Day: June 16, 2017

santorumsoakedpikachu:

rumpelstiltskinix:

hussyknee:

Sometimes Tumblr is a great way to find community, share knowledge and experiences and perspectives and see the world in radically new ways.

But most times Tumblr is just a bunch of sad (not in an insulting way. Just really sad and depressed) angry people who are so beaten down by the world that they can no longer see difference without threat, triggering each other, refusing to acknowledge each other’s humanity and basically whipping each other into an exhausting froth for no real reason. We’re not communities, we’re mobs with pitchforks aimed at each other.

When I joined Tumblr, it was the only place where my anger as a result of trauma and oppression was valid and powerful. Seeing the inequalities happening in the world, my minority status validated but forced into a self-examination of privilege changed me as a person and my worldview. But Tumblr culture also fails to acknowledge that anger is only good as a catalyst, that holding onto it for too long is dangerous and can warp you. Anger is exactly like fire; if it is not carefully doused and contained it will burn everything in its path including you.

I have grown more educated but but I have not grown wiser, I have not grown more patient and tolerant and I don’t know if I’ve become less of a toxic, overreactive bully. I think I’m still toxic, overreactive and bully-prone, only from a different political viewpoint. And yeah, a lot of that is trauma and mental illness, but I’ve never made that an excuse for anything and I can’t start now.

I can’t see people for ideology anymore, I dismiss and dehumanize entire swathes of people for their politics, I lose sight of the fact that people are more than their politics and every time I lose my shit at people and call them names on here, my behaviour is validated as warranted. I’m feeding a horribly toxic, purist morality culture that uses whataboutism and identity as weapons, I encourage isolation and insularity under the guise of self-care. I’m actually yelling into an echo chamber and expecting it to do anything for either my personal growth or anyone else’s, my politics are to me are what religion is to other people except without the emphasis on spiritual nourishment. It would actually be more beneficial to my agnostic atheist ass at this point to get religion.

I’m thirty, what the entire fuck am I doing.

It’s really easy to get sucked into that aspect of Tumblr. Even if I’m making an active effort not to get sucked into that aspect of Tumblr, there’s always someone going through the process of Tumblr Yelling Over Random Cause… and sometimes it’s me. It’s contagious.

Not sure if there’s any real solution aside from stopping when you notice yourself and trying to limit the shit that triggers that response from you. (I got an xKit app that blocks certain posts 5ever and I feel spikes of fury toward so many less people now. *.*)

For me, paying attention to what gets my hackles up has been helpful to know what to prune/limit. I also have the privilege of someone who listens to me rant and can say, “hey, maybe you should take a break from toxic gaming community #2554478/stupid forum arguments/trying to fit square pegs in round holes, which catches a lot of blind spots for me.

Yeah, Tumblr’s endless cycles of rage are addictive, and blocking things is a real lifesaver.

I’ve been meaning to post my Thoughts on Ideologies for Tumblr, and now is as good a time as any to do it:

• All ideologies are flawed.
• All ideologies are products of their time and place.
• All ideologies have room for improvement.
• All ideologies can be used for evil, no matter how good they seem. Some ideologies, like Nazism, are inherently evil; most are not, but they can still be used for evil.
• If ideology is seen as more important than those whose lives it’s supposed to improve, then it will be used for evil.
• If any ideology or any group is required to be seen as perfect and not questioned, evil will result. Never stop critically thinking.
• Truth matters. If an ideology is founded on lies, it is poisoned from the get-go. Lying in the service of an ideology will not create a good outcome, and people who do this are not to be trusted.
• In any identity group, you will find people who believe any ideology and its opposite and everything in between. Identity is not the same as ideology. Both of them are not the same as being a good person.
• People who believe the same ideology as you are not necessarily going to be good friends to you, and they are not necessarily good people.
• Trying to purify your thoughts is a fool’s errand, and if you’re prone to OCD, it’s a dangerous trap. It accomplishes nothing.
• In the end, what matters is what you do, not what ideology you subscribe to. In the end, what matters is to be kind.