In the age of online mobs it's probably very commendable for the news outlets not to throw anybody to the lions, especially since in this case the responsibility seems difficult to establish. Is it the fault of the captain? The Egyptian pilot? Some technician that caused directly or indirectly a blackout on the ship? The Egyptian authorities who authorized the ship to cross during bad weather? Etc...
It's a very good thing that the media was more cautious IMO. And conspiracy theories don't need anybody feeding them, you have armies of losers online doing nothing but making that stuff up 24/7.
I don't think there's anything "strange" going on (a rather conspiratorial wording in and of itself IMO), it's just that it's very hard to place the blame with the information currently available, especially since all the first party sources have a very strong incentive to push a certain narrative.
The Costa Concordia on the other hand was much more clear cut and you had the extremely embarrassing recording of the coast guard telling the captain to return to the ship and him cowardly refusing to do so. There's no such thing here as far as I know.
Again, I don't care to find them excuses. "Somebody called me a loser so I decided to spew bullshit online" is what losers do.
I'd much rather empathize with this captain who was targeted solely because she's a woman. That seems like a much better use of my time than caring about keyboard warriors on twitter or 4chan.
I'm talking about addressing systemic issues in our culture (like calling any group we don't like by a bad name) that are definitely, provably, obviously, causing more of the bad behavior that we're trying to criticize.
I live in a very "purple" area and even though I am "blue" I get along with "red" people easily by, I dunno, not calling them "deplorables" when they say something that offends me.
It's up to each of us if we want to link our identity with a zealous cause and never back down because we're afraid of social penalties from our in-group, or if we want to actually learn how to get along. But if you go around calling people "losers", you should consider how that might be adding to the problem you're trying to solve.
Edit: btw I agree 100% with everything you've said except for the "armies of losers" phrasing. That's all I'm trying to communicate to you. That there may have been a more constructive way to get your (correct) point across.
I understand your feedback, and I generally try to be level headed in these matters, but I simply think that it's a losing battle.
Playing the victim is a competitive sport online, suffice to see the outrage caused by "literally whos" who post some silly extreme take on some social network. It then gets posted and reposted everywhere to rile the troups.
My point is, if a nobody like myself calling a bunch of people "losers" online is enough to motive some of these people to change their behaviours, IMO they were just looking for an excuse to do so. In truth in my experience they're not arguing that in good faith, they're just cherry picking in order to "both-sides" the issue.
I think it's a waste of energy to try to build bridges with these types of people, they're not interesting in honest debate, they just espouse the form of a civil debate in order to bog you down. So I just explicitly reject them without engaging, if you're the type of person who likes to spread disinformation like the one discussed in TFA then you're a loser in my book and I move on with my life.
Note that I'm not singling any particular faction here, while I do think that the right wing is definitely employing these tactics at a much greater scale, the left is definitely not above them either. It's standard internet discussion tactics, unfortunately.
I cherish HN because it's one of the only relatively mainstream online forums I know of where these types of discussions don't turn completely one-sided. It's far from perfect but places like reddit, facebook, twitter or 4chan are effectively lost to civil discourse as far as I'm concerned.
I'm saying "civil" means not saying "armies of losers". More or less by definition. If you're not trying to build bridges with most people most of the time, what are you doing exactly?
Again, my only point, is that your idea that calling them losers will do anything except trigger a double-down is hurting your own cause.
Also, HN is a niche echo chamber similar to those others you mention, in many ways.
It's a very good thing that the media was more cautious IMO. And conspiracy theories don't need anybody feeding them, you have armies of losers online doing nothing but making that stuff up 24/7.
I don't think there's anything "strange" going on (a rather conspiratorial wording in and of itself IMO), it's just that it's very hard to place the blame with the information currently available, especially since all the first party sources have a very strong incentive to push a certain narrative.
The Costa Concordia on the other hand was much more clear cut and you had the extremely embarrassing recording of the coast guard telling the captain to return to the ship and him cowardly refusing to do so. There's no such thing here as far as I know.