Reflecting upon pressure by society

I am amazed. Or maybe I am not amazed. It is for sure that I am not surprised.  Society today is filled with cyber and  Internet bullies. Really? What makes me say this?

The Peloton Christmas commercial. You might have seen it. Perhaps you have heard the backlash for that commercial. A man gives a woman a Peloton bike for Christmas in this commercial. And the company is slammed for being sexist, misogynist and terrible. Yes, terrible! How dare a man give a woman a bike. What is he thinking? Obviously he hates women, especially the woman who is supposed to be his wife.

I just heard this morning (Wednesday), that Peloton stock is down over 12% because of...wait for it...that ad! Social media had a huge backlash against the company AND against the actors of the commercial. The actors have received threats because they "starred" in that terrible ad.

Talk about bullying. This is bullying at its worst. I don't like the ad, I am offended, so let's all get together and attack the company and the actors in order to drive them out of business because I feel offended. The idea is that if you don't agree with me, I will destroy you. I will beat you up until you finally give in to my way of thinking.

Now you might say that it is a way to get your opinion across. There is the idea that boycotting is something that you can do. Yes, you can boycott. But this goes beyond boycotting. This is actual attacking of a company because you don't like an ad. This was tried with Chick-fil-A. But the people pushed back and the company survived.

I am all for exercising your rights to support or not support a company. If you like what they say or sell, go for it. If you don't, don't. That is the way it is meant to be.

But you do not have the right to bully. And that is what happens in our society today. We bully someone until they either give in an agree with us or we will destroy them. I don't get it. Or perhaps I do. Bullying is something that is done each day and it is getting worse. Social media makes it possible to destroy someone quickly. And they will not have the chance to respond. Because if they respond, they will be attacked even more.

So what does this mean? It means that people are not willing to stand up for what they believe or voice what they think. Social media bullying has made it that folks do not speak up because they are afraid of the backlash. 

Why am I writing? Because I was disgusted with the backlash against Peloton and the actors for what was a good commercial (if there is such a thing as a good commercial). It disgusts me to see such bullying taking place. And there is so much more that can be said about this topic. But that is enough for today.