Always with the negative waves, Moriarty

...a line from one of my favorite movies, Kelly's Heroes.

It appalls me how much negativity is on the web. Recently I've been listening to a book on CD, The Shark Mutiny (typical Clancy-like thriller stuff), and I've been enjoying it very much. So the other night I logged onto Amazon to see what else the guy had written and ran across the reviews for The Shark Mutiny. And everyone hated it! Virtually all bad reviews; 2 stars average, maybe. And I noticed instantly that I was enjoying the book less myself. It was the same old book, but it had just been bombarded by negative waves.

Do people consider that when they make a negative comment or write a negative review that they're simply adding to the World Negativity Quotient(WNQ)? In my experience at least 75% of the material on internet forums consists of simple negativity and out-and-out rudeness. Who raised these people; were they taught no manners at all? Did their mother not tell them that, "if you don't have anything good to say, don't say anything at all?" Or am I just prejudiced because I was raised in the South?

Consider that for every negative comment loosed on the world, somewhere out there is a receptor for it (or, thanks to the internet, thousands of receptors). Consider that your one piece of blithe negativity may have an adverse affect on thousands of otherwise positive people--a powerful position for one nattering nabob.

It's way past time for a return to simple civility. Enough with the negative waves, Moriarty.