The danger of caricaturing bad people as monsters isn't because it's "too mean" or "uncivil", it's because naive idiots get confused when they finally meet the villains in person and find they don't literally drool or cackle, and go "gosh guys I met them and they're just human, maybe we were wrong" - ThreadSky

mortalwombat.info • 39 days ago

The danger of caricaturing bad people as monsters isn't because it's "too mean" or "uncivil", it's because naive idiots get confused when they finally meet the villains in person and find they don't literally drool or cackle, and go "gosh guys I met them and they're just human, maybe we were wrong"

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mortalwombat.info•39 days ago

It drives me insane every time someone is like "I too used to believe this person was a monster like we all say but I met them and they shook my hand instead of biting it off and they made some corny dad jokes instead of saying continuous slurs, so everything we thought about them must be wrong"

mortalwombat.info•39 days ago

I think this is the real problem with getting people who don't understand jokes too invested in caricatures of bad people instead of their real world bad actions. They literally expect them to be movie monsters and if they ever find out the person was nice once they become disoriented and may flip

mortalwombat.info•39 days ago

I think this 2018 article was the first to really drive me up a wall with that kind of thing. "Bari Weiss advocates disingenuously for horrible things but it turns out that she could chat warmly with me about sourdough and relationships so maybe I was wrong?" https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/03/opinion/bari-weiss-eve-peyser-friendship.html

mortalwombat.info•39 days ago

I think it is a valuable topic to explore if you do it right, that people can be amiable, warm, and even selfless one-on-one with certain people, and then later that day, calmly take some actions that cause untold damage to a bunch of other people. It's unnerving and hard to wrap your head around

speterdavis.com•39 days ago

I remember in the run up to the 2016 election there was at least one article detailing how very normal and actually quite polite Donald Trump was. Personal anecdotes like someone served him at a counter and he smiled and paid and said thank you everything. I'm like, as opposed to what, choking you?

mikie1600.bsky.social•39 days ago

What I don’t like either when they are labeled as monsters it’s that it takes away their responsibility. No they are not just "bad by nature and it’s not their fault"; they are indeed human beings and what makes them bad is nothing but their horrible acts. And we always make choices.

joulesbyrne.bsky.social•39 days ago

Well, sure, Forrest Gump might think that.
"Mr. Hitler. They said you had horns and a tail, but you're just a little fella."

jmlwhittington.com•39 days ago

I can't help but feel she addressed this in her thread.

octorine.bsky.social•39 days ago

People think they're better judges of character than they are. If they meet some famous baddie and he doesn't set off their internal alarms, then all the horrible things they heard about him must be fake news.

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