don’t bring me down (bruce)
This may come as something of a shock to those of you who know me personally, but I am not perfect.
(I will pause here to give you time to breathe into your bags and clutch your heaving bosoms and sniff your smelling salts. Also, this is 1890.)
I am a human being like any other, meaning that while I try not to be an asshole and generally do a pretty good job of it, I am flawed. Sometimes I say things I should not say, sometimes I do things that I ought not to do, and sometimes I am just a selfish, judgemental, argumentative explicative — take your pick. I deserve a bit of a scolding when I behave badly, no matter my intentions or level of drunkenness. I am usually (sometimes) sorry for what I did and why I did it, and the fact that this happens with less and less frequency as I age leads me to believe that, for the most part, I am growing into a more thoughtful person. I generally don’t mind if someone beloved in my life takes me to task for these flaws in my character — painful as it is, this is how I grow.
Now all this is generally confined to actions and words I am responsible for, and to people who, at the very least, I am on a first name basis with. This does not extend to Joe Fuckery on Twitter. (My apologies to anyone whose Twitter handle actually is Joe Fuckery — it was a spur of the moment writing choice and I am sure you are a lovely person who has never trolled me nor referred to me as “Liberal trash”.)
Twitter is that magical, terrifying place on the internet where anyone can be anything they like and criticize anyone else for not being that way. Your deeds and words hardly matter so much as the people you follow, the articles you retweet, the causes you support, and the arguments you choose to wade into. For a very long time I avoided Twitter like a toddler avoids sanity. I knew myself to be incapable of passive observation and that if I involved myself in anything other than cat videos and celebrity worshiping, I would get myself tangled up in all sorts of tomfoolery that would lead to teeth gnashing, tears, and ugly crying. Of course I did it anyway, albeit it took me quite a while to really get going. A vaccine tweet here and there, something about Sarah Palin, Oklahoma’s ridiculousness, Rick Perry. That sort of thing. They were one off comments with no trending hashtag lest too many people gain access to my scandalous thoughts on healthcare and education. Oh the humanity!
And then, just like with my reduced assholery, with age and maturity came a shedding of the thin skin that governed my reluctance to engage, and the person who emerged ran a fuck store and had zero inventory.
The first few times I got skewered for having an opinion different than someone else in a controversial topic, I thought I might die from the shame. I cannot describe it any other way than a white hot embarrassment that spread throughout my body while I sat staring at a tiny screen, reading and re-reading the hateful words over and over again until they were all I could see even when I closed my eyes. People whose first names I didn’t even know called me horrible names and belittled causes and beliefs that I held dear. And I had put myself directly in their path by daring to voice my imperfect opinion on a platform they despised. Was this what it was like to engage with the world on this level? Sadly, yes. And I will admit that at first I did not, still do not, react as I should. (As I said, I am flawed!) I try to be decent, I really do. But sometimes I am merely “good” when I should be “great”. Eh, actually I’m “just okay”. But I am getting better, and part of it I must attribute to my ability to take criticism in this extreme form, and here is why:
Twitter is stupid.
I am sure some of its users are exacting real change, reaching and inspiring people, disseminating valuable information, and doing all-around good in the world. But I am not one of those people. I am a flawed human being with opinions. And at some point in the middle of expressing them I realized that try as some people might, they just couldn’t get me upset anymore. Not really. Because it doesn’t matter. These people don’t know me beyond 140 characters and a brief sentence about my political leanings. And if they do not like my 140 characters and my political leanings, they lash out. And hoo boy — do some of them lash out. Remember the meme of John Lithgow and the message “Shut Up Cunt” I mentioned in my last blog post? Just a small example. But instead of white hot shame, when I read that I felt laughter bubbling up until I was squirting wine out of my nose. Who does that? Who calls someone they don’t know a crass word for a vagina and expects that person to be upset by it? My guess is that whoever does such a thing is probably not someone that I would not choose to remain on speaking terms with even if I knew them personally, had drunk their booze, and petted their awesome dog.
So I find that, after all, it does not upset me anymore. At least not in the way they probably wish it did. And I am happy to report that I am trying to be good about my responses — I really am!
Just tonight I advised a person who called me a “fucking socialist” to have a drink and calm the fuck down, because it’s only Twitter. And I suggested pie might be a good solution for what ails him, which I also pointed out seems at this point like a lot. Of course the reason that he called me a fucking socialist was that I might have called him a Conservative fuck. And I may or may not have advised him to buy a fucking map after he told me he wished that Oregon would secede along with California and take me with it (I live in Seattle, which is in Washington.) See? I meant it when I said I’m really “just okay”. Sometimes I just can’t help myself.
