The Snoop Next Door Is Posting to YouTube

Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "Your most trivial missteps are increasingly ripe for exposure online, reports the Wall Street Journal, thanks to cheap cameras and entrepreneurs hoping to profit from websites devoted to the exposure. From the article: 'The most trivial missteps by ordinary folks are increasingly ripe for exposure as well. There is a proliferation of new sites dedicated to condemning offenses ranging from bad parking and leering to littering and general bad behavior. One site documents locations where people have failed to pick up after their dogs. Capturing newspaper-stealing neighbors on video is also an emerging genre. Helping drive the exposés are a crop of entrepreneurs who hope to sell advertising and subscriptions.' But other factors are at work, including a return to shame as a check on social behavior, says an MIT professor."

Comments

No problem?

[alshithead]

I don't see a problem. You can either forgoe shameful behavior or keep it hidden. If you're doing something you would be ashamed of then you probably shouldn't be doing it in the first place. If you're doing something that you feel you shouldn't be ashamed of but that others might want to shame you for, then keep it private. I call that civilization. For those that say they are entitled or should have the right, if most people agree then there is no reason to be ashamed. If most people don't agree then maybe you need to reassess whether or not you should be ashamed.

I'm betting some will disagree with me. If you can provide me an example of where I might be wrong I'm certainly willing to think about it. Offhand, I couldn't think of an example on my own where my logic wouldn't work.

First post?

Re:No problem?

[robably]

You don't see a problem? The problem is How long does someone have to be ashamed for, and in front of how many people? You put something on the internet and potentially it's there forever and can be seen by millions, like with Star Wars Kid. I believe forgiveness is necessary in society - being allowed to learn from your mistakes and move on to become a better person - but we seem to have a culture where nobody forgives and nobody is allowed to forget. The people doing the uploading, who feel the need to shame and humliate someone this much, must be pretty unpleasant themselves.

Re:No problem?

[GreggBz]

I guess I don't think like you, not anymore.

A few years ago one warm summer day, I got fuming mad at some woman who was going rather slow, worrying about something inside her station wagon and could not decide on a lane. I remember this vividly. Latter, honest to god, I saw her checking out at K-Mart. She was buying gatoraide for some reason and chatting with the clerk. She started crying. It turns out she had just moved to the city where I live, someone had stolen her pocket book, she could not find it in here car and she was having a really bad day. I made it a point to apologize for my behavior when we were both driving, cause you see, I was the real asshole.

You don't walk in these peoples shoes, please don't arbitrarily demonize them. Nobody ever gets to know anyone these days. I guess we are to busy hiding behind our gadgets. Really, how well do you know your neighbor? It's easy to judge someone badly, it's a little harder to get to know your fellow humans and see them for what the are, human. People are not just an inconvenience in your self-absorbed little world. Yea, I know, it's scary to say "hello, how are you, I'm such-and-such..." but you'll feel better if you truly live and let live.

Re:No problem?

[joto]

Or his potential employeer will see that he is the famous Star Wars Kid, and employ him on the spot, hoping that some customers will recognize him. Which is just as likely.

Or his potential employer won't recognize him. Because he is at least 5 years older, has different clothes, a new haircut, and doesn't try to dance around with a long stick. Which is the most likely thing to happen.

But then again, it's only our generation who cares about this. When the kids of today grows up, everybody will have access to nude/embarassing/whatever pictures/movies/whatever of everyone else.

It seems to me...

[ChePibe]

...that it's fairly simple to avoid becoming a target of these websites:

Pick up after your dog.

Park correctly.

Don't take things that don't belong to you.

I know that if people in my apartment complex did this, we could all live happier lives, particularly the picking up after dogs bit.

Don't want to have a video of you stealing your neighbor's paper show up on YouTube? Don't steal your neighbor's paper.

Re:Dog crap?

[tomhudson]

Why not cure both problems - pick up the dog shit they didn't pick up (use a plastic bag) and "fill up" the door handles of their car that they so inconsiderately parked in your spot.

If they "discover" this at night when its dark, so much the better ... shit happens ...

Just remember to post the video :-)

Is shame still an effective deterrent?

[hasbeard]

To what sense is shame still an effective deterrent? To feel shame requires that one sense that in some way his actions are socially unacceptable. As the boundaries of our culture seemed to have been stretched further and further, what was once unacceptable is now acceptable. For example, once homosexual behavior was deemed unacceptable. Now, it seems at times, homosexuality is almost a "status symbol." Increasingly, rudeness seems to be tolerated. Right wing and Left wing political figures and commentators insult one another with abandon. It seems to me that there are an increasing number of people who seem unable to sense when they have crossed the boundaries (or else they don't care).

Think hard about your own life

[houghi]

Have you NEVER done something that could be seen as shamefull? Have you NEVER been drunk as a student? Have you NEVER behaved as an asshole when young? Have you NEVER wore stoopid clothes where people laughed at you? Never ever in your whole life did something you are ashamed of?

Seriously? Are you a bot?

I know I have. It is called learning and living.

It amazes me that so many see no problem in this. It all sounds like: if you don't do anything wrong, there should not be a problem.

This is just a modern version of a pillory without the basic justice even the people in the middle ages had.