#thanks for this msg btw i was worried ppl would call me a hypocrite for wanting my dash not to depress me

[letitrainathousandflames]

Omg thank you for saying it

Multiple times I've come across ppl literally sharing images of people who've been killed (in one case children what the fuck???) And even if its below a cut I still have to read the description of why they've put it under a cut. I know ppl have different opinions of this stuff but in my view that's so disrespectful of those who've lost their lives. The guilt trippy stuff (and I'm sorry but it's largely coming from people that don't know what they're talking about, as shown by the fact that there's literally no awareness that the stuff that's being said/shown untagged is hugely triggering for ppl who've lived through this stuff)

This is not a news site!!! People trying to avoid this stuff does not mean they don't have awareness of what's going on and aren't staying aware by getting their news from actual news sources???

I'm not against people talking about this stuff on here at all. It needs to be talked about. But for the love of God, making a post is not the same as taking to people in person. People do not have the option to walk away when you just send a post out in to the ether like that. Just tag things appropriately it's not that hard!!!

So yeah thank you for saying it. I always feel hugely guilty for trying to avoid certain things because of the guilt tripping that's so rife on this site but I really shouldn't cause half of what's coming up isn't even constructive (or true a lot of the time) and it just brings up a whole load of stuff that hits my mental health and makes it harder for me to actually campaign in a way that helps people

I always think of that one tweet that's like 'misery is not activism' making people feel shit isn't actually solving any of these issues or helping the world at all lol

When it comes to this topic, I always think of some articles I read about the human brain's capacity for processing bad news. One of them was titled something like "your brain can't handle the world".

Basically, it talked about how years ago (mind you, not that many years, given how fast modern technology evolved) you would get your handful of news, good and bad, on the newspaper or on TV and radio, and even that was already much more than a person in the 1800's would, given the slow pace of letters and how only vital info was able to fit into one. Newspapers would often only carry local news, and you could spend a whole lifetime without knowing what was happening in countries on the other side of the ocean.

Now, imagine that. A wedding would be the talk of the town for weeks. A funeral would be The Sad Event for your to grieve over for the following months. That is the amount of happy and sad (and playful, and contemplative, and other emotions) that one could experience and process in a healthy manner.

But nowadays, you get see the story of a family adopting their first puppy two continents away, and that's great and cool, but unfortunately that also means that you get the story of a bunch of children dying two continents away too, and the testimony of their families, and the overview of the political landscape that lead to this happening and the bleak understanding that that's not gonna change and it will happen again--

all that while you might be dealing yourself with a fascist government in your country, and your own bad news, and your own shitty economy, and laws that hurt a minority of which you are a part, and, and--

That is all too much. Literally too much for the mind of someone who is already tired of doing their own activism and surviving within the microcosm that is their town/community/country.

So you close CNN. You turn off the news livestream. You take a deep breath and you open tumblr because your mind is parched for dopamine and happiness you could use some cute fanart and compelling headcanons to relax.

You are two cute dog pics down when you scroll into graphic pictures of the latest massacre, paired with a detailed testemony of whatever horrific thing that happened. There isn't even a link for donations, or an e-mail you can reach to do anything remotely useful about it. It's just a spatter of misery smeared on your phone screen, quickly erasing all joy you might've gotten from the dog pics.

Your taglist is extensive, mind you, for the sake of keeping your dash a small safe haven from the dangers of doomscrolling - it's all there, blocked from sight: #negative, #current events, #death/, #child death/, #animal death/, #[insert current world tragedy], #[insert topic particularly triggering that could send you into a panic attack].

But people don't tag their shit. They say shit like "i don't care your blog theme, if you don't reblog this, you're a monster". They say "stop scrolling and look at this horrific thing". They say "why is no one talking about this"--

And don't realize, or don't care that some people are drowning in bills to pay and extra shifts to work and needing to double-think about wearing their pride pins because homophobia is getting worse in their country, and struggling with depression and anxiety, etc, etc.

I'm too adhd to make a concise text post ever, but if I can make any sort of point here, I guess that would be:

There is nothing wrong with not wanting to see, reblog or interact with negative posts about current events. This is not a news website. You did not come here for the news, and therefore is perfectly normal that you don't want to deal with them.

There is nothing wrong with making your dash a nice place curated with only the things you like. Block tags and blogs liberally. I know I do. This website is, to me, a source of memes, headcanons, jokes, character analysis and occasional useful knowledge. I don't get my news here. I don't engage in political/ideological debates here. I see a transphobe, I block them. I see a gun-freak bootlicker, I block them. This is my little garden, and goddamnit I will rip off all the weeds.

There is nothing wrong with not reblogging certain content, no matter what the guilt-trippy reblogs say. You don't owe anyone the space in your blog. This is your little garden, people don't get to tell you what to plant in it. You are one. Little. Person. You rebbloging something won't have the Big Worldly Impact they're making it out to be.

If you want to make room for the occasional activism in your blog, that's fine too. I make a point that everything I reblog that has a negative tone must be not only properly tagged but also have some kind of action attached to it - a donation link, a link for further reading in case of something raising awareness, a contact line for representatives to stop some dogshit law. I never reblog things that are just depressing and leave you feeling hopeless.

Please stay safe, drink water, be wary of doomscrolling, allow yourself not to be an activist 24/7, give yourself a safe space to decompress, take care, I love you <3

Before I go, I must leave fair warning to the piss-poor reading comprehension crowd: no, I am not advocating for toxic positivity or pretending that everything is fine, I just want the poor fuck juggling two jobs plus school while living in a political hellscape and managing depression and some other undiagnosed mental condition to be able to scroll the funny shitposting website without having to see triggering content that will send them into a panic attack.

Oh, and if you like my writing, here's my ko-fi for you to drop a lil coin <;3