Observing the Internet |
Aight, buckle up folks cause this one is going to be a doozy. I’ve had these thoughts marinating in my brain for more than a month but I decided to wait until the end of the semester to start writing again. It’s been a while.
For context, I have been actively lurking
on the Internet since I was 10 or 11. A decade of growing up witnessing
things that happen online. It started with only listening to songs or watching
music videos then late 2013 I started really watching YouTube. Compared
to everything else, at the moment I spent most of my hours on YouTube and
starting the last couple of years I have really expanded the types of content
and the number of content creators that I watch. And if you know anything about
YouTube and YouTubers, it’s been a shit show. But that’s only one platform.
Another one that I wanna touch on is
Twitter. I made my first account probably around 2012 and from there most of my
tweets were just some cringe-infested “I’m 14 and this is deep” type of thing then
around 2015 it kind of escalated into “emo teenager who really hated herself and
people around her cause she was convinced everyone hated her”. Oop. Anyway, I
stopped using Twitter for so long until mid-last year I made a new account to
post, again, cringey tweets with double the simping and less anger issues. But
Twitter, just like YouTube and any other social media platform, is a double
edge sword. Sometimes, I wanna throw my phone at the wall. Sometimes, I scroll
through it for hours reading some insightful thread.
So, what’s the point of this post? I just want to rant about a few things I’ve been seeing and hopefully get some of your opinions on them. I guess I’ll separate each point so it won’t be too messy.
1. Celebrities, content creators, streamers, influencers and etc. are not our friend.
Here, I have to credit a video by Ludwig
called “I Am Not Your Friend”. He’s a YouTuber/Twitch streamer and in the video
he talks about parasocial relationship. It’s basically a one-sided relationship
where the audience feels like the celebrities or influencers are their friends
when the influencers only see them as, well, an audience. Ludwig explains that
it’s more likely to be stronger between streamers and their audience because
the interaction is instant. The audience says something in the chat, the
streamer (I’m gonna use this term for this part) sees it and responds to it. It
feels almost personal. But it’s not. Because the streamer can also see hundreds
if not thousands of other names and messages. It’s hard for them to feel
connected personally to a member of the audience than it is for the audience to
feel connected to the streamer.
Now, what happens when the audience feels closer to the streamers than they actually are? They think they’re friends. And start making jokes friends would say to each other. Or apply their emotions to the streamers’ emotions. Or think they can speak on the streamers’ behalf. I’ve been watching a lot of streams lately and I’ve heard them asking the chat to be mindful of what they are saying, to not assume things about them and their friends, and generally to not cross boundaries that you won’t cross with people you barely know. It is possible for streamers to notice and pay attention to you, it is possible to be friends with them, but I don’t think that would be the case for everyone. There’s just too many people watching, and only one person showing their face (or not, we respect people’s privacy here) on the stream. It’s a parasocial relationship. Those streamers and content creators are not our personal friends. So act like it.
2. Influencers are still people.
I started thinking about this when I
watched a video by Alex on Khloe Kardashian. It’s the whole ordeal about her
facetuning her picture to the point that she doesn’t look like herself. Alex
was basically pointing out that, regardless of how we feel about the
Kardashians (cause they’re not exactly the nicest people), Khloe is still a
human being and she would have her own insecurities just like the rest of us. There’s
a chance that she felt like she needed to facetune her picture to that extent because
of what people have been saying about the way she looks. She may be rich, but
she is still a person. And so is every other famous person out there.
Okay, I get that some celebrities and influencers or rich people in general can be really tone deaf especially at a time of crisis like this. We’ve all seen that horrible rendition of Imagine. We’ve all came across those articles of celebrities feeling trapped in their giant mansion. And we rolled our eyes at them. Which kind of confuses me just a little bit. Again, I understand that some of them are very tone deaf, but it kinda makes me think that sometimes we forget rich people have problems too. Not the same problems as us peasants for sure, but health especially (mental and physical) doesn’t really care how much money you have. Yes, money can help with that A LOT but, I don’t know, it must kinda sucked a little bit that people won’t treat you like you’re a person when you have a certain amount of money. I’m just kinda conflicted about it. What do you think?
3. Influencers make mistakes.
These influencers (using this as a general
term now) are humans, and humans make mistakes. I’ve heard this from multiple YouTubers
and I remember D’Angelo Wallace saying this but I don’t know which video… (And
yes, this “essay” is written using YouTubers as references, deal with it.) What
they all said was not to “worship” influences. “Stan culture” can be very
toxic. And what I mean by “stan” here is being a die-hard fan that you think
the influencer you like is perfect and can do no wrong. Turning a blind eye to an influencer’s mistake would benefit nobody
but the influencer. Even then, that means that they can never grow from their
mistake.
Of course, “mistake” here can mean many different
things but let me give you an extreme (but unoriginal) example. TRIGGER WARNING:
Sexual assault.
