The School of Life｜网上评论的秘诀

The Secret to Leaving Comments Online

Comment sections online should be the beautiful public squares of our democracies: places we navigate to for frank and thoughtful exchanges of ideas; places where we learn to understand each other’s point of view and where serious discussions evolve over time. But, of course, they are havens of the grossest abuse, verbal violence and cruelty. It’s understandable if we sometimes conclude, after time reading comments, that humanity has lost its way.
网上的评论区应该是我们民主国家美丽的公共广场: 我们可以在这里坦诚而深思熟虑地交换意见; 我们可以在这里学习理解彼此的观点，严肃的讨论也会随着时间的推移而发展。但是，当然，他们也是最粗俗的谩骂，言语暴力和残忍的保护区。如果我们有时在阅读评论后得出结论，人类已经迷失了方向，这是可以理解的。

But there’s another explanation: The source of dismissive and rude remarks and frustrating discussions isn’t bad people: it’s that commenting online isn’t something we’re naturally or automatically very good at. It is, however, a learnable skill. In fact, everyone online is almost always trying to do something important, but just going about it in a hugely unfortunate way.  
但还有另一种解释:轻蔑、粗鲁的言论和令人沮丧的讨论的根源不在于人坏，而是我们天生或自然而然就不擅长在网上发表评论。然而，这是一种可以学习的技能。事实上，每个上网的人几乎都在试图做一些重要的事情，但只是以一种非常不适宜的方式去做。

So, for example: We want to communicate an urgent, and sometimes well-founded belief that another person is mistaken and what we too quickly say is: You are a fucking idiot who can jerk off with my shit. But what we could learn to say, given that no one ever learns anything under conditions of humiliation, is a more effective: I wonder if you might have missed something that feels important from where I am positioned…
因此，例如：我们想传达一种紧迫的、有时是有根据的信念，而另一个人误解了，我们就破口大骂了起来……。但是，考虑到屈辱人并不能说服别人的情况下，我们可以学着说一句更有效的话：我想知道，从我的角度来看，你是否错过了一些重要的东西......

Or we want to stand up for clarity and common sense by admitting that we didn’t understand something that another person said. And so we say: Wtf motherfucker..But it could be a revolutionary move, with huge influence on the way other people start to think one could and should behave online, to say: I found it at points a little hard to follow your train of thought, yet deeply respect your underlying intentions…
或者，我们没有理解别人所说的话，于是想听更多解释性和常识的话语。于是我们就又爆粗口了。但如果这样说，可能是一个革命性的举动，会对开始意识在网上该有的行为的人产生巨大的影响：我发现有时有点跟不上你的思路，但我非常尊重你的潜在意图......

Or we want to convey immense disappointment, so we say: I used to like what you do; but now I think you’re a phoney and a total fraud. Unsubbed, wanker. But we could say: I’m puzzled because I generally very much admire you and I don’t entirely see the point of what you seem to be doing now. It would be lovely if you could perhaps explain things from your no doubt very legitimate perspective.
或者我们想表达巨大的失望，所以我们说：我曾经喜欢你所做的事情；但现在我认为你是一个骗子，一个彻头彻尾的骗子……但我们可以说：我很困惑，因为我一直非常钦佩你，我不能完全理解你现在所做的事情的意义。如果你能从你那无疑非常合理的角度来解释事情，那就太好了。

Or sometimes, we simply want to exorcise the humiliation that a cold and indifferent world has doled out to us. So, at our keyboard in the middle of the night, with the odd freight train whistling in the darkness outside, we say: Suck it up bitches; bunch of fucking wankers spewing bullshit from your own anuses…When what we could learn to say, from our isolated bedrooms, is: I sometimes feel so sad and so alone…
有时，我们只是想驱除这个冷漠的世界给我们带来的羞辱。所以，当我们半夜坐在键盘前，听着外面黑暗中奇怪的货运列车鸣笛时，我们又忍不住骂了一通……而我们本可以在我们孤立的卧室里学会说的是：我有时感到很悲伤，很孤独……

Let’s remember that no one is ever brutal or cruel online by their ultimate free choice. They are so because they are hurt, damaged, alone and afraid – and because no one has been kind or good to them for a long time. Behind every online outburst, there’s always a complex, painful backstory, which we will mostly never know but which we can be sure is there, and which has made it impossible for the commenter to feel that they can be realistic, reasonable or civil.
让我们记住，没有人自愿在网上变得野蛮或残忍。他们之所以如此，是因为他们受到了伤害、损害、孤独和恐惧--还因为长期以来没有人对他们友善。在每一次网络谩骂的背后，总会有一个复杂而痛苦的背景故事，我们大多永远不会知道，但可以肯定的是，它确实存在，且这个背景使他们呈现不了现实、合理或文明的一面。

People get rude too, because – in their very isolation and powerlessness – it’s impossible for them to believe that others out there could be vulnerable to their insults. Their rudeness is grounded on a disbelief that strangers could take them seriously and might be tipped over into inner collapse, despair and self-hatred because of them. Such is their background feeling of impotence, the troll has forgotten their own power.


After spending a while in the comments sections, it can be easy to form the belief that humans have grown into monsters. The good news is that even though comments claim to reflect how the world is, they in fact represent only the fringe views of a tiny percentage. They induct us to forget the vast invisible army of moderate, reasonable, kind, not-terribly-opinionated individuals who are just standing by in silence, as appalled as we are. The world is much saner than it appears. The real achievement would be to build an online world every bit as kind, patient and good as most of us are in our real lives at every moment of every day.

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