Well, my grandparents grew up in a small town and they claim that living like your life is an open book is a horrific experience . When everyone knows your business, you had better be the exact same as everyone else or you will be ostracised, belittled, and in some cases just "disappear". I mean by "disappear" is some community minded person will hit you on the head with a shovel, and bury you body where nobody will find it. You can also expect that if you manage to avoid "disappearing" you will be turned down for permits, jobs, and other public services. So we will be returning to the days of the Salem Witch Trials, where anyone who is just a tiny bit different will be publicly hung and vilified. Even if you manage to somehow avoid most of the social/economic/religious/legal repercussions of being "different", you can expect to be treated like "those people from the other side of the rail road tracks."
May be humans have evolved since the days of my grandparents but I don't think so.
The recent news articles and noise about the Muslim Community Center in New York City is a great example on how the Internet has failed to "enlighten" or "exhibit rationality" on the part of humans. No matter how someone "feels" about this, there is a rational way of looking at it. It just doesn't really matter because very few people involved in the discussion are rational or want to be rational. The Internet hasn't spread "rationality", it has spread memes, partial information, opinions, and emotionality. These things are all part of being human and having them exposed really hasn't done much "rational good".
Just for information, I support freedom of religion, I personally wish the owners of the community center had taken the feelings of others into consideration but I don't think they should have to back out of their project either.
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