If a victim suddenly comes forward and
accuses an influencer of being a predator, that victim deserves a safe place to
tell their story and the influencer should also have the right to defend
themselves. If the whole Internet only sides with the influencer because the public
thinks they can do no wrong, and completely harasses the victim, how do you
think the victim and other victims of abuse will feel? In a lot of cases,
there is a power imbalance from the get-go. Remember, we don’t know these influencers
personally, and we sure as hell don’t know the truth. In this particular case
of sexual assault, I’ve seen some people say the victim should just report it to
the police and handle it privately. I don’t personally agree with that. I agree
with reporting it to the police so that a proper investigation can take place
and the victim can get justice (but, it’s not my place to decide if a victim is
comfortable with or trust the authorities to do that). I don’t agree that it
needs to be handled privately in cases where the influencer has clearly abused
their platform and manipulated their massive audience. If the influencer is a
threat to the public, then I sure as hell want the public to know about it.
None of this “jangan bukak aib orang” bullshit. It’s a fucking crime, not gossip.
So, the conclusion to this part is don’t worship influencers and believe they will never make a single mistake. Don’t let them get away with crimes. Hold people accountable. Which brings me to the next point.
4. Cancel culture.
The term “cancelled” is so overused that it
loses its meaning. For the record, I believe in holding people, especially
people with a lot of power and influence, accountable for their mistakes.
Again, “mistakes” can be so many different things but for this part I want to
focus on actual oopsies, unintentional mistakes that people can learn and grow
from, not repetitive intentional criminal or harmful actions.
There’s a comment under a video by Laurel Lakoundji
on the problem with commentary YouTube that I think is really eye-opening. I’ll
attach a screenshot here but in case you can’t read it, find the comment by Reilly
Sidle. I don’t think you have to scroll that far to find it under the video.
For context, it’s a whole situation where a
drama YouTuber, Angelika Oales is being called out/accused of microaggression,
transphobia and ableism. I’m not gonna get into the details cause it’s a whole
shit show and more importantly because I am not the ones affected by her
comments and therefore have little to no say in the matter.
What I do wanna focus on is the comment.
Reilly points out that influencers are always quick to defend themselves by
saying “I’m not racist”, “I’m not transphobic, “I’m not ableist” etc. But
saying that kind of makes them seem like they’re denying having said anything
that is hurtful and by effect would invalidate the feelings of the people they
have hurt. They think it’s an attack on their character. They say they didn’t
intend those words to hurt others. It’s not (for example) racist by intention,
but it is racist by effect. The thing is, we grow up in an environment
that provides us with subtle cues and biases. And those things can very well come
from a place of ignorance. But as we get older, we learn things for ourselves
and even more importantly unlearn our biases and reduce our ignorance. In
that process, it is highly likely that we say something ignorant, offensive,
racist, sexist etc. because we didn’t know it is wrong or why it is wrong. It’s
important to acknowledge that even without intention due to our ignorance, our
words or actions can hurt people. It is first and foremost important to apologize
to the people we hurt and learn why those things are harmful.
This of course needs a two-way communication. The one who hurt others needs to accept those criticisms and admit their mistakes. Those who were hurt need to provide valid criticisms and help the other party to understand where they were wrong. I believe some people don’t agree with the latter, with the argument that they don’t owe the one who hurt them any explanation, that the ignorant one should do more research by themselves and so on. To a certain degree, I get it. Again, not my place to tell people what they should do or feel if the situation does not concern me. It is only my opinion that an open healthy communication would be very helpful cause people sometimes make honest mistakes. I would like to believe that people can learn from their mistakes and become better.
5. People are different.
This one doesn’t pertain to influencer-audience
but more about the general population of the Internet. Listen, the Internet is
a space where people from all over the world can interact. It’s a big world out
there and people are bound to differ in personal tastes, opinions, beliefs,
religions etc. and also in circumstances, health, wealth etc. It’s not that fucking
difficult to understand that. If someone does not agree with you on something
that literally does not hurt anyone (like personal taste for music, movies, and
so on), just don’t argue with them. You don’t have to tell them that you hate
it. You can just kindly fuck off. I am so tired of seeing people
commenting/replying “ew I don’t like this person because (insert personal reason
that has absolutely nothing to do with the actual content/person)”. If you hate
it so much, just scroll past it, mute the name, or even block it. You literally
do not have to see it.
This is quite specific but I hate it when
people apply their personal opinion onto someone else’s situation, particularly
when it comes to relationship and marriage. I am tired of people arguing
about it as if it’s their relationship. Whatever applies to you, applies
to you. If a couple does things differently and they are both adults who are
happy with it, let them be. You don’t have to waste your time typing a
paragraph of why a couple should break up because they don’t do things the way
you would. They didn’t ask for unsolicited advice. Each to their own, dude. It’s
that simple.
Okay, one last thing. If you don’t understand someone’s circumstances or why they are upset, it is not your place to tell them what they should feel. People process things differently and deal with problems in their own way. Just because it doesn’t affect you, it doesn’t mean everyone else feels the same way. Not one person is a spokesperson for a whole group. You don’t get to push your own voice down somebody else’s throat. That’s disrespectful.
6. Conclusion
The Internet is a crazy place and can get very
overwhelming sometimes because of the aforementioned reasons. Please take
occasional breaks from it and cut off the things that can be harmful to you
mentally or emotionally.
That’s it. Congratulations if you’ve made
it this far. This is actually longer than the essay I wrote in my exam
yesterday lol. Byeeee.