I opened a Facebook account years ago in order to keep up with family living in various places across the country. It’ll be fun, they said. And at first, it was. Pictures, events, recipes and everyone’s morning coffee have been shared on this venue, for which I am appreciative. It’s gotten pretty dicey at times and I’ve had to remind myself why I am on social media in the first place.

I often wondered why it changed so much but then realized it’s because the world we live in has. We’ve changed with it. Things that matter to us are all plastered on there and it’s no longer about sharing thoughts in our own words. It’s now full of memes, GIFs, political articles, competition, and memories of long ago that we share again in the hopes of remembering what was.

Then I started a Twitter account and kept it private until about a year ago. I wanted to just lay low and see how it was to interact with mostly strangers. Way out of my comfort zone, but I’ve grown to appreciate many in that community of people. There are some very smart people who have gained a following and use it fairly wisely. I use social media more than anyone else in the family, including the teens. They actually see it for what it is and if they want to connect with friends, they do so with texts and phone calls. I could learn a lesson from them.

I have spent many hours on social media, some for work, some in my friends bubble on Facebook and eventually outside of it on Twitter, quietly observing other users mostly in the writing arena in order to get a feel for what it would be like to be a writer whose work would be critiqued, commented on, and hopefully even found to be useful. I’m actually very impressed with how a few of my favorite writers handle (or don’t handle) comments from the masses.

I’ve been afraid to put myself out there in this day and age where everyone gets their news at the speed of light, and in turn can have an opinion on everything from politics to parenting and even some things that have no consequence to one’s existence. This is assuming, of course, that I get a following outside of my bubble.

Let’s be honest; sometimes the comment section on a post is like a car wreck you can’t take your eyes off of. Some of them even make us uncomfortable, because now we are faced with the fact that not everyone sees things the way we do. Sometimes people sit in their own truth, which is the furthest thing from the actual truth. Other times we are closer to agreeing on a issue than we think. It’s been a fascinating year and here are my general observations of the top 10 types of social media commenters, in no particular order.

The Headline Commenter: Many people who comment on news sites I follow read the headlines of articles but never the actual article. They are looking for something to find fault with and the quickest way to do so is to pick a controversial headline, type something irrelevant about the article, and get into conversations with complete strangers about a topic they know nothing about, yet apparently have strong feelings about the seven bolded words that lead up to it. You can figure out who has and who hasn’t read the article as long as you have.

The All Caps Commenter: These folks often get chided for using all caps in a conversation as if their caps lock is stuck. It’s usually older people who have a blank avi (they were called eggs on Twitter, but now they’ve changed the silhouette of the blank avatar to an actual person) and think they have wisdom that no one else has so in order to get their point across the caps come out. I’m all for respecting the elders; as a matter of fact, I pretty much am one now. But nothing says “I’m shouting at you on the internet” quite like the all-caps thing. It also doesn’t make your statement more truthful when you use them. My personal exception to this rule is a cousin of my dad’s, who told me before we started communicating on Facebook that she always types in all caps. No matter what. It’s her signature and I find it amusing.

The Snarky Commenter: I’m all for a little sarcasm. We can’t be serious all the time. There are some really quick-witted people who can comment about a topic and force us to see the humor and ridiculousness in it. I appreciate those people because I am one of them. When there is very little logic being used on one side of an argument, sometimes you just need to point it out in that way. It probably makes the other side more angry, but if they had an actual argument to begin with that wouldn’t be so easy.

The Parroting Commenter: Using phrases like “we the people,” “deplorable,” and “the new normal,” the parroter peppers their comments with catch phrases from talk radio and/or news outlets. They also use the words “global,” “social,” “misogynist,” and “Hitler” a lot. You can usually tell which side of the political spectrum these people are on and how disconnected from actual facts they might be. They mostly let their feelings rule them. Also see: trolls.

The Cursing Commenter: This one drops the f-bomb often, sometimes in abbreviations and acronyms you might have to look up in the urban dictionary to figure out, and those words are becoming more common than the word “the” in a sentence. It used to offend me, but now it’s part of the everyday language on social media so I’m not as taken aback as I was a year ago. Not my style, but it works for some, especially the younger writers. A friend once referred to Twitter as the bathroom wall of social media. I can’t say I don’t agree with that.

The Busy Body Commenter: Because I’ve been a wife for the last 26 years, a Christian, a conservative, a stay-at-home-mom, a homeschool mom, and the furthest thing from a feminist one can get, my life is fodder for controversy. The hilarious thing about it all is that it’s absolutely none of anyone else’s business how I conduct my life. It’s of no consequence to yours and your life is for you to live. Social media has given a voice to anyone with a keyboard and those voices are many times used to pass judgment on our fellow human beings for the absolute dumbest things. Guess what? It will never change my mind to know how some stranger on the internet feels about me teaching my kids at home. Thanks for your concern, though.

The Data Commenter: I, too, know how to Google and look stuff up. These folks post links to charts and data or articles from HuffPo to support their points, but they don’t make an actual point first. They just post the first wiki article that pops up and then expect you read it. If you want to have a conversation, use your own words and thoughts, not someone else’s. It’s pretty simple. Maybe comment first about why you chose the thing you are posting so it can seem relevant.

The Text Commenter: I get there are just 140 characters in a tweet, and now 280 for the select few. But really, the word “you” has just two more letters than “U” and it’s pretty easy to type “to” instead of “2,” unless you are confused about to, too, and two. Type the complete words out and just do another tweet if you run out of room. We shouldn’t have to try to decode the meaning of your post so please just stop. I don’t even read those anymore. But please do keep using emojis. They are useful many times; especially the eyeroll one.

The Logical Fallacy Commenter: These are the people who took debate in high school or read some books on logic and want to impart their wisdom to us all. They point to generalizations, strawmen, red herrings, and the like, after which Google gets a workout from those in the conversation who have no clue what any of that means. My rule, always, is to stay on topic, know your audience, and don’t get personal. That way I won’t have to tell you that you are using an ad hominem. (I was a debate teacher, so….)

And lastly,

The Troll Commenter: They can be spotted a mile away. Many on Twitter are bots now. They are programmed to respond instantly and are never nice or have anything useful to say. They want a response as instantly as they gave theirs. It is the troll’s desire to get attention, even if it’s bad attention. They love to be combative, never stay on topic, are rarely logical, and comment just to get a rise out of people. They are commonly accused of living in their parent’s basements. Don’t feed the trolls.

I’m positive I’ve left someone out. Like the people who just want to make sense of it all. Who are honestly sharing their perspectives on a topic and would like to know more about how other people are thinking and have a legitimate conversation. We are living in a rapidly changing world because of social media. It’s a blessing and a curse. Some just want to reach out to know they aren’t alone trying to navigate a world that makes no sense at times. When I can, I want to be the commenter that lets them know they aren’t. We need more of those.