The Peanut Gallery

When I want a quick news fix in the middle of my work day as an Agent I go to msn.com.  I should probably make my default the NY Times, and I've tried to in the past, but something about the interface of msn.com, my familiarity with it, the way it flashes 7 slides with 3 stories each when you open to it makes it my go-to.

Usually it links to NBC news stories or MSNBC news stories or msn business, relationship, or fitness articles that I find interesting enough and pretty well written.

But in the past two weeks, during the Olympics hub-bub it habitually linked to Fox News reports recapping stories coming out across the pond.  And almost everyone I read was repulsively written, with a snarky, conservative stand point leaking between every line.  I finished every article thinking to myself, "who are the assholes they have writing these pieces??"

24 hours after Gabby Douglass won the all around gold, she googled herself and amidst a million articles calling her America's Sweetheart, a handful of comments about her hair not being done well for the competition caught her eye.  The McKayla Maroney is not impressed meme went viral over night, and my bff posted a beautifully written piece to his fb wall which he usually gets no deeper or personal on than in reference to his favorite childhood film or flavored mocha latte and it received over 1300 likes and some few hundred comments...

From the peanut gallery.

Most were positive, but a handful were rude, unintelligent, and most annoyingly, unnecessarily negative.

To which I ask, why???  Why the negativity?  What does it add to the world to make a peanut gallery contribution that's negative?  McKayla Maroney had that smirk on her face in one moment, but she had tears in her eyes for far more as she stood on the gold medal platform smack dab in the middle of the Fab Five, her teammates & friends.  Gabby Douglass defied gravity over and over again with a breathtaking exuberance smiling for miles. 

I mention the Fox news articles I kept coming upon on line last week, because, for the first time ever I was actually tempted to post a comment criticizing what I was reading - but I didn't because the thought would occur to me: what's there to gain? 

Remember that lesson from Bambi?  If you don't have something nice to say don't say it at all.

It's right on.