After demonstrating some poor taste in humor, Greg Glassman has stepped down as CEO of CrossFit. His tweet, and the fallout from it, demonstrate just how much social media has dulled our sense of empathy and basic decency.
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Last Saturday, Greg Glassman, the founder and CEO of CrossFit, tried to be funny but demonstrated some pretty poor taste. In response to a tweet that said racism should be considered a public health crisis, Glassman responded by saying, “It’s FLOYD-19.”
In response to the fallout over this exceedingly insensitive joke, Glassman has stepped down as CEO of CrossFit and admitted the comment was a mistake.
I’ve long taken the view that this current generation of Americans is thinking too much with their social media sense and not enough with their common sense, and too often in a way that abandons a basic sense of decency.
Glassman’s joke was absurd and demeaning. George Floyd’s murder was a heinous crime, and the video of his death has rightly shocked the nation. But instead of becoming a moment where the country can come together, far too many people of all political stripes are responding in ways that are just tearing us more apart.
And, the behavior and speech so damaging to the fabric of our society primarily results from the compulsive need for likes and shares that we, the social media junkies of America, feed on. Off-color jokes, demeaning rhetoric, insulting memes, derogative gifs…the way Americans treat each other keeps getting worse and worse as social media enables us to switch off our empathy.
Worse, how often have we seen the instinct to switch on the live feed and hold up the phone when witnessing something horrible instead of doing something about it? I’ve personally found it striking that so many of the same people who decry the police officers who failed to intervene to save George Floyd’s life are the same ones who watch dispassionately, phones up, as peaceful protests have devolved into frenzied violence that has burned down homes, destroyed people’s livelihoods, and has ended more precious lives (including black lives).
I suggest that if we want to find solutions to the problems that face our society, we switch off the social media apps a little more and go talk to real people, especially those we don’t agree with or don’t understand.
I’m sure that had Greg Glassman thought first of the real people his tweet would hurt instead of the coveted RTs awaiting a smart-ass remark, he wouldn’t be in the boat he finds himself in today.
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