Getting out of "attack mode" in the social media age

Last week, Janet Lyons wrote me this email about Lance Armstrong:

"I have noticed most of the tweeting that has gone on during his Oprah interview is very negative. Now that could be because he is hateful, or it could be because it is simply more fun to be snarky and negative in the tweeting world."

There was definitely a lot of animosity in the air among people holding strong opinions on Lance Armstrong. I have my own thoughts on Lance, but most people seem to fall into one of two schools of thought:

1. I am angry at Lance Armstrong.

2. I am angry at people who are angry at Lance Armstrong.

Tweets about "lance armstrong"

Twitter is a pretty effective vehicle for negative thoughts. As forms of communication get shorter (from articles, to blog posts, to microblogging), are we getting meaner? There's a reason why the word "short" can mean "obnoxious." As in, "Why are you getting short with me?"

We all want to be funny and smart. Which makes it tough to remain calm, friendly, and charitable within 140 characters. One-liners tend to be the territory of the insult comic.

I wish I could claim to be innocent of this, but I can see myself gravitating into the same habits. I used to do it in school. If you want to write a paper that's quick and short, just criticize something you read. Proposing new ideas is hard work. Attacking other people is easy. It's really hard to be (1) terse, (2) clever, and (3) POSITIVE at the same time.

After all, short, positive phrases are often attacked as cheesy…

This instinct has carried over into my professional life in advertising. For example, I recently had to write copy for the front of a postcard. The challenge in this assignment was that I had maybe 20 words to get across a pretty complex concept in a clever, amusing way. Queue those natural tweeting instincts. I proposed that the front of the postcard depict someone doing the OPPOSITE of our message. The copy would then cut him down. "Don't be that guy!" was the message.

The idea was quickly rejected by the client. "We're looking for a positive message," was the response.

Ugh, I thought. So I guess we're doing this the hard way.

But this is what the partners for New Think have been doing their whole lives: coming up with short, clever, POSITIVE phrases to describe clients (see: Have It Your Way, We Bring Good Things To Life, We Love To Fly and It Shows, Life Takes Visa). It's easy to be smart when you're tearing something down, whether it's Lance Armstrong or Hot Pockets. It's much harder to be clever while promoting something positively. It’s something that's not taught very often in school these days… and even less often on Twitter.