Ticks and Leeches

The Internet, as most people realize, is a microcosm of reality. It's a slice of humanity, and inhumanity, congealed into one place -- a place that doesn't actually exist -- but a place, nevertheless.

And as such, it's filled with the fleas, ticks and leeches of humanity.

People who see everything as a chance to lie, cheat, steal, invade, disturb, and provoke their fellow human beings in any way possible, using methods such as phishing, spam, viruses, spyware, malware, comment spam and everything else under the sun.

It's not even sad, it's just pathetic.

These are the same people who see tragedies like the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center as an opportunity to scam good people out of millions. I'm not putting Internet annoyances on a par with that, but you get the parallel. This planet is filled to capacity with scum sucking slime.

I bring this up because of a recent spat of comment spam that has been making the rounds through web pages of myself and my writing friends. And no, it's not the first time. Neither will it be the last time. It just reminds me how many a-holes there are in the world, and how used to them we've all become.

You know who they remind me of? Those people who run around the Internet leaving ridiculous spam on blogs, sending meaningless emails to web page owners, and flitting in and out of forums with no purpose other than to cause trouble?

They remind me of those losers in High School. Remember them? The jerks who talked too loud, thought annoying you was the smartest way to gain attention, and had nasty personal hygiene. The ones who grew up to be known as Trailer Trash, who probably never managed to go to college, never left their home town, and probably still live in the basement of Mommy's house.

Now, instead of tossing spitwads around the class, or making ridiculous jokes about boobies, they can flit around with anonymity and leave unwanted comments on blogs, in emails, and leave droppings in respectable forums.

Oh, I'm sure they get a good laugh. I'm sure they sit around in their sad little basements in front of their sad little computers, after a day of working their sad little jobs, spending their sad little lives still telling boob-jokes because they have yet to see a real one, still picking their noses and typing out their little spams.

And the rest of us; still saddled with the good manners our parents taught, will sigh, shake our heads sadly, perhaps roll our eyes as we hit the delete button, place someone on ignore, run our virus scans and our spyware searches, and remove comment spam --

And rejoice, for we are not them.


Now that we've had our public service announcement, let's scroll down and look at the pretty men again!