Mean people suck

I have spent the past week mentally hiding under the covers.  Do you notice that in the parts of the internet world that you visit, things happen in waves?  Or is that just me?  On the good days, everything I read, every site I visit, it's funny and happy and I feel better for having spent those hours merrily clicking around.  


But on the bad days, I click around and suddenly find myself in The Bad Part of Town.  One minute I'm reading about a recipe that I might like to try, because I will never let go of the notion that one day I will call a truce with food and we will actually have a good and healthy relationship.  Then, the next minute I've found myself on some site that is bashing everything about the internet, blogging, bloggers who are on the internet and birds.  Who hates birds?!?!


I hate when that happens.  It takes the wind out of my sails.  It makes me want to stop blogging for fear that I'll end up on those sites, with anonymous people ripping apart my life simply because I feel compelled to write and share.  I have a thick skin and I can give as good as I get, but doing that is never satisfying.  Verbally cutting someone to the bone never feels as good as you think it will when you play it out in your head.  Those cool one-liners, those zingers, that snark (which is a word I've really had enough of) always seem to fall flat when they hit the air.


I'm tired of mean people.  I'm tired of people hiding behind their 'anonymous' shields and being just plain hateful because no one can look into their eyes.  It's really hard to look someone in the face and deliver your cool, biting one-liner and then pat yourself on the back when you can see their shoulders slump, the light leaving their eyes.  So instead we get on our computers and get all 'Mean Girl' on people because you don't have to see their eyes when you type out your mean comment that probably took you twenty minutes and countless backspaces to get it right.  Then again, maybe not.  Maybe the mean-ness is right there at your fingertips, just waiting for the moment to pounce.  Either way, it's gross.


I hate being reminded that the world is an ugly place.  I hate remembering that people sometimes suck.


Blogging/writing is fun for me and I treasure the friends that I've made through our blogs.  But honestly, clicking around and finding all the trash and the hate and the general ugliness out there has really made me want to just close my computer and never open it again.


But of course, I haven't.  I've been feeling this way for days now, swearing I wouldn't bother writing about it because who cares that I'm whining that people are mean on the internet.  Color me naive, but I was really shocked that there are so many websites devoted to ripping apart other bloggers and their lives, whether they write about fashion, lifestyle, cooking or birds.  And there are so many comments on these sites, all chiming in with their mob mentality.  I was just so turned off, but like a fool, I kept reading and kept clicking and getting sadder by the moment.  It made me want to take my ball and go home.


What benefit is there to being mean for being mean's sake?  Why do people suck?