Read on Twitter
Social Media Fatigue
“This weekend was emotionally exhausting.” How many times has this sentence applied to twitter in the last 2 years? G+ before it? Large slacks and discord channels too, not just the big social media platforms. Today I want to Take a small look at the why.
“This weekend was emotionally exhausting.” How many times has this sentence applied to twitter in the last 2 years? G+ before it? Large slacks and discord channels too, not just the big social media platforms. Today I want to Take a small look at the why.
Flattening and Context Collapse
Your audience in real life is small and its contextual. On twitter its thousands and contextless. Its very tough to tell emotional volume witht just text, its tough to tell intent without knowing a person well.
Your audience in real life is small and its contextual. On twitter its thousands and contextless. Its very tough to tell emotional volume witht just text, its tough to tell intent without knowing a person well.
And talking to my best friend and a total stranger look the same if you just wandered by. And you always just wandered by because twitter presents information that way. So you hope someone reads a thread or checks the background but who has time for that?
Sarcasm almost never works. Ditto absurdist humor, because both work on undercutting expectations and you cant have expectations when your post shows up next to both socialists and nazis in the timeline. So just figuring out tonally how to read most things starts out tough.
And beyond that, how do you tell the more subtle differences? I am angry my neighbor was a jerk vs I am angry our country is on fire basically look the same. Now those are obvious enough because of cultural context. But then we get to problem 2.
Community or Industry
(Work and Play)
If my coworker is an asshole I stop seeing them after 5pm. I collect my paycheck and go home. Ron the asshole who steals peoples sandwiches isnt at my local game store and he cant get to my fridge.
(Work and Play)
If my coworker is an asshole I stop seeing them after 5pm. I collect my paycheck and go home. Ron the asshole who steals peoples sandwiches isnt at my local game store and he cant get to my fridge.
The RPG scene is work AND play. I talk to friends about my recent game session, hype new projects, and Ron is everywhere. I mute Ron, but other people like Ron and quote tweet his stuff. And while I dont wish Ron harm I also dont want to deal with him. But Ron keeps showing up.
Irl Id forget about Ron. Ron is a pest. Online even Rons smallest things keep grating on me and adding up because now Im not just thinking about Ron stealing my sandwich, Im also thinking about Ron having bad taste and people liking him anyway, Ron directing the discourse.
And forgettable ghostable Ron in real life has become that motherfucker Ron who is ruining my mood every time I see him post, and he wont stop posting. Things have escalated. Ron makes good games even if they arent for me and so Ron gets invited to my private spaces too.
Ron is everywhere and Im feeling pushed out. Before I inevitably explode and try to nail Ron to the wall, lets look at thing number 3.
Toxic Individuals
Communities, multiple rpg communities have issues with toxic individuals. Obviously toxic via things like sexual harassment and racism. Less toxic by way of making things generally and continuously unpleasant. Sometimes theyre the same but not always.
Communities, multiple rpg communities have issues with toxic individuals. Obviously toxic via things like sexual harassment and racism. Less toxic by way of making things generally and continuously unpleasant. Sometimes theyre the same but not always.
Indie, osr, dnd, wherever. Ive seen people be terrible mods and lose general trust. People who are emotional vampires: they dont do anything wrong you can point to but over time you start seeing them post and feeling anxious and closing slack. People who love to argue.
And whatever the reason, these people destroy communities. They need to be pushed out for the spaces to thrive. And sometimes they are, with the community stronger for it, and sometimes they arent and we see the aftershocks.
We ALL know someone like this if weve been in rpgs more than a couple years. And because we all remember, and because were all scarred, we are all vigilant. I must be a better person this time. I cant sit by like I did and let it happen again. I want to BE better, DO better.
Vigilance for bad behavior plus context collapse plus flattened emotional range means disaster. There are bad actors. And those bad actors must go.
But also personal fights become community fights, and even the ones that dont still expose faultlines. People pick sides and so the next time we arent just fighting the new fight were fighting all the past fights too.
And figuring out which fights are the ones we need to engage in vs the ones we need to step back from is another layer of emotional investment on top of the investment in the fight itself. And while all that is happening our friends and colleagues are getting hurt and in pain.
The very act of deciding when and how to engage is overwhelming. And if we engage we are person engaging number 45 and suddenly what could have been a block and forget has become an event.
But if the person is terrible how can you stand by? If your friend is in pain how do you let it go? Should we? Is it even moral? I have over 1500 followers and thats not big reach but its reach. If I let something bad happen and I have the influence to stop it isnt it my fault?
Anger is the best method of inciting engagement, so twitter exacerbates all of this a hundred fold. But the same dynamic holds on slacks and discord channels that get large enough too.
This isnt really about this weekend and its not a commentary on the people involved or not involved. Its about how many people I see after every time something similar happens get more disillusioned and sadder and talk more about wanting to quit and less about the joy of rpgs.
And I dont know what the solution is because this isnt twitter unique. And I get joy from the good stuff on here. I love talking about rpgs and I love seeing peoples new projects and the excitement for recent games and the rest. Ive made friends on here, and not just in passing.
I dont want to quit. But there has to be a better method to engage responsibly and ethically and for the health of the community without coming out the other side exhausted.
This weekend I unfollowed a couple people, blocked a couple people. A single retweet, a couple likes, and a DM and that was basically it. Compared to other people I respect I did very little.
And I dont know if it was enough or too much but even with just that it ate my entire emotional limit for the weekend. And me being emotionally exhausted this morning is the priveleged position. Its clearly more personal and more harmful and more...everything for others.
I wouldnt even want to mention my small bullshit other than to say: there has to be a better way. Structural solutions arent everything but they sure do help. And I dont know what that looks like here and I dont know how to find it but Im tired of being tired.
And Im tired of seeing people I like tired. Thanks for taking the time to read on this one, and take care of yourselves. 
