To me there is nothing in this world that is simultaneously more sad and more funny than Internet comments. Often, I find myself discussing the comment thread to an article or link just as much as I discuss the content itself. I’m not sure what it says about my personality that I find this kind of character vomit somewhat fascinating, but I’m certain it’s probably not healthy. I can’t even think of what the real world equivalent would be without getting completely grotesque, so choose your own abhorrent adventure, I guess.

When we first started posting stuff online for SmoothFewFilms, I wasn’t always the best at reacting to comments. OK, that’s a massive understatement. Probably more truthful to say that comments used to send me into an epileptic rage.

I’m sure we’ve all seen John Gabriel’s theory on the matter and sadly, comically, it’s true. Mainly, it baffled me that people could say some of the garbage they did without recognizing that a real person was on the other end of it. Over time, I had to learn to just ignore most of the stuff, and if I was ever going to respond to something negative, I had to balance it by responding to the positive as well. This has given me a pretty keen head in terms of the way people interact on the Web, and helps me to ignore what isn’t constructive… which leaves only about one percent of anything typed on the Internet.

This shouldn’t be surprising, really, but it is for me. I think any instance in which people don’t have to face consequences for their actions, they’re going to let their true colors show. In a small way, you see the same thing on the road, and how “courteous” people act when driving, just on a much smaller scale.

This train of thought for me actually started today when I watched the classic Kung Fu Bear video, and marveled at the glory of the argument below. How does a video of a bear spinning a stick even start an argument? Regardless, the video itself kind of rules, and you should watch it.

The YouTube community probably encapsulates this better than any other place online. Most of the comments left on our video channel are surprisingly imbecilic, even by the already curb-high standards that most of us are used to. Case in point: our newest episode of Web Zeroes has basically turned into a chorus of people trying (and failing so, so hard) to re-create the Legend of Zelda Triforce using symbols. I just can’t even wrap my head around it.

In the future, I’ll probably make it a regular series of posts to collect the most ridiculous YouTube comments from each week and post them here. But I will be honest, I am kind of afraid to do this. Pray for me.

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