I believe comments are read in a different tone than intended by whoever posted them. When people see a comment that criticizes media they like, they view it as irrational anger. Positivity is also similarly exaggerated. Words like “Seethe” are thrown around as if people are angrily smashing their keyboards to form a comment, but when we take a more objective view at ourselves, the people we regularly communicate through multiple means of communication, and the standard comments we all post on the internet, that doesn’t make any sense to me.
From the side of the average commenter on the web, we tend to use vocabulary and expressions when typing comments we don’t normally use when speaking to others personally. Anonymous or not, we have a persona when we communicate through pure text that is not truly reflective of our nature, think of all the times you typed “lol” but didn’t actually “Laugh Out Loud”. When that comment is read, it is imagined the person behind the comment is laughing, but how it’s being used is simply a label that expresses a content that has the minimum comedic value to get that response.
I believe the many comments are made in a way to influence how we want to be perceived, rather than how we actually feel. And exaggeration is often used to make a point. When I type HATE in capital letters within a comment, I am trying to emphasize that my perception towards something is more than mild annoyance, but as a result it is easy to interpret that word as a yell.
And from the reader's perspective, the tone we read comments isn’t only influenced by the vocabulary of the comment itself, but is also filtered through our own biases. If someone said they “hate the color purple”, I would view that more angrily if I didn’t agree with the sentiment than if I did.
So what we type isn’t reflective of how we feel, and what is read is dependent on the individual.
I think this is how we get stuff labeled as “Toxic Fans” or “Angry Haters” to comments that for all we know, were simply disgruntled remarks made on lunch breaks. I found the internet to be a more sensible place when I started imagining most comments being made by pretty calm people.
That’s not to say there aren’t idiots or bigots by the hundreds, thousands, or even millions, just that comments are incredibly unreliable at determining that unless they are explicit. I don't think that needs to be preached to most people here, honestly, but this is something that has been on my mind for a while and I don't use social media or forums these days. Ya'll are stuck with me.
I think what elevates this from an inconvenience to societal harm are influences, politicians but also celebrities, encouraging discourse on topics most people are not very educated on with users that are not seeking for answers outside of their bias. Place that within the democratic/republic systems that inherently divide us, add a touch of inflated self-importance, and then you have Twitter.