I was going through FaceBook this morning and encountered this item from ABC7 a news outlet in Los Angeles and Southern California. You will see an all too familiar type of headline.

It was not the headline which took hold of my attention. It was the reaction emjois. Now Facebook being Facebook you can expect a few twisted and ignorant souls to put up laughing ones when there is a human tragedy and also thumbs up when Trump’s administration does something. After all it’s FaceBook where the ignorant, ill-informed and prejudiced of any political stripe be it Right or Left congregate.

The aspect which disturbed me was that there were approximately 200 thumbs up (maybe more now and worse 150+ whose reaction was to put the laughing face. A quick glance at the comments revealing one GIF ICE – themed support.
These twinned actions say much about a corrosion of the common sense of Humanity. That folk can support or mock the misery of children, vulnerable and frightened small individuals does speak harshly about those folk.

Now down Humanity’s long jagged, ragged road there is nothing new in this. One of the most frightening creations we have to offer is mentality of The Mob, be it a howling scream missile throwing horde or a host of folk with access to social media. Of any political or social stripe by the way. Against these waves of irrational hate and screaming War can at times look positively sanitised ‘It’s nothing personal. It’s just business,’. It is also fearfully easy to be swept up in the emotions of a crowd whose passions have been ignited.

The most dangerous aspect of this mindless action comes from the Opportunist. The Opportunist comes in many forms. We think of them as simply charlatans looking out for no more than personal gain from ‘the rubes’. But there are those who harbour extreme beliefs who will sense the discomfort and anger, to harness it and thus have a fertile ground to promote those ideas. There are those who are possessed of a narcissism and thus will use any means to promote themselves. There are the professionals who are there at the behest of an organisation or nation to stir up the Mob, who will be quite unaware they are fodder. And there are those who just want their moment of Glory, not really sure where it leads. All of these types will work upon the crowd, turning it into a mob, mindless.
Now aside from the expert professionals and the more astute of the charlatans both of whom know when to fade into the background or ‘jump ship’ at the right time there can grow  amongst the rest an unholy alliance between Opportunist and Mob. This being that the Opportunist delivers what The Mob want to hear, but The Mob will want more, howling for it, so the Opportunist begins to do at the behest of The Mob and thus the cycle picks up a giddy pace both parties locked into a whirlwind of emotion where all perspective is lost. The end leads to some type of destruction, either materially or of the Soul, sometimes both. For within this there will always be the danger of the element of retribution, and that comes in many forms.

To return to those foolish folk who applauded at that news item. They would do well to consider an incident where some of their own; close friends or relatives are attending a gathering, a rally. There is an accident, a fire in the building maybe, loss of life much injury. How will they feel in the aftermath of that horror and tragedy to see thumbs up and laughing emjois along with cruel comments?

The door swings both ways. 

And since there appear to be those who say they espouse Christianity, then they should meditate on the words of Christ as recorded in Matthew 25 verses 31-46