Twitter Fights, aka Getting TweetSlapped

Cartoon by Hubby

I am a professed social media fan.  I may be a little slow to catch on the new forms of social media (hello G+) and some I stay away from due to their potential to be a total time suck (Pinterest anyone?), but one thing I have come to love, after years of professing to hate it, is Twitter.  I love that I can get info faster on my cell phone's twitter app than the media news outlets.  When an earthquake was recently felt in Pittsburgh, Hubby called me to check in, and when I told him I knew nothing about it, he simply said, check your Twitter.

Twitter is, for me, a great way to sound off when frustrated, to make connections with people worldwide, and to promote my blog posts.  All in 140 characters or less.  I adore it, which is why I am annoyed to see what may be the dumbest thing ever- Twitter Fights.

Last night, by feed got flooded by two Burgh Tweeps fighting.  Tweep A had tweeted something and a bit later Tweet B said something remarkable similar.  It was a Pittsburgh joke about Jeff Reed, one that I am sure at least 100 other Burgh based Tweeps probably tweeted about, as it was not exactly a sophisticated joke.  But Tweep A got bent out of shape, and ranted and name called.  And Tweep B totally fed into it, instigating more and more.  In the end, they both ended up looking like, pardon my language, douchebags.

To be clear, these people were not fighting over hate speech, political ideas, radical thoughts, and anything that was contributing to the betterment of mankind.  No, these guys were fighting over a joke.  A dumb joke about Jeff Reed assaulting a Sheetz towel dispenser that stopped being funny about 10 minutes after the incident happened in 2009.  This was the single dumbest waste of time ever.

Why do people feel the need to engage in this behavior?  What point does it serve?  Anyone can be brave when sitting behind their laptop or smartphone screen.  And really, who cares if someone allegedly stole your tweet.  It is TWITTER, these things are not gaining entry in the Library of Congress.  I guess this falls in the same category as trolling, acting out in ridiculous ways on Twitter.  And I see so much of it.  I see people blatantly attacking others on Twitter, completely unprovoked.  I just cannot fathom how much someone's life must suck if picking fights on Twitter is the only way they can feel good about their pitiful existence.