ca•thar•sis
2. Psychoanalysis Elimination of a
complex by bringing it to consciousness and
affording
it expression.
When
I belatedly got my first computer and signed onto the net,
I never realized how powerfully addictive it could be.
Not only the millions of websites that touched on every
conceivable subject matter, but particularly the chatrooms.
These chatrooms were “cyber-havens” for people all over
the world, people that would never have come into contact
if not for the information superhighway. They provided
a link, connecting disparate souls into cyber occasions
that could be pleasurable, entertaining and enlightening.
Or at their worst, they could be unpleasant, aggravating
and downright frightening.
My
first experiences through chatrooms came through my
ISP, AOL (disparingly known among web junkies as AOHELL,
due to their numerous tech glitches). Being that
I’m a huge movie buff and have been trying to push screenplays
for many years, I was instantly attracted to a chatroom
entitled Movie Madness. Little did I
realize then that the room’s title could be a literal
description of its activities.
My
first forays into the room were pleasant enough.
While the room contained its share of shut-ins, illiterate
types and annoying teenagers, it also contained a fair
amount of intelligent and knowledgable film buffs, who
were a pleasure to chat with about all vintages and
genres of film.
However,
as time progressed, I became aware of an alarming trend:
there was a rather unholy clique of homoerotic neo-Nazi
types, led by one person with the screen name “Madman
Mundt.” If you’re not familiar with that name,
it comes from the 1991 Coen Brothers film Barton
Fink. Mundt was the name of the demonic,
psychopathic serial killer played by John Goodman.
As I was about to find out, it was an appropriate screen
name for the sociopath who chose it.
Mundt and his cadre were a bunch of vicious bullies,
relentlessly insulting people who they felt didn’t have
the requisite film knowledge, tearing into people who
were sensitive, shy, or behaved in a manner unacceptable
to their Nietzschean ubermensch mentality. Mundt’s
followers tended to be bitter, angry, frustrated types
with apparently no form of sex life. The parallel
to 30’s Germany became even more pronounced as their
bigotry came to the forefront. They spewed their
hatred toward all minority members, particularly targeting
those who admitted to being part of a minority group
in chat. All minority members got a torrent of
insults, but a special level of venom was reserved for
gays and Jews; I’d pity the unsuspecting, openly gay
Jew who unwittingly stumbled into Movie Madness.
Mundt’s
followers had a slavish obedience to him, almost bordering
on a sexual obsession with their beloved Fuehrer.
As I learned more about him I found this very puzzling;
a picture of him was floated by a legion of his detractors.
Mundt lived in a Florida trailer park. He was
the quintessential figure of white, bigoted Southern
trailer trash. Quite the egotist, his picture
showed a bare-chested fellow bordering on the portly,
in his early 30’s, with long hair extending to his waist.
If you can’t make a mental picture, think Bigfoot with
electrolysis. There were pictures of him playing
lead guitar in his neo-Nazi band. He was a general
contractor (or so he claimed) who was also an accomplished
filmmaker who entered his short films in numerous film
festivals (or so he claimed). My thought was,
if he had all these accomplishments, why did he behave
like such an enraged psycho in chat? One poor
slob that was the continual target of Mundt’s barbs
was foolish enough to list his real full name as his
screen name and even more idiotically, tell which city
he lived in. That gave Mundt the cue to look him
up in the phone book, call him up and level a death
threat against him (true story).
This
outrageous incident finally turned the tide against
Mundt. AOL had received a torrent of complaints
about him previously, but in their usual impotent fashion,
had done nothing (this was their usual response, of
course, as they feared that the loss of a customer would
detract from their bottom line). However, with
a group of people relentlessly insulting Mundt in chat
and complaining about him to AOL (I was part of that
group), the ISP finally gave in and permanently suspended
his account.
I
felt this was a minor moral victory. I got a satisfied
feeling that I was part of the vanquishing of this bastard
and got a neat emotional kick out of it; one could say
it was a form of “internet catharsis.” I’m sure
Mundt got a similar level of catharsis from his behavior
in the chatrooms, levelling his angry frustrations at
unsuspecting chatroom occupants. Only now, he
has one less venue to spew his venom.
If
you think this was the only example of Abnormal Psychology on the net,
you’re mistaken; in Part 2 of this article, I’ll tell you some of the crazed
experiences I had on a trivia website.
See
ya soon.
Steve
Finkelstein can be reached at steve@babblog.com.
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