I know people can often have strong (often completely uneducated) opinions on things they like or dislike, but it seems that discussions on movies can get as heated as any political argument. I used to be appalled at the comments left on imdb.com (Internet Movie Date Base) on various movies before imdb wisely shut this section down. I mean, if someone disagreed with another's opinion of a movie, they would write the most hateful things, attacking them, their politics, their sexuality, even their mothers to a degree that made one wonder if these people were playing with a full deck. On Facebook, one guy left a comment on another guy's post, saying that he thought a movie that the first guy liked was over-rated, and the original poster replied "You're an idiot!" I mean, the guy who left the comment wasn't nasty, it was just his opinion, but the first guy was obviously on the maturity level of an eight-year-old. It's true -- we live in an Internet world where even the most childish, stupid, most uneducated person can have access to forums, and the result is unbridled nastiness. I believe people over-react in this way for several reasons. They are insecure, wondering if perhaps their opinion is not the "correct" one or unsure of how much they really know about movies (especially film history). They are, obviously, very immature, regardless of their actual age. And they have a weak sense of self. If you dare say that you don't like -- or conversely admire -- a film they love or don't care for, you are attacking them and they feel a need to strike back, like a child who feels insulted and has to immediately say something nasty or give another child a whack.
Sad, really. .
