Ariel Horn: Talking to fighting to anger

It's late on a Sunday afternoon after "everything happened" -- my euphemism for the events of Sept. 11 -- and I'm trying to do some reading at the library. It's not working though. My eyes glaze over the words vacantly; I'm turning the pages, neither willing nor able to digest any information.

My eyes pick up a phrase here and there in my history reading that I absentmindedly choose to highlight -- "end of democracy," "need for retaliation," "inevitable destruction of normal society." I flip ahead in my reading -- 130 more endless pages to go.ÿI just can't do this anymore. I need something -- anything -- that will entertain me. Naturally, I get up to check my e-mail.

Having just checked less than five minutes earlier, there's nothing in my inbox to distract me from work -- it's the e-mail addict's eternal nightmare. I surf the Web and end up, as an absolute last refuge from library boredom, at the Daily Pennsylvanian's Web site. I click on a link that invites Web junkies to "Share your thoughts on the terrorist tragedy. Post your comments online."

Hmm, this could be interesting. It's certainly better than doing work. I decide to check it out.

Three posts are up already, the last dated Sept. 17. One reader suggests forceful military and economic action against terrorism. Another argues with that post, claiming that killing innocent people with violent retaliatory gestures won't accomplish anything. The next post suggests that military action needs to happen to preserve the American way of life. Each post makes a good point. Hmmm.

I click off the Web site and am actually proud of Penn and the DP. People can voice their opinions in a mature and safe environment. This is dialogue! This is the American way! This is freedom of speech, baby! I'm impressed.

About a week after my Sunday afternoon in the library, I find myself strangely drawn back to the DP's terrorist tragedy link. But this time, discussion has begun to drastically deteriorate on the site -- the dialogue has turned into a tangential discussion of abortion and its relation to terrorism. One reader posts his opinion -- another tears it to shreds, unwilling to even consider the argument itself, whether he agrees with it or not.

He ends his post, "That's right, you scumbag. I THINK YOU ARE A NAZI. I refuse to give your opinions the dignity of further consideration or reply. Go on living your hateful, puritantical life, but don't bother the rest of us with your rantings."

Not exactly the thoughtful discussion that it had started.

A day later, another reader posts a response to the "Nazi comment." The reader is insulted and appalled by the flippant references to Nazis ("which I'm offended by, you ignorant son of bitch"), and argues with the poster that he "can't see the forest for the trees."

The discussion turns back to a heated debate about terrorism -- this time, on a personal level. The forum no longer deals directly with issues -- its new focus is shooting down the arguments of others through personal insults. A personal favorite, posted in response to another student's claim that the United States essentially brought this tragedy on itself: "If you feel that way, why don't you get the hell out of America?"

Ah, Penn. Intellectual home of "open discussion" and "dialogue."

The irony of all this "open discussion" at Penn, all this "dialogue" that Penn has become so proud of fostering? It doesn't actually exist.

Just last week, I attended one of Provost Robert Barchi's "Fireside Chats." Students gathered there to discuss their reactions to the Sept. 11 tragedy. And even though the students had gathered there with good intentions, the comments, though not as personal or angry as those on the DP Web site, inevitably ended up being one-sided claims such as "War doesn't work." (Incidentally, then, why isn't the Third Reich the government of all of Europe now?)

Penn students claim to want dialogue. The problem is that dialogue, in reality, has deteriorated into fighting. "Talking" has become yelling, and "opinion" has transformed into anger.

The necessity for dialogue is clear everywhere on campus; the honest desire to make it happen is not. It's time for us to try listening as an essential component of speaking.

Ariel Horn is a senior English major from Short Hills, N.J.

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