My Thoughts on Comments

These are four select comments from comment section of an article on The Atlantic website titled "The Media Can Prevent Mass Murderers From Becoming Famous". This a continuation of my post titled "My Controversy".


Credible Comments

1. The commenter is expressing anxiety in his comment. DoctorFakename is anxious about the lack of coverage of mass murder caused by arson in comparison to a shooting spree. It is easy to see his anxious state by the questions he poses and then immediately answers. Also, his vocabulary is crass which further conveys his anxiousness.
2. DoctorFakename believes that one particular atrocious act should not receive more attention than another different but similarly atrocious act. He values human life greatly because he pays attention to loss of human life and it angers him that all loss of human is not covered equally. Finally, DoctorFakename believes the media is what drives these shootings because he equates shooting a gun in public to being famous which is line with the article.
3.  DoctorFakename is reasonable and credible to me because I can see the emotion behind the words but he uses it in a constructive way. Also, the examples he provides to back up his thoughts is not outlandish or even noticeably untrue. His levelheadedness throughout the comment allowed me to take him seriously.

1. In Lizzie's comment, it is easy to tell she is expressing a wish. Throughout the comment she is explaining and creating a different reality. This reality is distinctly different from our world therefore she is expressing a wish for change.
2. Lizzie has conservative political beliefs. She has a conservative outlook on life because she feels the media doesn't need to be a major part of everything. She most likely finds the media to be too invasive in most news stories.
3. I find Lizzie's comment to be reasonable because she began her comment with some evidence. She mentions Gavin de Becker and some his ideas as her evidence. After a quick Google search it easy to understand why she chose him as an example. She then puts de Becker's idea into an example I could understand as someone who is foreign to de Becker. All of this made her comment one of the more reasonable, trustworthy and credible comments in the comment thread.

Not Credible Comments

1. LittleWillie is expressing fear in his comment. He is scared by this radical idea the author is proposing. His language is extreme and misused which lends more to the idea that he is expressing his fear.
2. LittleWillie most definitely believes in his rights. He is terrified that they may be limited or taken away. His political opinions are very transparent as well. He is definitely a conservative, even a libertarian. His distrust in the government and its perceived ability to censor is what tips me off to his political views. Finally, LittleWillie strongly believes in his right to free speech because he defends vigorously throughout the comment.
3. LittleWillie lacks credibility to me because he does not see the whole picture. His aggressive defense of his rights throughout the comment is not at all warranted because the author of this article is not suggesting a restriction of rights. LittleWillie is simply off subject with his comment. Next, his escalation of events from censoring the name of mass murderer to the evisceration of freedom of thought is completely ridiculous. All of this made LittleWillie not credible in my eyes.

1. scott_lewis is expressing anxiety in his comment. He is concerned that the media, video games, society, etc. as he put it will be blamed for mass murders instead of what he sees to be the real problem which is mentally unstable people having access to firearms.
2. scott_lewis believes there is a simple answer to most of societies problems. He also believes that these problems are often blamed on the wrong parts of our society for various political and economic reasons. His tone throughout the comment also suggests he is cynical.
3. I did not find this comment credible for one reason. scott_lewis boils down the complex relationship between mass murders and media outlets to a single reason. That simply reeks of ignorance. Nothing is that simple and scott_lewis does not acknowledge that at all. I see a lot comments like these on news posts. I find them to be a waste of time because they refuse to acknowledge the vast complexity behind many of the problems in our society. There is no one time fix to any problem and that is why I find this comment not credible.

Edit:
I commented on Lauren and Ann Emilie posts. Both did a fantastic job of understanding the feeling of each commenter. They could read whether or not the commenter was expressing fear about the topic or hope for a new reality to emerge some day. In Lauren's analysis of Chelseagrilll comment Lauren saw that the commenter was hoping for the day when medicinal marijuana is legal everywhere. In Ann Emilie's post she did an excellent job of with the comments that were deemed not credible. Her criteria for what made a post not credible was defined well and the comments fit neatly into the set lines. Generalization, name calling and racism were her lines for a comment being not credible and the elegant way she wrote about it in her analysis was something I had aimed for in my own post but failed to do. Overall, my peers did an excellent job in their analysis of comments relating to their controversy.