Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Delete

This Is A $30,000 Vibrating Musical Waterbed (With Mood Lighting!)
Read about it on The Frisky.
I suppose it was bound to happen, but it never occurred to me that I would want to delete a comment on one of my Pinterest pins. When I pinned this picture of a funky waterbed, it got a lot of repins, and then it got a bizarre comment: "That is so gay."

I was confused. The only way I knew to interpret that statement was as an insult, and a lazy, offensive one at that. But she could possibly have meant that it would be a perfect environment for a little same-sex snogging. So I replied, "?"

She explained that it was dangerous and hadn't been well thought-out by someone who was not using their brain.

Her equation of "gay" with "ill-conceived" really got under my skin. I seriously considered educating her on how to use the English language effectively, rather than offensively, but then I considered that she was likely to be a troll, and I decided that this was not a relationship was even remotely interested in pursuing.

It's so easy, in this always-connected world, to be sucked into engaging, to be driven to right all the wrongs, to judge and to correct.

But the reality is that we have to choose where we will become invested. Even where we will allow ourselves to be vulnerable. This was not one of those situations. So I let it go and deleted all of the comments.

These words sum it up quite nicely:

A fantastic Polish proverb.
Have you had to delete or otherwise deal with offensive comments on your social media posts?

2 comments:

  1. Fortunately, I have not really had to deal thus far. I don't know if I just don't post anything that warrants it -- or if they can tell by my writing tone already - yeah, don't mess with her.
    Tumblr can get a bit crazy - but that is a bit to be expected. People expect comments and to be engaged on what they post.
    I think you handled it the right way. it's best not to feed the trolls.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, I don't know that there was really any other option. It just surprised me to encounter that on Pinterest, of all places.

      Delete

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