Yahoo had a cute little nothing headline today - White House trick-or-treating, with the President and First Lady passing out candy to various cute trick or treaters. One little boy showed up in an excellent Prince costume - he had the purple suit down, the guitar was fierce, just absolutely adorable, and there was a 12-second video of the President crooning Purple Rain at him (surprisingly on key, btw...) It was absolutely adorkable, in all the best ways... and then I made the mistake of looking at the comments below the article.
I know we're a polarized nation. I know that anonymous commenting brings out the worst in people. But for heaven's sake... what possible good could it be doing your soul to actively seek out, read, and bother to comment on a cute little nothing video like this with hateful rhetoric? And it wasn't just hating on the President (although there was some of that.) People were insulting the little kid! There was a comment on cultural appropriation (the kid was African-American, by the way - I'm pretty sure the comment maker doesn't understand cultural appropriation.) There was a comment about not dressing up like Prince because he was a drug-fiend (no... pretty sure he was just in a hell of a lot of pain, there at the end, but I don't see how that makes him an anti-hero.) There was even someone accusing Yahoo of publishing this to distract from the Hillary email scandal.
I find myself really hoping that things calm down after the election, but I'm afraid this boil is just going to keep growing until we find a way to lance it. And I don't know if the country could survive the surgery.
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