So I go online to look for blog fodder.
One of the things that is trending is West End Caleb.
In a nutshell, this dude in New York is on a hookup and dating app. He’s hooking up with these girls who all give it up on the first or second date. Then as soon as he scores he disappears.
He’s a scumbag.
So these girls are creating and longer and longer thread of TikTok videos of their experiences with this piece of shit to the point where it’s trending and gone viral.
So these sluts are doxxing this piece of shit for doing exactly what this app was created to do, i.e., pair off people with poor morals for meaningless sexual encounters.
Fundamentally, I shouldn’t care about this.
I’ll let the late great Norm McDonald sum up my deepest and most sincere feelings on this matter:
But I’ll tell you why this upsets me.
Because everything goes on social media nowadays.
I open my browser and my news feed contains stories from The Daily Dot or some other pop culture site about a video that has gone viral over some bullshit minutia.
Some waitress didn’t get a tip from a rude couple or someone got into a minor argument over a last donut in the case at the grocery store (both are real examples) and instead of it being settled privately, it’s gone viral.
The alleged victim has a TikTok video with hundreds of thousands of views and a Go Fund Me with a $10,000 goal because she got stiffed on a $20 tip. The alleged perpetrators are being doxxed and destroyed without the opportunity to defend themselves.
I’m old enough to remember when shit like this was settled in person.
I was a waiter once. You get stiffed and you go back into the kitchen and call that customer a dick.
You get into an argument at the Kroger and you end it with “fuck you, fuck your mother, and fuck everyone who has fucked your mother, which is most of the fucking state.”
And that’s it.
No permanent damage.
Today, it feels like one of those westerns where the gunslinger comes to town and pushes everyone around because he’s the quickest draw in territory.
Except in this case it’s the TikToker or Twitter user with thousands or millions of followers who can get their narrative out faster and to more people to murder your reputation online who is the gunslinger in the black coat.
This is the greatest evil of social media.
To borrow the words of the Bolshevik revolutionary Pasha: “The personal life is dead in America. Social media has killed it.”
When Facebook first opened up to most people, I summarized my feelings about social media thusly:
“I ate a pickle, and nobody cared!!”
I haven’t seen a lot to change my thoughts about most of it, except that people now demand we care that they ate a pickle, and there can be real-world consequences for not expressing that care vigorously enough.
The way we’re going … I seem to remember an episode of a science-fiction show – maybe Stargate? – that had a society wherein everyone wore a “social credit” button on their shirt. Make someone smile, they tap your upvote button. Make a bad impression, they downvote you. And do something bad without even realizing you’ve done it (like not giving your seat on the bus to an old lady … who was standing behind your seat so you didn’t even see her), but is captured and shown on public TV and you may get so many downvotes you’re reprogrammed.
I was episode 7, season 1 of “The Orville.”
“Majority Rule.”
It has stuck in my mind ever since I saw it…
Thank you! Orville makes more sense than Stargate, certainly, but we haven’t rewatched it in a while.
There is also a very similar Black Mirror episode.
You don’t have to follow social media, you know.
It’s that that I follow it. It’s the fear that my shopping cart bumps the car next to me while I’m loading my groceries on Saturday and I end up trending on TikTok because I viciously attacked the car of a enby POC with shopping cart in a hate crime and I go into work on Monday to find out I’m getting fired because the internet mob is demanding it.
This panicdemic would not exist if it were not for social media.
BLM/Antifa would not exist if it were not for social media.
AOC would have been a flash in the pan if it were not for social media.
And, J.kB is absolutely correct. Social media has gone from “like it if you like it” to “You are not liking it enough! Punishments will now commence.”
Social media is going to be the downfall of civil social interaction.
When the demoncraps kick off CWII and the food chain, internet, etc. goes down, they will have to venture out into the real world. Then, and only then, will they be taught how to live in civil society. IF they survive the teaching.
On the one hand social media used like this can be seen as an extension of speak softly and carry a big stick; ie if you are dick and have bad manners you now get to be famous for the wrong reasons.
On the other hand, it is completely stupid and I’ve hated the sharing of miniscule details about ones life to live journal, twitter, MySpace etc since the beginning. I cannot adequately express in words how stupid I think that is
In principle the first thing isn’t necessarily bad, keeping people accountable is good. What is bad though is what is now acceptable and who decides it rapidly changes and has no tolerance for what was OK yesterday and this accountability ends up having more serious consequences than just embarrassing you.