There sure is a lot of outrage out there. Protests, riots, flag burning, looting, killing, general mayhem... all in the last couple of days. From what I'm given to understand, it's largely because of a YouTube clip that was disrespectful to a religion.
I don't know about you, but I grew up in a world where literally everything is targeted by hecklers. I'm pretty sure if I searched around for eight or ten seconds on YouTube I could find examples of every documented religion being heckled, satirized, warped, misquoted, misrepresented, dissected and disrespected in every way imaginable.
If every instance of religion-oriented heckling resulted in violent protests, there wouldn't be time for anybody to do anything else. I would have to dodge protesters on my way from the couch to the kitchen every time I wanted another handful of wasabi peas.
So why this video?
Speculation: Maybe the people who got so mad are folks who aren't desensitized to heckling the way the rest of us are. Ever see a stand up comedian get heckled and just lose it? Start ranting and raving and yelling and whatnot... I think that's sort of what's going on here.
An experienced speaker can play through heckling gracefully, even turn it around on the heckler and come out looking better for it. Worst case scenario the offender is kicked out of the club. Nobody gets shot.
On the other hand, if somebody gets heckled, throws a tantrum and yells at everybody, after the venue all anybody can remember is how much of a jerk the speaker was. They know the heckler was just some nameless idiot in a crowd.
That's if for me, I have to go heckle Dr. Phil.
2 comments:
Can you post a link to the youtube video? I must be out of the loop cause I haven't heard anything. Great blog as always though :~)
Lizzy! You know what, to be honest I never saw the video myself, just heard about all the hubub on the news. I guess it's quieted down now anyway. Or people are pointing fingers somewhere else.
Post a Comment