The internet is a place where negativity tends to thrive. To try and combat some of this negativity, there are certain features on some social media platforms that allow you to shield yourself from this negativity. In this case, I am referring to the “block” button. The block button can be used in both positive and negative ways, however, I would like to focus on how the block button can be used positively. When one comes into contact with a hateful, triggering, or just negative person on the internet who is causing them direct or indirect harm, that person can block that other person. I think that is a good thing. It allows you to go about your internetting without fear that you will have a negative interaction with that same person again. This meme takes the concept of “blocking” a person one step too far by implying that blocking someone is not enough, and instead that person (the one who shall be blocked) must be removed from the earth in order for you (the one who is doing the blocking) to feel satisfied. I think this meme can be harmful because it perpetuates an already hostile attitude that we often see on the internet. I also think this meme is harmful because it plays into the growing amount and intensity of parasociality that we have been seeing on the internet lately. The meme implies that you feel so emotionally strongly toward someone, that you most likely don’t even know, that you want them dead.

I think that there is a possibility of this meme becoming as popular as the original meme, but only because the format of it is funny and not because of the actual content. If anything, this meme would go viral because people would read it as ironic instead of sincere, which is the opposite effect that it is supposed to have.

I think the reason we don’t see as much good news in the circulation of news is because we just don’t view good news to be as urgent as bad news. For example, we see it as more important to keep up with negative or sad news, like school shootings, instead of good and positive news, like an advance in recent medical technology, because there is more emotion and drive behind the bad news. With “bad” news there’s often a motivating issue behind it that we want to change, therefore we choose to focus on that news. In order to push good news more into focus I think there need to be more people reporting on good news. Until there is as much reporting on good news as there is reporting on bad news, I don’t think the good and bad news in circulation will ever balance out. All in all, I think that there is more bad news because bad news elicits a stronger emotional response than good news does, and to get more good news in circulation there needs to be a more general shift and focus on reporting on good news.