7 56 pm pst   [ for Catherine ]

I have to ask a question. And I know no one has the answer. But there's something I don't understand. I don't understand cruelty. I mean, down to the core of my being, the fact that people are cruel to others makes me ache.

I've tried to skirt this issue. But it has been with me every day of my adult life. It came with my first kiss. My first lover, my first love, was a cruel man.

David. Each time I write about him, I promise myself it will be the last time, but he has left a permanent imprint on me, and I know he will continue to surface from time to time.

I can't talk about David right now. But I can tell you he was cruel. I can tell you there were times when even he saw how horrible he treated people. I can tell you most of the time he was perfectly happy to have no friends -- perfectly happy to take on the whole world by himself. He was proud of his struggle.

And every time he was cruel, I could only silently ask why?

My father embarasses people. When asked how many people are to be seated at dinner, he tells the waitress, "fur." She looks confused. She asks, "four?" It kills me inside each time. There is nothing I dislike about my father more than his delight in making others uncomfortable.

And then we have the web.

[I know this is scattered. I can think of no way to organize it beyond just letting it flow.]

MOOs are a text based virtual environments which I wrote a paper about in 1996 and maintain a list of. On a recent MOO search, I read on Lucy's MOO page her description of why she is different from most MOOers. She included:

I take MOOing seriously as a means of social interaction, and I don't exempt anyone from normal social politeness, mores, or behavior. I like to play as much as the next person, but I don't forget there are real people behind the avatars.

She describes how I feel. She describes how I feel about all internet interactions. I never excuse rude e-mails. I think they sting as much as if the same impoliteness was said to one's face. I call people on their crap every time I see it. I have been told to "go to hell" by the most notoriously cruel poster on diary-l and journals, because each time she hacks into someone, I make an effort to stand up for them. When someone says something that I know would hurt my feelings, I try to tell them it is not ok. Just this past week, a person posted a message on journals saying that another person was wrong. Catherine (of Naked Eye*) said that he should ammend the message to say "in my opinion..." Lots of people disagreed and Catherine brushed it off by claiming that she was joking, but I knew exactly what was going on, so I sent the following explaination:

I have read all the messages, so I acknowledge that Catherine was joking and everyone agrees with you, but I am still going to tell you why. If you write "web pages are easier to read if they are black text on white background" most people would think it is your opinion without you having to say so. Some people might take it as fact because it was stated as such, but that is neither here nor there. That isn't why Catherine joked you should have said it. It is because you weren't talking about the readablility of text, you were telling someone they are wrong. And bluntly -- without explaination. So a little caveat at the beginning might have softened the blow and spared some feelings. I winced a little when I read your message, but mostly because it seemed to me that by not explaining why it was wrong you were saying "it is so obvious to everybody that you were wrong that I don't have to bother saying why," which isn't something I would like someone to say to or imply about me.

I try to take the high road all the time, and it wounds my soul that some people enjoy hurting others. Which is really my point here, though I have taken a long time getting to it.

Why? Why are some people cruel? We don't even have to talk about holocaust proportions. We can just deal with one on one interactions. What posesses someone to send a cruel e-mail to someone they don't know with the sole intention of hurting them?

I didn't want to ask this because I know no one can answer it. That fact in itself brings tears to my eyes. But today I must talk about it, for today someone I know was hurt.

Catherine wrote an entry detailing how a stranger cut her down in e-mail*. In chronicling her story, she linked to an entry from terrapindream which also confronts a cruel e-mail. And so I must face my own.

Catherine, this is for you. This is because I have gone through this too, and we get strength from each other. That is why online journalling is an ever growing medium.

On Friday, 11 February 2000, after nearly two and a half years of having an online diary with only positive feedback, I received the following message:

Eat some meat, weirdo! I'm smoking a big fatty of some kind bud as I write this, while listening to Al Stewart's Sirens of Titan tune (which a loser like you would never have heard). And I think your so called kaleidoscope wallpapers suck shit. Try a program called Silicon Mirror if you want to create something deep. For a Berkeley chick, you sure are boring. I think about all the cool Dead shows I have from the Greek, and what you would have been like if you had been to even one of those entirely fantastic performances of those who were known as the Grateful Dead!

I was floored. Why would someone take the time out of their day to make me feel bad. This person had read about my veganism, the fact that I've neved done drugs, the concerts I have and haven't been to, the fact that I like rap music. This person had read that I went to UC Berkeley and had taken the time to look at my desktop images, which is a rather obscure part of my site.

This person had spent a long time at my site reading up on me so that (s)he could find some lifestyle choices I am proud of to criticise me about. This person sent an anonymous e-mail. And all I could do was silently ask why?

I took the link to my discussion mailing list off my front page so that this rude person would not post there. Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." While I love the idea behind the quote -- the idea that you can be stronger than someone's cruelty -- I don't actually believe it for a second. We would be better to say that we will work not to feel inferior, but others need to be responsible for how their words hurt us. D. A. Battista said, "The scars you acquire by exercising courage, will never make you feel inferior." That I buy.

There is no direction for me to go in now. I can offer no advice. I can offer no explaination. Catherine, I'm sorry someone hurt you. I don't know why they did so. But I feel your pain.

I never wrote about the message I recieved here (until now). I though I would give the person no satisfaction. Though my mind raced with dozens of comebacks, I did not reply to the message. I simply clicked on over to earthlink's website, read their Acceptable Use Policy, and then forwarded the message to abuse@earthlink.net in the hopes that the offending account would be cancelled for policy violation. Some mean person might have been inconvinienced by having their e-mail account cancelled, but I am still left with why?

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