Yes, indeed, we should all learn <i>not</i> to use our emotions in online discussions. People will say and do things that they would never say in real life, even under their real name, because of the disconnection from the actual person hearing/reading/seeing that.<p>Funnily enough, this is how I quit Imgur for good. It's amazing. I posted something that I believed was right and got downvoted to hell.<p>So I started asking people "why, why do you downvote?" and got mostly laughs, memes and people calling me stupid. Except one person, who said "you care way too much about this". Indeed, I did. Thank you random person!<p>Not sure why but it affected me more on Imgur. Maybe it's the length of the comments? The memes that encompass a thousand words, as they say? Regardless, I just deleted my account and never went back. It's great.<p>Still trying to quit Reddit and HN, but they're good resources if you ignore all the stupidity. Imgur is bottom of the barrel social media, but it was fun.<p>And of course, this is used by various media outlets, has been for a long time.<p>It's all about eliciting emotions, which come from the primitive part of the brain, bypassing any advanced conscious analysis and engaging the impulse to do either what you're told (good for sales) or the opposite of it (good for spreading a message) or something in between, but it's a response that you <i>will</i> remember and most likely take action.<p>I forgot what I was trying to say. Somehow Facebook never got me, it's just a useless platform aside from contacting people.