Verenata

Omg I do get the physical stuff baaaaddd and I hate it!!!

But also yeah totally when our friends are happy we become happy and maybe I'm not an extrovert and I just keep getting energised by feeling others energy?

I think for me if it was just hyper empathy I'd love it, I love that intense raw experience of life and emotions, what makes it hard is when that intersects with my BPD and creates spirals of convincing myself I'm hated and everyone will abandon me. That's a dooooozy.

Tone: fr fr

I totally see what you mean and honestly yeah even as a white girl I've noticed the power imbalance.

Maybe I'm wrong but the most prevelant racism I think i see on here (as a white girl) is the poc kick off and white people kinda give them that "alright no need to get that upset about it" like it's less kick offable about. Kinda like the polite discourse crap. I mean I went nuts in that incel thread, I got some guys acting like I was the irrational woman not engaging with the issues because they just missed any context and I swear I see it on here with poc users kicking off and white users being all reddit polite discourse about it. But if we are telling incels to grow up it's "ableism".

Like even though trans users have a big userbase (which id have assumed meant power on the site) there's still transphobia and takes that you just don't expect showing up and that it's not really a numbers game imo because white cis men will inherently hold power and direct discourse etc because aquaman (i dunno havent worked the last bit out yet). At least that's the vibe I'm getting.

What put me off making an account on here for so long was waiting till I thought it was a healthier place for women and well.... I don't think it is but anyway.

Despite being a big lurker I didn't notice poc leaving but tbh I haven't seen Angel post outside of mutualaid in a while now that you mention it.

I didn't think self crit was the vehicle to impact change, especially one as ingrained as racism but from my other comments you can probably see what angle I came at it from.

I'm sorry I feel like I'm just chatting now.

It's like I was thinking wouldn't it be nice for people to make big effort posts educating others again but then it's like a) not victims jobs to educate oppressors and b) they never fucking work in my experience. People need to want to change and I think that was one of my issues with the self crit comm, does it create a desire to change or is it just a way to avoid the hard work/questions/change in perception that's required?

Honestly that is me, I feel physically sick when i see people embarass themselves and I feel sick and cringe for them as a easy example but I always thought that was normal for everyone? You telling me that me feeling people's grief and getting sad with them cos I can only imagine how hard it must be if I put myself in their shoes? Is that not just empathy? If you feel it that intensly thats a different thing? Omg that's so wild.

Literally!! And to compensate I try to remind myself of that all the time and then completely ignore the very obviously social cues because I'm like "no just because they seem angry doesn't mean they are, I'm just assuming their feelings again!!!!" And omg it's such a chore to be me lmao.

Tone: not at all it's nice and I'm learning too!

Oh cool thank you for clarifying

I'm really sorry but I'm not following this comment.

Have I fucked up or offended or insinuated something here?

I am literally anxiety incarnate.

I don't even know where I inject it into my day to day life so my perception of self crit as an expectation I do worry is me being that white girl empath trope and then projecting my anxiety onto that situation.

Yeah bullying is maybe not the right word, it feels like the enforcement of a power dynamic in a social space like making examples of people but then I don't know who's more terminally online, hexbear or me for seeing that where maybe it is or isn't lmao.

I get the idea behind it, but in practice the message it's sending to everyone else is "get in line or else you'll be posting here if you want to keep using the site", which feels and functions like a social threat. It will be sending the anxiety of some comrades through the roof and it will be suppressing well-meaning but less well read comrades from speaking their minds in a way that will get any brainworms they have out into the open where they can actually be addressed.

Get out of my mind liquid!!

I think that's it, I recognise my whole post is "vibe" (I hope i made that clear) and without interviewing everyone we can't really know but hey at least we are talking about it! Yey look at me go!!

I don't know, tbh I'd never heard of that till just now. Maybe? It feels like me but also am I not just a bit of a narcissist main character hero complex who thinks she knows how people feel, assume she's right and runs with it and then talks about it? I also have negative confidence so I'll probably default to assuming it's a me problem. I worried about the above the whole time I was writing the post.

