Why we need emojis and smilies

Funny usenet story.  There was a long thread about
seat belts.  Of course lots of people were upset
that the US was then writing laws mandating their
use.

One day, I took one of their posts and did a
find/replace from "seat belt" to "headlight" and
then made a tweak or so.

One sincere-sounding kid from Bell Labs (yep it
was a while ago) answered me with good arguments
(of course). That reinforced my growing
realization that people are unable to detect irony
or humor on the internets.