Put Down That Axe

As I am writing this there is yet another bit of inflammatory gossip circulating on Social Media. This time it is someone receiving 120hours of community service for "killing three children."

I'm sure you probably felt your "HEY?! What the F...!?" social injustice gland just kick. Thats normal. I did, too. That reaction is a good thing; it prompts us to take action when injustice occurs. But unfortunately, too often, we tend to let ourselves be ruled by that initial reaction, and that can lead to problems.

In this case it was a video of a judge handing down the sentence and a parent being understandably upset. I then went on to read the comments and saw the Internet lynch mob in full swing. Judge is bad. Accused is a sociopath (because he had no contact with the defendant to apologize). Legal system in the country this happened in is bad. And on and on..

But the truth is that from this clip and the inflammatory posting that led to it I know almost nothing

• Do I know what happened? NO.
• Do I know the laws in the country in question? NO.
• Do I know the conditions surrounding the accident? NO.
• Do I know anything about either party? NO.
• Do I know if the judge has a history of being lenient or harsh on such things? NO.

As you can see when looked at in that way any sane person would say that I do not have anywhere near enough facts to form an opinion. Due to the language difference in this instance and having years of seeing how people operate on the Internet I'm guessing the vast majority of commenters have no more information then I.

Making a judgement on someones guilt or innocence, on the rightness or wrongness of a situation based on nothing more then inflammatory remarks and little to no informations is the stuff of lynch mobs. Lynch mobs are notoriously bad at getting things right. All they do is get someone hurt or killed, and in doing so vent the mobs anger at a perceived social injustice.

Now let us cover what I do know:

• I know that often terrible things happen for no other reason then statistical probability, no one and nothing you can really blame, sometimes bad shit just happens.
• I know it is very normal for people effected by such things to want to find someone or something to blame. People need a "Why" and "Statistical probability" isn't a good one.
• I know it is common for lawyers to tell their clients not to talk to the other party. So suddenly the accused goes from sociopath to simply following legal advice.
• I know that when deprived of a "Why" or a "who" when something terrible happens the people hurt by it have no place to vent their anger and they often lash out at whoever they can. (thus the throwing of the chair)
• I know that I don't have the slightest clue what is going on.
• I know that making a judgement based on such tenuous information will most likely be wrong.

I also know that as a society and in the case of the Internet a global society we need to stop lynch mob mentality any way we can. If we don't we will end up in a world where the rule of law is replaced by the rule of the mob and we know from history that that is a very bad place to be. People start getting hurt and killed on nothing more then hear say. And people manipulate the mob to attack people they don't like, "hey everyone! Bill is a sociopath that kills kittens cause he hates LOL cats... Get Him.." And sadly, the mob will.

So I implore everyone. The next time you feel your "Social injustice gland" kick in.. Use the rush of energy to gather all the information you can. Who? How? What? When? Where? Why? Try your best to get as close to the original source of information as you can. Information gets distorted as it spreads outward (especially through a crowd). And then, if there has in fact been a social injustice and this isn't a case of the Internet mob being wrong yet again, then write about it using all the information that you gathered.

So I guess I'm saying, for the sake of us all put down the axes and pitch forks. Because if we don't one day the mob will be looking at you and uninterested in the facts because they "heard it on the Internet, Twitter, Reddit, Etc. so it must be true, and you must suffer"

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