Humanity as a whole must orient to the principles of rational self-restraint and responsibility.
A utilitarian, exploitative attitude toward fellow human beings and toward the environment, is characteristic for the consumer society and for its extension into the virtual domain, where ethical restraints are more and more often ignored in favor of new experiences and forms of arbitrary self-expression.
Transferring communication between human beings into the domain of social networks blurs the distinction between the personal and public spheres. Today this has already caused a decline in the quality of discussion, promoting an atmosphere of mutual impatience, in which the ability to reach measured judgments is being lost and replaced with monosyllabic reactions like „I like it„ or “I don’t like it„, based on mere emotions and the pursuit of ratings and „likes“.
The virtual space “without rules" incites people to pursue their desires without any limits or consequences, including even the lowest and most sordid impulses, the desire to achieve popularity and attention at all costs, to demonstrate aggression and violence, and to incite others to hatred and discord. All of these undermine the capacity — fundamental to each human individual, as a being possessing dignity and free will — to take conscious responsibility for one’s own words and actions.
Rational self-restraint and responsibility must serve as norms for all human beings, regardless of whether they are acting in the real world or in the so-called virtual domain.
