship and so forth.

In this blurb I just want to remind my fellow members who you're dealing with when you post to ATS.

You are dealing with your brothers and sisters around the world.

Each of us has our own points of view, and they often conflict. It is normal for brothers and sisters to fight, so let's not get too bent out of shape that we fight here, too.

It's okay, as long as nobody puts an eye out.

It is very easy in a text-only medium to think the person you are arguing with is a mindless idiot or the Devil Himself, bent on world destruction.

We all have creative minds, and sometimes our imaginations get the best of us.

Here's the truth: All of your fellow ATSers are human beings (except for the Zeta Reticuloids and post-bots, but that's only a small fraction).

We are all drawn here by pretty much the same thing: a desire to learn things we cannot learn elsewhere.

Sometimes the consequences of our search are shocking and unpleasant -- we don't always uncover what we wanted to uncover -- but we keep coming back, because we must.

All ATSers are driven by this. It is what binds us together as a community.

On the other end of that argument you're getting more and more worked up over is a real person whom, if you met them in real life, you would probably like.

That's right. Even though you hate each other online, I'll bet my bottom devalued American dollar that if you met that person in real life, you would probably end up liking him or her.

Don't believe me? That's okay. I understand.

But I'm telling you that if you don't, you're wrong.

Bless your heart Majic. I know yor're right but my heart has hardened. I have been called unpatriotic, tulipwalker, wackjob, etc too many times to forgive and forget. I know that the people that call me names wouldn't like me if they met me. They have exhibited a type of intolerance in their posts that trancends reason. I have experienced racism first hand. I know the type of people that hate others for no reason other than their skin color. Now that it isnt PC to be overtly racist they vent their hatred on people that don't think like they do. Like you said it's very easy to be mean and hateful in cyber space but i'm not so naive as to believe that this wouldn't carry over into real life. Just ask them if you don't believe me.

Times Of The Signs

I wrote this over a year ago, and much has changed since then.

But my opinion on this subject hasn't changed at all.

Amen. We are all people, and to think that someone else is perhaps not a nice person is just plain wrong. On ATS you cannot turn back, you can only go forward, and that should be what we are aiming to do. Not dredge up old prejudices, but forge ahead and make friends and friendly enemies.