Maui News stops the madness: no more reader comments online

I worked for the Maui publisher half a life ago. He's a very fair, patient man, so for him to get to this point, the situation must have been really bad.

 

Umm, I dunno ... maybe pot's no longer the drug of choice in Paradise.

 

So when you do features about 12 or 13 year old girls and the comments are "too bad she has lousy tits," it's part of doing business?

When the first comment on virtually every crime story is "you know whoever did this is another f*cking Mexican piece of sh*t", it's part of doing business?

It's time to find another business. And anyone who thinks web hits will plummet if you can't add comments is completely nuts. My shop's site got upwards of 6 million hits a month without allowing comments. They added comments... and the hits haven't gone up.

 

Pot is practically passe. "Ice", the local meth blend, is the big thing now.

 

The biggest issue here is that too many people in our society have decided to stop taking responsibility for their actions and words. They want to be able to say whatever they want and to hell with anyone who says otherwise.

In this case, people throw out explosive words for the sake of being entertained and watching the shit storm that follows.

It's another sign that technology has crippled our ability to be civil in an anonymous forum. Too many people with too much time on their hands are spoiling what could be a good thing if used in a responsible manner.

I'm all for free speech, but I think the lack of accountability by those posters forced that newspaper's hand. And I wish more would take the same steps as long as people continue saying such hurtful things and then hide behind a screen name.