An incident happened earlier this week which really made me think about the state of mind of those on Twitter: what their expectations are of others when they choose followers. Seems as though many want you to be their BFF-to-be as an essential requirement.
On the day in question, I happened to notice a consistent stream of down-to-earth humour flowing from fellow Tweeps in Minneapolis/St Paul. It was around midnight CST, therefore early morning for me here in the UK. I decided to dedicate Wednesday to Minneapolis/St Paul tweeps and started recommending some cool Tweeps a bit early. What ensued was a textbook example of how some people don’t re-eeeeal-ly get Twitter, to be filed under the ‘You Don’t Really Know Who You’ll Meet Out Here In Cyberspace’ chapter.
Someone actually took offence to my recommendations, and then proceeded to push me to justify why anyone should follow me. When I prodded further, it was clear that the person was (in her own words) ‘overly sensitive’ to the FollowFriday meme because she thought (and still does, I’m sure) it mean to the people who aren’t recommended. The situation devolved to the point where, after being unfollowed and blocked, the offending individual proceeded to tear into me, allude to my manners being representative of England, and then when all the name calling didn’t get any of the reactions she wanted, she then pulled out that tried and true Hat-rabbit of the Eternal Coward: the racial slur.
What did this all teach me? That a lot of people need to get over Twitter as a place to meet people to reduce their loneliness. Twitter is a place to make mutual connections, and there is a difference. Twitter is a micro-blogging service, which is (at present) free and available to most of the global public who have internet access. It isn’t a chat room as such, although it definitely can appear that way at times. Connections are based in shared ideologies, concerns, and vantage points. So a really good way of looking at engaging Twitter is not as someone who’s lonely reaching out into the night, seeking solace with potentially like-minded persons, but as a blogger who has a text constraint of 140 characters by which to present content. Not all connections are personal friends, and it’s a big mistake to confuse the usages.
When people follow you, they are subscribing to your stream of content, not signing up to be your personal guidance counsellor. The sense of emotional boundaries from the blogger perspective should help reduce disappointment if people don’t respond as you want them to. Having said that, it’s very easy to see how one can be drawn to disparate voices in the vast expanse of cyberspace, trying to connect even on the most basic emotional level. Heaven knows my Twitter activity was a key positive during my own difficult patches this year. And that’s fine – this is partly what social media is about. What concerned me about this particular incident, was how this person was so aggressive in her thinking that we were having a discussion, and didn’t appreciate that I didn’t see it as such. It’s common internet etiquette that the use of capital letters signifies elevated voice, or shouting. This person was shouting far too much for me to even pay attention to what she was saying. And the thing was, after it was suggested that she unfollow, she continued the conversation. This is not the behaviour of a fellow micro-blogger; this is the behaviour of someone who doesn’t appreciate that calling out into the dark after someone to ‘listen’ to you is not the same as doing the same in the physical world. There should be no expectation of ‘care’ while on Twitter save for the common courtesy that you’d engage in within the physical realm. That just ain’t healthy.
Of course, some Twitterers have found great potential friends who they haven’t met yet – but that scenario isn’t the endgame of Twitter. Just like it isn’t when you go to the supermarket or clothing store or work environment: common objectives don’t ensure automatic friendships.
After the nonsense, I thought long and hard about raising this with Twitter as a problem, and then I realised just how much I believe in free speech and the normalisation of shame within democratic societies – even cyber ones – to convey to others what is acceptable and what isn’t. People like that unfortunate woman have as much right in a free society to air their views – even as personally offensive as they can get. I put my trust in Twitter culture to let folks know what’s just not appropriate.
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