#john green

[dejaruhe]

John Green is one of the best guys on the Internet and has been since. At least 2007. I remember seeing the hate campaign and also wondering if I was wrong for loving his work, and I do think that caused me to drift away from Nerdfighteria for a bunch of years :( I regret missing any of it, Nerdfighteria is the best online community ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ categorically, 100%, not up for debate, if you disagree with me you're incorrect and you will never change my mind... I think it's really important to talk about how Tumblr, a thing that taught me the basics of intersectional feminism as a teen, also tried to destroy one of the best guys for no good reason.

I can't stress enough how much the John Green debacle was an early example of how cancel culture and purity culture combine to make people feel righteously justified to engage in harassment.

John Green, during his time on tumblr, committed the heinous sins of...being neurodivergent and talking openly about it, earnestly interacting with fans in a very direct and unfiltered way, and writing about teenagers navigating first love and sexuality while he himself was an adult. The worst things he ever did were be a little cringe or misspeak, for which he was always prompt to apologize (often whether he really needed to or not).

Yet despite the former two being things tumblr claimed to love and the last one being true of 99.99% of YA authors, in this case a large segment of tumblr users steeped in the early 2010s resurgence of purity culture decided that these things were suspicious and predatory, and used that as an excuse to justify some truly awful behavior.

Which is really all that cancel culture is: the normalization and even celebration of the process of misapplying morality or ethics to dehumanize someone for the express purpose of justifying whatever pain and suffering you want to inflict upon them. Basically, deciding "this person is bad, so I am exempt from affording them basic respect and human dignity, and am allowed to cross any and all otherwise uncrossable lines in order to punish them without damaging my own moral or ethical standing."

Contrary to popular tumblr lore, the infamous "cock monologue" was not the sum total of the harassment, or even the worst of it. Callout blogs issued long lists of "receipts" about how terrible John Green was, most if not all of which were either taken out of context or completely refutable. His works were torn to shreds by people who'd never read them, as evidenced by much of the criticism being obviously and blatantly counter to the actual contents of the books.

Not that it mattered. Once the John Green hate party reached a certain level of critical mass, it became less about who he actually was or what he'd done, and more about proving you were a good person by hating him. That's the natural conclusion of cancel culture, after all: virtue signalling by identifying yourself in opposition to the cancelled parties. They're bad, and I'm good, so I hate them! Or, more often: They're bad, and I hate them, so I'm good!

Before it was over with, John Green had been accused, with no evidence, of being everything from a Nazi to a pedophile and subjected to hate mail and death threats. He eventually left the site for the sake of his own mental health, and because he no longer felt comfortable engaging directly with fans in the same way he once had.

Yet even now, with the benefit of hindsight, and even among those who ostensibly reject purity culture and condem bullying and harassment, very few on tumblr take what was done to John Green as seriously as it should be taken or condemn it as thoroughly as it should be condemned. Which I think is something we need to at least consider doing, given the increasing rise of purity and cancel culture online, and given the recent influx of professional creators eager to interact with fans on a more direct level than they have on other social media.

And my concern is not purely, or even primarily, for the Mike Flanagans and Lynda Carters of the world. I'm far more concerned, actually, for the small, independent or self-published creators in this space, and how much even a very small level of visibility gives too many people a feeling of carte blanche to engage in harassment.

I myself have less than 3k followers on here, a handful of popular posts, and zero notoriety or consequence outside of tumblr whatsoever, and I've been repeatedly told to kill myself for saying such innocuous things as "I don't think censorship is the cure for the world's evils" and "maybe learning the history of communities you want to participate in would be a good idea."

Thankfully, all it took for me to stop the harassment that came my way was to block those few individuals. But there have been many instances over the years of small creators or just random tumblr users that got a bit popular being stalked, doxxed, swatted, and harassed to the point of leaving the site and dealing with serious mental health issues as a result. It has never been just John Green. John Green isn't even the worst example. And tumblr has never learned its lesson.

[weaponsofmassdisruption]

Not what I expected coming from John Green

[ayo-edebiri]

Oh my god!!???

[feathersof-hope]

In June 2021 I was reading my favorite book, The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green, in the psych ward, feeling completely hopeless and alone.

Today I was reading my favorite book, The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green, in the waiting room to go to the first doctor visit on the road to start testosterone.

I know how it feels to think that you would be better off dead, but today I also know that:

"You can't see the future coming-not the terrors, for sure, but you also can't see the wonders that are coming, the moments of light-soaked joy that await each of us"

[surqrised]

I’ve always liked quiet people: You never know if they’re dancing in a daydream or if they’re carrying the weight of the world.

John Green, Looking for Alaska

[99legcentipede]

woa... i didnt know he was so old...

[sizzlingsandwichperfection-blog]

My new book Everything Is Tuberculosis comes out March 18th.

I'm signing 100,000 copies of the first printing. You can preorder a signed copy here or wherever books are sold.

This has been the most fulfilling (and heartbreaking) writing experience of my life so far. I really hope you enjoy the little book that resulted from it.

[thoughtkick]

I’m so proud of you that it makes me proud of me. I hope you know that.

John Green, Will Grayson, Will Grayson

[asymptotic-rage]

Imagining trying to explain to my 12-year-old self that John Green is your favorite non-fiction author and Hank Green is your favorite fiction author

[aconfusedgoose]

AND DAN AND PHIL ARE BACK???

I started this year making a meme about John Green being back and I thought that would be the wildest thing to happen this year... Clearly I was wrong. I feel like the universe is just confused about what year it is... I'm in my mid 20s now and I don't need to be going through this again.

[jeremyfrail]

x

[beautifulbookishdisaster]

Susan Sontag wrote that "Depression is melancholy minus its charms." For me, living with depression was at once utterly boring and absolutely excruciating.

John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed (Harvey)

[edenfenixblogs]

I’m sorry I’m still not over this. Every single aspect of this is terrifying to me.

[prickly-paprikash]

Dude, you know it's so fucking over when John Green himself picked a gosh-diddly-darn side.

[mxstyk13]

i have no one to share this with and its actually mind fucking me. i just learned JOHN GREEN wrote "The Fault in Our Stars"....... THE john green?? HUH? i literally read like my life depends on it, how have i missed this?