Why I left Twitter (aka X) again…
I just can’t do it, y’all
Listen, I know that Twitter (currently known as X, but I refuse to call it that) is valuable for a writer.
I’ve landed clients there myself, and it’s a great way to showcase your writing skills since it’s a text-based platform.
But there’s something about X that makes me dread opening it and writing on it every morning. I’ve tried to grow accounts there a few times, but each time, I end up throwing in the towel and X’ing it out of my freelance business’ content strategy.
So why did I leave this time?
Let’s get into it.
#1: Not enough free features
I’m sorry, but I won’t be paying a monthly fee to edit posts and get over 280 characters in a tweet.
I also won’t be caught dead with a blue checkmark that’s obviously paid for since I have less than 1,000 followers and looking desperate.
Most platforms have the ability to edit posts after publication…for free. X is not that great to begin with, so why are we paying for a super basic feature?
I also can’t write long posts, which can get frustrating when I inevitably fail at fitting my thoughts into limited characters or dividing them into a thread.
#2: The bot follows
I’m sorry, but I don’t want to spend half my time on X removing p*rn bots from my followers list.
Most days it seems like my reach is only extending to the bots. I have to remove a million fake Margarets and Cynthias, which brings my follower count down, which is a little depressing, to be honest.
It’s also frustrating that X doesn’t seem able to fix this problem.
#3: The culture of negativity
This is honestly one of the biggest reasons I keep leaving X.
I think it’s partially the communities I’m part of, and partially the nature of only having a few characters to type out your thoughts.
There’s little room for nuance when you have limited space to write, so sentiments that might otherwise have value or nuance just come off super strong and really negative.
There’s also just a lot more trolling that happens on X than other platforms, at least from my observations.
The overall culture on X seems to be one of one-upping and tearing people down, which isn’t what I’m on there to do.
#4: The rampant sexism
Somehow, I always end up getting a bunch of tweets in my “for you” tab that are men talking about how you need to “stop chasing women” or “giving up women” to be successful and other objectifying bullshit.
It’s like these men don’t understand that women are people, not objects or vices. It’s just gross and makes me throw up in my mouth every time.
It seems like these types of sentiments are super prominent in “hustle bro” culture, which unfortunately gets into my feed since a lot of them are marketers or entrepreneurs, which is most of who I follow.
If I could go on X with less fear of seeing posts objectifying and vilifying women for the bad choices men make, maybe I’d stay on it.
#5: The hustle culture in general
Hustle culture, unfortunately, seems to be relevant to my main field, marketing, which means I see a lot of those tweets on X.
It makes me grind my teeth when I see so many people advocating not watching Netflix, only reading nonfiction, and basically making having a business your whole personality. Newsflash: this mentality is not healthy, and watching Bridgerton doesn’t mean you’re not a real entrepreneur.
I haven’t noticed as many people on, say, LinkedIn hyping up hustle culture as much, and this appears to be another negative side of X.
Obviously it does get touted on other platforms, but on X, it’s just super prominent.
I come on X to see what projects cool biz owners are working on and learn cool things happening in the marketing industry, not to be shamed for how I spend my time.
While Twitter is a valuable platform, unfortunately its culture is just not for me. No matter who I actually follow, I always end up seeing gross, sexist content that makes me wish I never opened it that day.
I’d love to be on Twitter for business reasons, but for me, it’s not worth it when it ends up making me feel angry and bad so often.
If you’ve had a different experience on Twitter or advice on how to curate your feed or avoid getting followed by gross bots, I’d love to hear it in the comments.
