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This isn't something I wanted to say because I hate saying anything sincere online but boy does it suck to see how many professional friends on here stoked terror and panic for likes and then turned around and started chortling about introvert jokes while people were terrified.
Like goddamn, I went from listening to how going outside was going to kill everyone's grandma to "lol here's some stuff you can do to be productive in quarantine." Man, I'm fuckin terrified because I listened to you, you can't even be arsed to ask how I'm doing?
Anyway, I wanted to let that out because it's been eating me alive. Everything about this situation sucks, but it cuts me deep to see how many people I liked I can't trust anymore.
It also fucking sucks that it feels like we can't talk about this, like acknowledging how bad it is and how badly people acted instead of "lol lets make sourdough" is taboo.
It also fucking sucks how everyone will go on rants about the urgency of using their platforms responsibly and no one will take responsibility for the terror they sowed or the bad information they pushed.
Part of me feels stupid for even bringing this up, since it's basically another "people suck on the internet," but it was pretty wild for me to have listened to friends who promptly abandoned their principles of compassion at the drop of a hat. Makes me feel like I got suckered.
And the more I started looking at it, the more I saw all the stupid shit in The Discourse. We'll argue about liking the wrong cartoons or the wrong art, we'll stoke emotions to unhealthy levels, then not give a shit when it affects people. And I know it's Online, but it sucks.
And yeah, asking for strangers online to consider your feelings is a fool's errand. But man, I was not ready for the shock of seeing the people who talked about responsibility and kindness not actually give a shit about that.
Which, oh well, live and learn. Everyone gets sucked into Online Shit now and again, so I'm not ashamed or bothered by that. But man, there are relationships I had that didn't survive the first fifteen minutes of this shit and I'm sad to see them go.
Also sad because it feels like my mental health was tossed out so someone else could get precious, precious clout, but that's the internet, I guess.
Also sad because of how much The Discourse has become about manipulating emotions and convincing people they're monsters.
I don't think the little corner of the internet I've cultivated for myself is bad, but I do think I've let a lot of bad people in and I was nervous about pushing them out because they were The Good People, but The Good People ended up sucking, so I guess I can have my corner back
Also kind of fucked up how long it took me to acknowledge this because the people who suck are popular and have a tendency to punish people pointing out how shitty they are, which is another thing to think about for another day.
I'm tired of this thread now but I also don't want to make another gripe thread later: if you changed your display name to some kind of reprimand so you could scold people before they even meet you, that's really fucking annoying and condescending.
