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Incivility and Online Comment Sections

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Currently, given the pervasiveness and universality of online incivility and language profanity, netizens have gradually come to tolerate and even perform such conducts. Unfortunately, a considerable number of online comments tend to be uncivil, with obscene languages, exaggerated claims and offensive remarks. For instance, I can find hate speeches and personal attacks under every comments section of certain celebrities’ twitters and instagrams, regardless of what they post; and when people disagree in opinions nowadays, it seems more acceptable to type cuss words under Facebook comments sections than confront face-to-face with each other in real life. As a result, many Internet users comment only to hurl abuses and vent resentment, throwing random profanities irrelevant to the contents of original posts. Concerning that news websites have already integrated comments sections into their online stories, not only do these netizens bring incivility to entertainment sections and social networks, but also impose even more severe influences on specialist topics about politics, economy, medicine and law. Since some have accepted incivility to be a usual constitute of online comments sections, they consider it normal to get emotional and resort to abusive responses whenever their political, religious and ideological perceptions are challenged. Once the purported target audiences fail to bring justice to online topics under study, others are likely to refrain from associating with the news outlets, broadcasting channels and popular magazines. Online comments sections are originally supposed to bring people, especially experts in various fields, to shed light on and contribute to themes related to the articles. But online incivility under comments sections has particularly affected people’s attitudes in negative ways, cultivating loathing towards opposing views and instigating demagoguery against government’s policies. For example, as an international student from China, I daily frequent major government-owned Chinese news websites such as People.cn and Xinhuanet, where journalists and commenters post news stories and critiques. However, a large portion of online visitors simply insult authors and vilify the government under comments sections without reading a word of these articles. From a political point of view, these comments do not discuss the contents of articles, but simply incite netizens to express dissatisfactions and hatred towards the government and society. Therefore, journalists and authors of the articles are unable to gain respects that they ought to des

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