I’ve been meditating on whether or not to post about this for a while but I figure that I keep thinking about it so I might as well.
If there’s one thing I am sick to death of, it’s assumptions, and if there’s one thing this place is great for it’s making assumptions.
Tumblr is an echo chamber. It’s easy to find people who share your views on any number of things and to only find interaction with people you disagree with when one of you is looking for a fight. It’s easy to judge someone based off the blog you see and never stop to consider they might be occupying several spaces on the internet, all of them different but a reflection of who they are nonetheless. It’s easy to look at a blog, a few descriptors, and decide you know who they are and what they prioritize and forget they are a person occupying space in the real world, too.
You can make a million assumptions about me based on what I blog about and what I don’t blog about. Some of them will be true, others couldn’t be further from the truth. If we speak regularly, you may know some of my personal politics, causes I fight for, and personal life issues. You may know the things I struggle with, internally and externally. If we don’t you probably don’t. On any given day, at any given hour, you will get different flashes of the person behind this blog. (Some other blogs I keep won’t even give you that that often.)
But many times a day I will see a call for performance. In order to do X you must Y appropriately. If you blog about A, B must also be true. I met someone who was XYZ and because you’re also XYZ everything I think about them applies to you, too. Nuance be damned. It’s exhausting. I’m sick to death of it.
I’m just saying, please, consider that there is a person behind the blog. There is a person who has a life off the internet, a life you may know nothing about. Everyone has a history and they don’t have to tell you about it. Everyone has problems and passions. Some people don’t talk about them in a public forum for whatever reason. Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, all social media, is just a slice of a person. They show you what they want to show you, when they want to show it to you.
All I’m asking if for a little understanding. You don’t ever have to agree with me or even like me, but god please don’t assume you know me. Don’t tell me you know who I am, what I value, or what my history is based off one slice of life I choose to make public. You know what I choose to let you know, when I let you know it.
This is Not a Blog 