The Extremes Of Online

The "online community" is a reflection of society today.
This sentence is a scary sentiment. Can it be that the vicious, falsified, hateful and ignorant legions that reside in our computer screen are really reflective of the ever increasingly "tolerant" society that we claim to be forming?
Matthias Schwartz's article, "The Trolls Among Us" takes a look at the truly heartless dregs of our online society and try to come to terms with why someone would do this. The anonymity of the internet creates a shield around these people, allowing them to assume perfectly normal everyday personas that are socially acceptable, while online they harass and inflame. In the article, two very different trolls share their reasons for doing what they do. One insists that people should know these things and that he can't be held responsible for someone's stupidity. The only way for them to learn is through bad experiences and he is more than happy to provide them. He felt no remorse for an epileptic being tricked into clicking something that gave her a seizure. The other insisted that he only wanted everyone off of the internet who didn't deserve to be there. I imagine the list of motivations goes on and on, but can't relate to actually wanting to hurt people, even in a setting with almost no repercussions.
On my own blog show, I deal with trolls in a different way than most. Most people get mad and kick them or ban them. That only attends to the problem in the moment. They can easily log onto their other account (trolls always have another account) and continue the abuse and now they know they've affected you, which means they win. I don't kick or ban. I allow the trolls to stay and I let them verbally abuse me, but it doesn't affect me. I continue my show and I charm and I humor and eventually they either leave or subscribe. It's funny how many former trolls have subscribed to my show and shower me with compliments now.
This brings me to the other extreme of the internet. Its vast capacity to promote community and good tidings between people is astounding. When someone creates a memorial page to a loved one, thousands of people spend minutes of their day offering condolances and prayers. Strangers for a single moment see the suffering of someone else and can still feel a human connection. The para-social connections we make online are important and can become another family. Several of the trolls that used to attack me now defend me on my show. There have been stories about the anonymous community on 4chan banding together and helping to catch child predators. The very same tactics used to harass and defame others is used to protect and help people. So I say take the bad with the good when it comes to online interaction because the extreme terribleness that the internet can proliferate can yield an extreme good.