Full disclosure I think I did, like I don't find public displays fun but as I mentioned in another comment, self crit feels like a personal journey to me so that's probably the bias here that makes me feel how I feel about the comm and for me it just pops up in the local comms posts list occasionally and I'm like "oh God what did someone do now".

Yeah and honestly me talking stuff out in this thread is exactly that! It people genuinely feel it helps then who am I to say otherwise. I mentioned in a few other comments about how I worry having a signpost to reform kinda removes the personal initiative/drive/want to change that I think people need to actually self crit successfully but I recognise that's pure strawmanning.

That's fair, I think honestly if it helps then fair play. As long as people are feeling an expectation to do it then great. (She says like the inspector who came to check everything is up to board on hexbear).

Tone check: awwwh thank you and it's so nice to have chats on here, I'm not dependent on this site for socialising so it's no big if I leave but the idea of upsetting others and being seen as a bully makes me physically sick so it's nice to have chats on here without feeling scared that ill make a fool of myself.

I worry I'm strawmanning but yeah it's the choice to address what they did on their own without needing a signpost vs only doing it because of the sign post. Like yeah I honestly cant think of the answer because I agree that it will have encouraged some to be more mindful which is good!

Yeah and that i do totally recognise, I know I'm a bad girly girl and removing the brain worms of associating women and feminity has been a long process for me. Thanks modern media! Lmao dirt_owls post earlier about literally that topic was a aaaaah fuck moment cos I know that conditioning will still hide in me subconsciously. Like self crit is hard, I've had cycles of "who cares if people are feminine but women should always try" and "other women can do what they want but I HAVE to be feminine" and it's like I'm still being internally sexist, just cos I'm aiming it exclusively at myself doesn't mean I've grown out of it. Self crit is so hard and it feels like such a personally journey sometimes imo I think that's probably why the publicity of it all rubs me weirdly.

I can only imagine and while writing my post I couldn't help but think "for users this offended I'm sure some of them feel catharsis from their self crit even others don't" so I tried to not be too absolutist about what I thought so I'm glad you've said this.

Mmmm you've definitely convinced me of it staying around and agreed hopefully it can be more productive.

See i totally agree with you there, when it first appeared I had the exact same thinking. But over time I think the very act of having it in a specific sub creates a spectator sport of people's worst moments.

Like if people wanted to self crit then making a post in c/chat raising what happened and having that growth and discussion there sounds great. But having specifically a sub for it feels like it's takes the organic growth and desire from the user to acknowledge their mistake away. Like instead of them going "I should go on c/chat and talk about this productively to address my mistake" it feels like a signposted expectation. Like have they learnt if they didn't decide for themselves? Like the initiative is important I feel. But that's just me literally strawmanning tbh.

Awwh I hate referencing soros like they aren't here but when I saw their post I didn't read it and think "good self crit" youre based again. I've seen that user a lot and they aren't a homophobe imo and it felt weird to see them essentially wearing that jacket to start a conversation BUT I'm not a gay man so it's not my place to decide that or make any comment on it so disregard my opinion there lmao. I dunno like with the incels from last week, I'd feel so bad if one of them felt compelled to self crit. I'd rather they make a c/chat and just have an organic conversation on that they've learnt on their own initiative not because c/selfcrit gave them the idea.

And I totally see your points too! I think I'll probably not engage with it myself but if it does help some positive growth in users then amazing and yes maybe it could be refocused to a more general critique of behaviour vs individuals unless it's specifically relevant to a personal experience?

I think you've put it a lot more concisely than my yapping in the post 💪

Like I waffle a lot cos I'm scared that if I don't try and vocalise every nuance I'll get dog piled so to be blunt and maybe a bit reductive: self crit doesn't feel like reform, it feels like public punishment/bullying behaviour/hazing and any catharsis from having confirmation someone has addressed their views feels soured by the public spectacle of it.

I think I'll do the same, I try not to block anything if I can help it and just subscribe to ones I like but yeah.