[1156] Tragic Quip

It might just be a quirk about me, but I find it almost impressive how terrible people are at arguing for something.

I can be just as quick to “clap back” at someone’s comment or shitty opinion of me. That’s not “arguing.” I would call that more “shit talking.” Because of the internet, we’ve created this kind of hybrid shit-talking attempt at argumentation that is like the beating heart of most interactions online.

For as much as I distaste emojis, I think they got so popular because we instinctively knew our conversations were devoid of important context our faces, tone, and even ability to look basically coherent betrayed by spelling errors, otherwise provided.

Enough, too much, I get into some kind of back-and-forth with someone who I perceive to be oozing a substance described as “middling.” A reddit moderator. An HR person or supervisor. A first-order call-in representative. The kind of person who occupies exactly one area in life in which they have any remote authority or power, and if it’s under the threat of your observations or inconvenient perspective, they feel it’s time to sit you down and tell it like it is.

I post these digressions on reddit. Sometimes, my word choices trigger the automatic moderators. I message the mods asking for reviews. Almost always they get posted without issue a day or so later, and/or I have to go in and put [reddit trigger word] in place of a political figure name or you know how people will say “unalive themselves” in Youtube videos? Goofy shit like that because every day has to mock the reality of life in some way or we don’t get our ice cream.

Who decides they want to moderate a subreddit, let alone a popular one, I have no idea. That’s a very different person from me. One of the ones I caught recently complained that my posts are too long, they aren’t paid, and (after 4 emails) eventually quoted where I used the reddit trigger word, dismissed the context of it, and then went on to say my posts are inappropriate for a sub called “/r/self.” I’ve made about 100 so far over the years, but today, they’re inappropriate. The moderator also cited my “low engagement,” as though were I to garner enough internet points, I could spend them somewhere, or your average engagement on reddit is anything but obscene and hateful.

/r/self is a place where people mostly just go to ask teenager-level questions, quip about awkward situations, and stress over relationship issues. You know, my posts really spoil the pot of, “when ur naked in bed then he starts ranting & u find out he’s racist” and, “Is it weird for my younger brother (16) to stay in my room for a weekend?”

You would be making a strong and compelling argument for me to not use reddit (or even much of the internet) at all, let alone for the amount of time I do. I wouldn’t even feel compelled to argue back. I would describe my context of being mostly alone and functionally fishing in the ocean for the oft positive comment or interaction and person who feels like they found something useful in what I said. I have garnered 130-something followers on a blogging site before, have just a handful on reddit, and had people leave encouraging comments or send DMs. It also doesn’t really cost me anything to post depending on how you quantify dignity and time otherwise clicking between webpages.

Many people have described the kind of wimpy tyranny of these kinds of interactions. I liken it to the day that I was working at the liquor store, and a clearly decently drunk older lady came in. I could have denied her immediately. Instead, she came up to pay, was missing a penny, and I gave an extremely poor and unreasonable excuse that she needed to go back to her car and get me that missing penny. She gambled, showed up with a level of disingenuous entitlement and made a “Are you serious?” comment, that I would have said, “Of course not,” to anyone who didn’t put me in that position. She ambled out, back in, and got her booze. I can’t stop you from destroying yourself, but I have a say in how we interact together.

We have to interact with the systems on offer if we’re to maintain a certain level of awareness and superficial connection. You can spend hours finding alternatives to the giants of the internet, but it’s the same logic behind why people subscribe to major TV and music providers instead of torrent. You can make a wholly disingenuous argument about “theft” or find it too confusing, but ultimately it’s familiar, readily available, you’re bad with money anyway, and you already know “your show” is “right there.”

A handful of not the worst people on the planet are here. Sometimes we interact and it’s smile-worthy. They’re not going to flock to the alternatives with me. I’ve spent 20 years not-learning Linux.

I think we should all be mindful of that, “Now now, child” syndrome when it comes to discussing our issues with what someone has said or done online. You’re, almost certainly not, an authority. Even if you were, you probably unconsciously relay your perspective in a manner that isn’t just uncompelling, but antagonistic, condescending, and self-refuting. I know this because I write a lot and feel all of those things in my argument to the avatar of this collective voice. But, I can also feel the argument against things I’m saying in real time. It leads to qualifying, googling whether I’ve chosen the right word, struggling to analogize my instincts to real-world examples, or describe explicit easy-to-understand patterns.

My power isn’t in keeping the nonsense fight alive indefinitely. It’s incorporating it into how I engage going forward, or comfortably putting it aside in the future. For every 1 time I might write a digression about a particularly jarring or indicative-of-something-worthwhile interaction, I move on from 100. That wasn’t the case when I first started online, nor how I carried myself in life.

I don’t force you to read anything I ever post. You do sign up to have it pass by your eyes if we’re connected on these mediums. It’s worth figuring out why it bugs you so much.