THE GROUP COLLECTIVE. Shit-Starters and Groupthink

People like Andrea Edwards are what I refer to as bench-sitting Shit-Starters.  Bystanders – who find value in making fun of other people, and of criticizing people who are trying their best.

Shit-Starters get other people to judge other people.  

But, there is a fine line between Starting Shit, and defaming someone.

The Shit-Starter preys on unsuspecting people.  Their brand of meaning is to spread discord or controversy with a spark of nonsense, and then run away and watch the conflagration – snickering from the back of the room (or, in Miss Drea’s case, from the Teacher’s desk at the front of the 6^th grade classroom).

The Shit-Starter’s purpose for doing this is that it gives them a sense of relevance in life, some sense of meaning – things they can’t get by just living.  Their gain can only come at the expense of some unknowing prey – and always behind their backs.  This is the price that others have to pay.

We all know Shit-Starters in life.  They whisper things like, “hey, did you see what that other player just did?,” or “are you going to let that guy get away with what he just did to you?” or “what? – did you hear just hear that – aren’t you going to do something?,” or “I wouldn’t just sit and take that if I were you.”  They nudge others to go after others.

Not all Bench-Sitters are Shit-Starters.  But, all Shit-Starters are Bench-Sitters. 

Take Gardnerites United.  It’s a private Group.  It’s perfect for the Shit-Starter.  All it takes is one photo, or a GIF, or some other mindless reflex, and then sit back and watch the destruction that happens to another person.  Miss Drea will just take my words out of context, it is what she does – but, I’m only talking about 2% of the Gardnerites United members who are the Shit-Starters (the “2-percenters”).  We all know who they are. They know who they are.  The other members of GU know who they are.  All talk, no action.  Bench-sitters. Self-appointed experts on government theory.

Miss Drea’s style of Shit-Starting promotes a pernicious form of Groupthink. Whether she (and her featherweight 2-percenters) are taking credit for something good, or running away from deviancy (or worse) – they try to get everyone to think like they do.  Groupthink – because they don’t think you should have your own thoughts.

I don’t agree with Miss Drea – because I don’t believe that everyone in her Group buys into her (and her 2-percenters’) Groupthink.  I think they have their own brains.

I believe her members have self-esteem and confidence in themselves, and can speak for themselves.  I’ll use an example.  Say you joined an old-school gym, with 220-pound dumbbells everywhere, and guys posing in mirrors, and screaming.  You joined because you love the gym’s hours and the equipment.  But, you don’t like all that meathead stuff. If someone said “they are a bunch of meatheads in that gym,” you would not take that personally if you had any brains, and self-esteem.  In fact, even if you thought they were including you as a “meathead,” and you were one of those meatheads, you would laugh it off because everyone has their own opinion.  

But, if Miss Drea had anything to say about it, it’s no laughing matter.  Contrary opinion must be met with hate.  She would induce you to discredit that gym critic as a human – to hate him.  “Did you hear what he just said about your gym, he’s talking about you!”

On the other hand, when I speak alone, for myself, Miss Drea attacks me – by butchering my words out-of-context, behind my back, without my permission, to turn them into thoughts not my own – and publishes them on Gardnerites United.  She makes sure everyone knows exactly who she is attacking.  Me.  But Gardnerites United, the Group, is off limits?  

In real life, that’s not normal.

The Gardnerites United members who aren’t doing the chirping don’t need Chief Shit-Starter speaking for them – as if they don’t have a brain.  Miss Drea believes her Group members do not have brains enough to speak for themselves.  That’s pretty sad.  I disagree with her.  I do think her members on Gardnerites United do have brains.  

In fact, that’s why they are leaving Gardnerites United in droves – because they have brains.

In the end, she just needs Group comfort.  When that’s your main objective, and you have to disparage someone else to get it, your Facebook Group is not long for this world.  She can only get it through Groupthink.  She finds herself on the defensive now – and she needs the members to be personally outraged into a frenzy of Groupthink in order to give her shelter from the heat.

Miss Drea realizes that her desire to be a political operative has backfired now.  And, it’s going to get worse.  [Insert GIF of Roadrunner Tao – Wile E. Coyote, with white eyes blinking through a charred cartoon body after his own stick of dynamite blows up in his face].

Miss Drea chooses to attack me personally. The comments she leaves up about me, when she censors normal things, are statements that she should be very worried about.  As I have said, she gets no protection from Section 230.  I never did anything to provoke her (except to breathe).  It gives her meaning.  I get it.  But, I won’t squeal like a pig like Ned Beatty in Deliverance.

Miss Drea is used to having the remote control.  Until now, she has always been able to adjust reality to her liking, and get nothing but praise for doing so.  When you are not in The Arena, you have that luxury.  I wouldn’t know.  In the end, it’s pure Groupthink.  If that’s what you like.

The stakes for our society are too high for us not to take this endeavor on.  There are too many capable journalists across the country willing to take part in new and successful business enterprise dedicated to the smart delivery of local political, social and cultural stories.  The stories that tell us who we are and who we desire to be.