Can you describe what you found funny at the time? I'm genuinely curious what motivates behavior like this.

ethanrutherford 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Finding something funny doesn't necessarily imply you endorse the behavior, believe it to be harmless fun, or even that you don't feel sorry for the victim.

There's entire categories of entertainment media that use "unfortunate things happening to strangers" for comedic effect.

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wormpilled 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It was people that didn't like reading or nerdy kids, trying to spoil their interests.

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morpheuskafka 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I doubt that. Someone who doesn't like reading wouldn't think of "spoiling a book" as a prank category that comes to mind or understands it to be a serious upset rather than just slightly annoying. Also, they'd likely feel that going to a bookstore and shouting things relating to a book serious is "cringe" or whatever you want to call it, if they aren't the type to even go to a bookstore in the first place.

	▲	wormpilled 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		All it takes is one person to go "I did this" and then the others have a good troll/joke to use. Doesn't take a lot of effort and people were more outgoing back then.

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tombert 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I actually liked reading and I was a nerdy kid. To be clear, I never actively participated in the spoiler stuff, just read about the reactions.

I mean, keep in mind I was fourteen when this happened, and fourteen year old boys are very often assholes and I was sadly not an exception to this.

I guess I just found it funny how much of a reaction people had with it. I liked the Harry Potter books too, I was reading them like every other fourteen year old was, and the plot being spoiled for me didn't really bother me very much, cuz, you know, it's just a book. Some people really got upset.

Again, definitely a dick move to do that, and a dick move for me to find it amusing. Kids are douchebags.

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drawfloat an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It’s about 20 years old, so the likely answer: they were under 18

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3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[deleted]

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bryanrasmussen 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

lots of modern comedy revolves around people who should know better being petty little jerks and doing stupid things that actually don't cause any real damage but just makes everybody wonder "why is this idiot such a pathetic asshole?!?"

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dfxm12 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I don't know if I think it's funny, but I'm probably equally curious about two points. I do think that the journey is as important as the destination. I spoil things for myself all the time, mostly because I'm just always out of step with pop culture. It doesn't really impede my enjoyment of a well made book/game/film if I know some plot beats ahead of time. If you're just in it for the major plot twists, why not just read the wikipedia synopsis?

Also, there's the assumption that it was a real spoiler. It's not immediately verifiable. What if people were yelling "Snape kills Harry"? Why did the people in line assume the guy yelling into the night was being truthful, or that weirdly cropped images of pages weren't just photoshopped?