Can We Have A Civil Discussion, Please?

Is it just me or do you avoid the comments section of any news article, because you are horrified at what you might see? It's not that I'm not completely open to the sharing of opinions. I mean, c'mon, I'm married, I have elderly parents, I have teenagers...I get opinions and corrections thrown at me at a dizzying speed. But really, who are these people who feel the need to share with us their venom or disdain?


Our older son has ADHD. It is impossible to read an article about it without finding out that it doesn't exist, it's just an excuse for poor parenting, I am the world's worst parent and it's all my fault. Hey, I have teenagers - they can tell me that. All I need is Tom Cruise yelling at me over the psychiatric profession to make the mood complete. I was hoping to see techniques, books, or websites that other parents recommend. No hope for that in the midst of the blame game.


Another example - I attended East Carolina University. Try to read any article about one of our sports teams and the other schools fans will show up spewing venom about my school. Just as an aside, if you are going to demean the reputation of an educational institution, it usually works best if you SOUND EDUCATED. And for goodness sake, avoid all political articles comment sections unless you want to see true and complete inability to listen to another's opinion. All of the recent debt ceiling discussions have resulted in people everywhere sharing their opinions and ideas, but so often it's done with such anger or superiority that you can't bear to read their ideas or suggestions. 


Why have we become a society that is so incapable of listening to others in a well reasoned manner? What ever happened to civil discourse, to reasonable debate, to discussion? Can we please go back to "don't say it if you wouldn't say it to your mother"?