Even Amazon reviews have become tools for rampant anger. Some reviews are written by people who haven’t even read the book or used the product. The reviews are written as a political polemic. They encourage one-star reviews as a political vote—not on the book or product itself.

One woman, writing a book on finding forgiveness after the death of her small child in a mass shooting, was pilloried by radical guns rights activists. Regardless of one’s views on the Second Amendment, such disregard for human hurt counts as less than civilized.

Hank Davis, of Peacemakers Alliance, a group working with gangs and violence-prone groups, commented on the killings of three children in separate incidents in Cleveland, Ohio: “…social media websites, especially Facebook and Instagram, have helped fuel and ignite deadly disputes rooted in someone feeling disrespected.”

Perhaps the anonymity of the Internet encourages the temptation to antisocial diatribes instead of dealing with our anger in more mature ways.

We don’t see the ones we post to, whose needs we can ignore. They are not in front of us for any meaningful discussion. We don’t see their faces reacting to what we write. It’s all about us and our anger, and we can rant for as long as we wish with no one to check us. For many, the Internet is an ego magnifier.

To be sure, the Internet makes possible a more diverse discussion. It gives a certain amount of voice to otherwise voiceless, ordinary citizens. It has its place.

But our digital communications require what any civil society needs if it is to function: checks on our ego and a respect for the broader community.