Am I the baddie?

This is one of my favourite Mitchell & Webb sketches:

I've been reminded of it again by a particularly spectacular piece of internet trolling.



There's been a bit of buzz about Twitter and Facebook users responding to the incomprehensibly catastrophic earthquake/tsunami/nuclear emergency in Japan with alleged quips like "Karma is a bitch" and "This is payback for Pearl Harbour".

Now, to anyone with just a light dusting of sense, these are mind-numbingly atrocious comments, rooted in the black heart of racism and pig-headed stupidity.

Nobody responded to the Queensland's natural disasters by saying "That's payback for the state's historical record of appalling treatment of indigenous Australians." 

Nobody responded to the tragedy in New Zealand by saying "That's for Xena: Warrior Princess".

And with good reason - the issues are wholly and utterly unrelated (and because Xena, sadly unlike Queensland's treatment of its indigenous peoples, is awesome).

So I wonder - when people are writing these types of comments, does there come a point in their minds when they think: "Am I the baddie?"

Leaving aside the fact that the internet can turn even the nicest of humans into a rabid trough-feeding cretin - the answer is, depressingly, "probably not".

The fact that you could spew such hateful comments when about half a second of rational thought would indicate to you that they were patently ridiculous, seems to suggest that some people are just "the baddies."

I know I sometimes apply this question of "Am I the baddie?" to myself.

I like to think that I'm a basically decent person, who tries to be kind, and supportive and inclusive and gracious.

But I'm vulnerable to jealousy, pettiness, grumpiness, anger and hurt. I often say things I regret; I yearn for a "do-over", as our American friends would say, at least a few times every month. I've wished for people to fail; I've hated the fact I've failed; I've blamed others for problems of my own doing; I've said non-PC things; I've put on a false face; I've been guilty of schadenfreude. If my conscious were a judge, it would have the black hanging cap on.

And so, like David Mitchell's hapless Nazi, I see the skull branded on my own forehead and wonder if maybe I am the baddie.

Of course, what stops one going mad is knowing that there must be rankings of "badness".

I mean, I've never tried to apportion blame for a natural disaster onto a historical event, through a warped sense of cosmic revenge.  So that's a start.

And I'm NOT Andrew Bolt, so I must be at least a few rungs higher than Andrew Bolt.