The moment I knew that a small but very vocal minority of White Liberals had well and truly jumped the shark into disturbing waters was in February 2024, when a friend confided in me that she’d been messaged by an acquaintance asking how she dared post photos of herself on holiday while there were children being killed in Gaza.
Thank you for writing this. I have started and abandoned a similar article a dozen times. The hatred and active efforts to 'take down' people of social media by publicly calling for a boycott of their businesses has repulsed and frightened me. True activism is about make allies not whipping everyone into line. What appalls me most is the lack of empathy and awareness of the nuance which, in my little corner of the Internet, is a particular tragedy as my professional colleagues should have these qualities in spades.
I have been silenced and to be honest they don't deserve my words. But the sadness at seeing a worthy campaign push away potential allies is real. This is not what the left stands for.
What gives me hope is that in real life conversations (those antiquated things) and here on Substack, a nuanced conversation can actually be had, I believe largely because of the format in which the conversation takes place. Having political discussions with strangers via the medium of 60-second videos or 140-character tweets forces people to either dumb down or make more extreme arguments in order to catch the attention of that platform’s users. And due to the rapid, polarised nature of those platforms, the users have the attention span of a gnat and an inbuilt sense of inflated outrage. That does not an intelligent debate make.
You're so right Amity. And the algorithms have a lot to answer for. When we're constantly being validated by our tribal bubbles and told precisely what think and say, when we encounter someone not toeing the party line it can feel astonishing and nausiating.
I was listening to the Guilty Feminist last night and they were taking about toxic online spaces and how the Left is eating itself - and why that's playing right into the hands of those who whip up this division. A woman who runs a Pro Choice charity helping people access abortion says she was jumped upon for using inclusive language by the very people who would once have marched in the streets to support her work. I don't know where this ends but we have to reclaim the Internet by finding Brave spaces online - where we can disagree and have conversations full of curiosity and empathy - and leave our pitchforks at home.
And this is all exactly why I started my Patreon Amity - to offer a place off socmed to my community. A place run by a musician, not a multi billionaire tech bro.
Thank you for writing this Amity, I will read it again and again, for sure. My experiences reflect what you are talking about - and I’m finding much solace in Africa Brooke’s book - The Third Perspective, too.
Thank you for writing this. I have started and abandoned a similar article a dozen times. The hatred and active efforts to 'take down' people of social media by publicly calling for a boycott of their businesses has repulsed and frightened me. True activism is about make allies not whipping everyone into line. What appalls me most is the lack of empathy and awareness of the nuance which, in my little corner of the Internet, is a particular tragedy as my professional colleagues should have these qualities in spades.
I have been silenced and to be honest they don't deserve my words. But the sadness at seeing a worthy campaign push away potential allies is real. This is not what the left stands for.
What gives me hope is that in real life conversations (those antiquated things) and here on Substack, a nuanced conversation can actually be had, I believe largely because of the format in which the conversation takes place. Having political discussions with strangers via the medium of 60-second videos or 140-character tweets forces people to either dumb down or make more extreme arguments in order to catch the attention of that platform’s users. And due to the rapid, polarised nature of those platforms, the users have the attention span of a gnat and an inbuilt sense of inflated outrage. That does not an intelligent debate make.
You're so right Amity. And the algorithms have a lot to answer for. When we're constantly being validated by our tribal bubbles and told precisely what think and say, when we encounter someone not toeing the party line it can feel astonishing and nausiating.
I was listening to the Guilty Feminist last night and they were taking about toxic online spaces and how the Left is eating itself - and why that's playing right into the hands of those who whip up this division. A woman who runs a Pro Choice charity helping people access abortion says she was jumped upon for using inclusive language by the very people who would once have marched in the streets to support her work. I don't know where this ends but we have to reclaim the Internet by finding Brave spaces online - where we can disagree and have conversations full of curiosity and empathy - and leave our pitchforks at home.
And this is all exactly why I started my Patreon Amity - to offer a place off socmed to my community. A place run by a musician, not a multi billionaire tech bro.
Thank you for writing this Amity, I will read it again and again, for sure. My experiences reflect what you are talking about - and I’m finding much solace in Africa Brooke’s book - The Third Perspective, too.