Some people see white and gold. Some people see blue and black. And this is a "problem." I have to admit it bothers me a bit that I can't see black and blue.
Apparently it's the same with everyone else, whether they can see one color or another. Why does such a small insignificant issue cause this kind of unhealthy conflict between people online?
Seriously. It's just a dress (I say to myself as I stare at it with both eyes, with one eye, out of the corner of my eye)... Nope. Still white and gold.
Do we need to agree on everything? Does everyone else need to agree with us?
It just makes me think about how much time we spend online. Here I go being Captain Obvious, but these days we see everything that is going on in the world instantaneously. We get news immediately and hear about our friends' dinners seconds after they post a picture of it on Facebook (and before they may have even taken a bite).
And I am one of the worse offenders of this, so please don't feel I am pointing a finger. I'm just observing.
To quote Leslie Knope, "Are you better off?" I'm SO grateful for the ability to stay in touch with people over social media in this time of my life when I can't be as "face to face" social with my friends. But am I better off? My personal goal is to spend more of my free moments on my Kindle rather than Facebook.
Here's my main issue with this whole dress thing. It makes me sad to hear of vitriol being tossed back and forth online over it. I see it all the time when I'm dumb enough to read the comments for internet articles. I think this instant communication has made it easier to do this kind of thing to each other, to people we don't even know. Yes, people are going to be mean sometimes no matter what the context (ie, you can be mean over a handwritten letter to strangers).
And if you've made it this far into my seemingly random dress babble, you will now be rewarded with my point. What's the root cause behind this meanness? Why do we need to be mean to each other over this issue? Why do we need to be RIGHT all the time?
We don't. Period. If you feel the need to berate someone over the color of a damn dress then I have a feeling you have some deeper emotional issues to address.
Yes. People are mean. Over petty things. I have learned (or been forced to learn) to let things roll off my back out of necessity. But I have no time to dwell on things that don't matter anymore. That's one thing a baby cured me of. The time and energy to hold onto things that don't matter.
Finally, I have to wonder at the millions of mean comments flying back and forth over social media over this not very attractive dress: Where are the people getting the time? And can they come over and do some of my laundry?
1 comment:
There was just recently an NPR story that mentioned the crazy arguments people can get into online, and they mentioned another optical illusion that was posted. It's the one with a gray square on a light background and the same color gray square on the dark background, but they don't look the same to us. Comments on the post quickly devolved into name-calling and even political bashing between people who believed it and people who did not believe it. So, the one thing I can get behind - do NOT read the comments. Sometimes applies to Facebook, too! I hope you read this one though :-)
Post a Comment