The irony isn't lost on me. Trust me.
Jun. 24th, 2012 08:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lapacifidoraI totally Britta'd last weekend.
How I screwed up is, quite frankly, less important than how complete strangers reacted to it. I can't say that I am unused to being disliked. Twenty-three years of interacting with people who are *not* my blood relatives - and even, in two cases, people who later became relatives - I know for a fact that I am, at best, a spoiled brat.
At worst, I am a self-righteous know-it-all who takes twisted pleasure in baiting people to anger and who can play the field of passive aggression with the best (worst?) of all passive aggressive people. (To be fair, it's not always women who are the worst offenders on that field.)
But I've never been the object of such unadulterated hate and vitriol as I was a week ago Saturday. I had more than 20 complete strangers tell me, in language ranging from abusive to explicit and all the shades in between, that I was racist, elitist and, oddly enough, "the worst."
I've learned a few lessons from this experience. Lesson the first is that an unprotected Twitter feed is possible only if one is a celebrity or, perhaps conversely, one has no opinions whatsoever. Clearly, neither of those is happening anytime soon.
Lesson the second is that trolls are alive and well and, apparently, they love songs that discuss putting a portion of a woman's anatomy on a beer. I'm not terribly experienced, but I'm not really sure if that's physically possible. And it strikes me that it's probably not sanitary, either.
Lesson the third is that being 26 is apparently not enough to keep me from doing something stupid and rude in the interest of trying to impress my friends - or of taking random people's hurtful words too much to heart. Or, for that matter, of earning my friends' rancor.
Turns out being an adult sucks even more than I thought it did - and that I'm not nearly as good at this as I thought I was getting to be.
How I screwed up is, quite frankly, less important than how complete strangers reacted to it. I can't say that I am unused to being disliked. Twenty-three years of interacting with people who are *not* my blood relatives - and even, in two cases, people who later became relatives - I know for a fact that I am, at best, a spoiled brat.
At worst, I am a self-righteous know-it-all who takes twisted pleasure in baiting people to anger and who can play the field of passive aggression with the best (worst?) of all passive aggressive people. (To be fair, it's not always women who are the worst offenders on that field.)
But I've never been the object of such unadulterated hate and vitriol as I was a week ago Saturday. I had more than 20 complete strangers tell me, in language ranging from abusive to explicit and all the shades in between, that I was racist, elitist and, oddly enough, "the worst."
I've learned a few lessons from this experience. Lesson the first is that an unprotected Twitter feed is possible only if one is a celebrity or, perhaps conversely, one has no opinions whatsoever. Clearly, neither of those is happening anytime soon.
Lesson the second is that trolls are alive and well and, apparently, they love songs that discuss putting a portion of a woman's anatomy on a beer. I'm not terribly experienced, but I'm not really sure if that's physically possible. And it strikes me that it's probably not sanitary, either.
Lesson the third is that being 26 is apparently not enough to keep me from doing something stupid and rude in the interest of trying to impress my friends - or of taking random people's hurtful words too much to heart. Or, for that matter, of earning my friends' rancor.
Turns out being an adult sucks even more than I thought it did - and that I'm not nearly as good at this as I thought I was getting to be.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2012-06-25 01:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-06-25 06:04 am (UTC)I still have an unprotected Twitter feed mostly because I either ignore the hate I get (weirdly, the most hate I've ever gotten was when I called Snow/Charming "boring" right before the finale, WOW) or I actually enjoy responding to it, because they're clearly stupid.
The people who attacked you clearly had nothing better to do than troll a hashtag or trending topic and pick and choose who to yell at. They aren't worth the angst you're feeling over it. Imagine spending your time routinely attacking people who don't like Jeff/Annie or Robert Carlyle... just sitting on a Twitter hashtag, ready to yell at people who dare to say something you disagree with. That's what baffles me, and what makes me feel confident in leaving my Twitter feed and opinions open for everyone to see.
And, come on, a LOT of opening acts suck. That's why they're not headliners.
You're an awesome adult, don't think otherwise for one second.