Hello! This is about me - I wanted to respond... and this is my first time on tattle so wasn't sure if I'm using the functionality correctly (apologies if not). I think your assessment of me probably has a lot of truth to it, and seeing it on paper has been a jolt to the system. I started my instagram and blog (which is now defunct due to lack of time!) to talk about having an invisible disability, and I had a lot of confidence in that because it's my daily life. I obviously don't know if you've followed me for a long time or not, so I don't know if you have seen much of that at all. I started chatting about politics at the last election and during the pandemic, and you're right, it's not my lane. I talked about it because I am interested in politics, I have always believed that everything is political, and I wanted to encourage people to engage in politics. I worry that people not engaging because they don't think they're experts can sometimes have the impact of people just ignoring it or feel overwhelmed. But I definitely take your point on board, and it's been a good for me to see how it has come across.
Hi Susie,
Thank you for responding - I imagine it comes as little surprise that if I knew you or CaC would read it I’d have been much less cutting (or possibly said nothing at all!)
On reflection my last comment was unfair, largely because there are undoubtedly worthier targets of the remark — it is obvious that you and CaC are motivated by pure intentions and are not simply being vain, so social climbing is an unkind and off base accusation.
I do stand by the general gist of what I said (although am genuinely sorry I dumped it at your door a bit) - I do seriously question the wisdom of the current state of play on social media as far as social activism is concerned, and I genuinely think that we’ve all effectively sleepwalked into a situation wherein we’re essentially forced to abandon nuance. I know that race in particular is very difficult terrain for people to navigate and that the vast majority of people are doing their best and only trying to do and say the right thing.
I think my frustration — and the irony that I have now effectively contributed to this myself isn’t lost on me — is that people are now being so roundly chastised for every perceived transgression (and I know Susie Verrill’s
duck-up isn’t exactly a momentary lapse of judgment, although I do think that people on here have to an extent lost track of how quickly the Overton window of what is considered edgily daft and what is outright repugnant does shift) that people are frightened to communicate organically or spontaneously. I’ve seen people in the last few days crucified by one activism account for doing something intended to help that 48 hours prior was declared the absolute bare minimum by another activist account with broadly similar goals/politics etc. I fully admit it is easy for me to say from the sidelines, but from the way the whole “sphere” is structured it’s as though once you’re in it it’s impossible not to abide by the unwritten rules to an extent without inviting censure yourself, so people are in a constant feedback loop of anxiety and guilt. I don’t think that ultimately wins any hearts and minds, I think it just gets people falling into line either blindly or in some cases resentfully. And there’s also the fact that it’s gendered — women tend to be less callous, more collaborative and more empathetic - the flip side of which is that we are more susceptible to this particular brand of political cattle-prodding.
On here I’ve always been inclined to be sympathetic to people with social platforms who end up in the eye of the storm and don’t decide to get “ballsy” or take a potentially unpopular position because as much as it’s tempting to imagine we’d all do it, I think it’s easy for someone who only uses their Twitter/Insta etc in a private capacity to overlook how psychologically damaging it is to have armies of strangers calling you a
witch or a fool or a tone-deaf xyz etc etc. Most of the time I think people ultimately don’t deserve this even when they have done something I would consider to be completely unjustifiable.
I’m being really long-winded here — I suppose what I’m trying to say is that I think that for most people “watching” who aren’t already massively politically engaged, the current status quo where people are pressured into only expressing particular stances in very particular ways (and if they try but are clumsy somehow they’re pilloried) is it’s intuitively off-putting to people, and in some cases probably has the opposite effect to what’s intended. Two people who have broadly the same views and goals re: what is essential for a fair society can end up disagreeing on all sorts of things in terms of what’s realistic and what isn’t, what will actually work and what won’t, what is fundamental human nature and what isn’t, what is forgivable and what is unforgivable. My sense from Insta at the moment is that there is very limited room for that type of discussion. And I’m of course not disputing that there are discussions when certain demographics should have the floor and others should take more of a back seat, but there is IMO a limit to that beyond which things are just intransigent and ultimately unhelpful. And I think because so many people with platforms don’t have a massively holistic or thorough body of knowledge, they have to fall back on the intransigence of other more established or more confident voices to avoid things getting into an ugly spiral.
I know I’m getting dangerously close to an anti-cancel-culture diatribe here which isn’t my intention, but I do think the current landscape isn’t sustainable, and I think it’s a way of operating that is vulnerable to spiralling, and that for all its progressive intentions can end up appealing very much to some of our more medieval instincts.
I was having a difficult time for a while a couple of years ago with some temporary but serious autoimmune and mobility issues, and your content was a real comfort to me. You are a valuable contributor and I think have a real knack for looking at troublesome and upsetting things and making something joyful but genuinely meaningful out of them. It’s entirely appropriate that you don’t see BLM as something you can talk un-self-consciously about in the way that you can about, say, disability and health and workplace bullying (I feel the same, despite being of mixed heritage!) but as I say, I do think that everything is becoming unhelpfully gladiatorial.
I really hope you don’t take what I said to mean that you should somehow hem yourself in further or not speak out when you think people have been cruel. I can’t pretend I don’t find the discourse and exposés atm exhausting and destructive, but I was being cutting / breezily unkind in the way that I appraised you and CaC because, to be blunt, I didn’t think you’d ever read it.
