#I've seen a very huge shift in the conversation about mental health

[antimony-medusa]

So this fandom has a problem with trauma-dumping. We all know it. People are bad in streamers TTS, and we all cringe, and it seems like every major author has to have something in their Ao3 notes to say not to trauma dump, and last night I saw people telling tham n0phis, who is an artist and like 18 or 19, just details and jokes that you should not tell a random person on the internet. It's bad.

But Why is it bad? What's wrong about being honest about how you're feeling?

Okay, this is gonna take a while.

The basic test for "am I being weird/overfamiliar/trauma dumping" is "would you say this to a barista/cashier". Would you walk up to someone whose job is to take your money and give you coffee, while they are at work, and would you say this. This is the place that like 80% of TTS and a surprising number of anons falls down. They break the social rules, and make it awkward and terrible for everybody. But again, why is it bad to say these things to a stranger? If I think someone's hot, if I've been having tramatic things happen why shouldn't I say so?

Conversation is a game for two or more players. You have what you're actually saying in words, and you have a huge amount of information that is being communciated and things that are being assumed based on things like body language, cultural context, setting, etc. Some people find conversation very natural and keep track of all the rules easily, without thinking about it. Some people have to memorize the rules manually. I have had to memorize the rules manually. It is difficult and it sucks, but it's necessary, because the failure state of a successful conversation, what happens when you break the rules of the conversational game we're playing, is you being rude. That is all being rude is, it's breaking the rules of the conversational game. So. How do you avoid being rude?

If you boil allll the rules down to a single rule, it is "if I say this, do I know what the other person is going to say, and are they going to be comfortable with this. Am I changing the rules or setting of the conversational game we're playing." Not what I want them to say, in some imaginary world where we're best friends, but what is likely that this person who doesn't know me, and is having a causual interaction with me, is going to say. And if you have any sense that you are putting the person on the spot, or you're making them uncomfortable, if you are changing the tone of the conversation from "i am here to get you your coffee" to "things you say to a therapist", don't say it.

This is why you don't make suicide jokes in someone else's inbox, because how are you supposed to respond to that? This is why you don't bring up cancer, even if it's very on your mind, because it is rude to inflict the topic "cancer", or any other heavy thing, on someone who is not currently dealing with cancer already. (This is why it's not rude to bring up cancer at the cancer support group, because the setting has shifted and everyone here has already opted in to cancer. The barista has not opted in to cancer.) This is why you don't tell a stranger they're the cornerstone of your mental health, because again, how do you respond to that? If someone you've never seen in your life walked up and told you that, you'd be going "what the fuck, uhhhhhhhh" and then you'd be stuck between "you're welcome I guess" and "holy shit get away from me".

When you are in a causual conversation with a stranger. You throw them the ball of the conversation already knowing what they're going to say next. (In a general sense.) You say A, knowing that the normal response is B. You set them up for little interactions like "I like your hair/thanks" or "Oh what do you do for work/I work in a bakery/Oh what's your favourite thing about that". You keep that conversational ball in the air, and that's why people do things like talk about the weather, because we all already know what a conversation about the weather is like, so it's a chance for us to non-verbally communicate "politeness" and "friendliness" and "I aknowledge you as a human being and not a machine" while you have the same conversation at a bus stop you have twice a week. That is what small talk is FOR, and that's not a weakness of small talk, it's what it's designed to do.

The less you know someone, the more you are operating on a conversational level where it's vital that you don't say or do anything that you don't already know what they're going to say. Because it is rude to walk up to a conversation that's operating on a level where we're just basically waving at each other and going "hey, human! I am also a human!" and trying to drag it over to the level of intimacy you have with someone who already knows you and loves you, and would help you move without being asked, because this person does not know and love you and did not sign up for that. You're walking up to someone who doesn't know you from Adam and basically throwing your arm around their shoulder and going Heyyyyyyy, I think you and I are best friends, which is just so rude. You're making it weird. You're breaking the rules of the game.

To your friends you can walk up and tell them the terrible thing, because they're your friends, and they signed up for this. You will do the same thing when the terrible thing happens to them. You can move the conversational level beyond talking about the weather, to actual bad things (and jokes that would be inappropriate to say to a stranger), because even if you don't know exactly what your friend is going to say, you know you're not making them uncomfortable, and you have a history where you know you can bring these things up. A streamer/artist/author does not have this history with you. They did not opt in to these topics. They don't know you.

Basically just think about the person on the other end of the conversation and how it feels to be them when someone tells them that if their family finds out they're a lesbian they're going to kill themselves. They don't know what to say to that. You just took the conversational ball and you threw it in their face, breaking their nose. That is not a comment you make to a stranger.

Stop trauma-dumping, stop being over-familiar with people who don't actually know you, it makes it uncomfortable for everyone. Save it for the GC.