By JACOB LOPEZ
Staff Writer
reporter@sbnewspaper.com
Jacob Lopez
Here’s to all the keyboard warriors. Those brave souls who hide behind the safety of their computer’s LCD screen, typing away with the fearless bravado of a seasoned fighter, afraid of nothing — except real-life people.
Last week, someone commented on Michael Rodriguez’s column about U2 at the San Benito News website, sbnewspaper.com, which we have since filtered out based on its content.
In it, a user going by the name “Once a poor boy,” and using a fake name in their email address, called the writer a “morbidly obese oaf,” and a “son of Java [sic] the Hut [sic].” Spewing insults and asking (With incorrect punctuation, I might add.) “do you really think people care what you like and don’t like.[sic]” The irony in this statement is that this person took the time, not only to specifically target Michael’s column, but to read and comment on it.
“Your oversized self-esteem closely matches your lard-like carcass,” said Mr. Boy, which I’m guessing isn’t his real last name. For the record, the editor of the News isn’t a carcass that I know of — unless he’s a zombie, in which case, San Benito has much more serious problems than concerns over some water plants.
Never mind the atrocious grammar and the commenter totally killing the punch line of the Star Wars reference by butchering the spelling of Jabba (and Hutt) and replacing it with the name a computer programming language. There has to be something more original than a fat joke.
Recently, someone also phoned the News office and said that the people who go to the San Benito Food Pantry “chose” that life, arguing that impoverished people made poor decisions. I don’t remember all of it. I kind of tuned him out, and it was hard to make much sense of it over his heavy breathing and the long pauses.
I did tell him to write a ‘Letter to the Editor,’ so I can only surmise that he took my advice, but ran out of postage stamps and figured a comment on the site would be much faster (especially since Michael seems to think the aforementioned commenter and caller are the same person). Oh well, at least it brings click counts up.
Being that I began my writing career as a games blogger and technology journalist for UBM, VentureBeat and GamePro, I’m used to receiving hate mail. It comes with the territory. People who feel safe behind the anonymity of the internet or remain nameless with their phone calls tend to be a whole lot braver when they can hide behind the veil of a fake username.
Sure, it’s amusing sometimes. We get a chuckle and delete the latest keyboard warrior’s message. Of course, had this person said such things in public, it would constitute as harassment.
Some folks may have seen this in some form on Facebook or Twitter. Those aren’t always anonymous, but they are just the same in proving that some folks can act much tougher on the internet.
I may be opening myself up to criticism from this/these individuals, but it will take more than some emails and comments to stop me from writing. After all, my picture and name are at the top of this page — that’s more than our little troll friend can say.
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