Question: Advocacy
hypocrisy, part 1.
You can’t deny the fact that social media has changed a lot of things in our everyday lives, even if you personally don’t use it all that much. Social media has changed the way we communicate with each other, what we deem as appropriate to share with our loved ones – and total strangers. It is merely a matter of perspective how you see the change in relation to what used to be, to pre-social media times: is it a good or a bad thing to you can vary a lot based on your personal life experiences, such as the generation you were born into. Gen Z’ers tend to see social media in a more positive light than baby boomers, and the reasons for that are pretty self-explanatory.
But something fundamentally amazing that social media has given to us is the ability to form communities and come together with people going through the same shit with you, with people who have similar interests as you. Community building like that – across continents and oceans – simply wasn’t possible before the internet took over the world. I mean, I would have never met the love of my life if Instagram wasn’t a thing.
And this community aspect, a sense of belonging somewhere, is what keeps me going back to the internet, to the social media platforms that I sometimes reluctantly use but also find a lot of pleasure and comfort in. My existence on the internet has almost always been solely in the context of different online communities, simply because of that one reason – the reason we covered at the beginning of this chapter. And I can’t bring myself to dislike, let alone hate, something that has once upon a time given me a sense of belonging, a façade of acceptance and comradery that kept me going.
But there are times when I do have to sit down with myself and really think… is this REALLY what a community is supposed to be like?
Social media is an amazing opportunity for you to find people who face similar struggles to yours in their everyday lives. It allows you to connect with other people, to see that these mental problems that you’re dealing with are not only yours to bear, that you’re not a total fucking nutcase for having these thoughts and feelings.
hypocrisy, part 2.
Except… Except when you are.
The mental health community on social media platforms like Instagram only seems to allow certain kinds of advocacy content. It seems to me like there are these guidelines for how you are supposed to spread awareness on your own mental disorder. Sometimes it even goes to the extremes of completely denying access to the community from people whose mental illnesses are not the most commercial ones, the most palatable ones. Psychotic spectrum disorders. Personality disorders. Eating disorders. You have one of those on your name? Well, too bad for you, but you don’t have access to the only possible community that could ever truly understand you. Try being mentally ill in a cute way, then you’ll fit in!
Some things just always go back to the high school cliques, don’t they? Especially for me, it happens every other business day.
Why are my experiences with being hospitalized at a psychiatric facility not acceptable to you? Why are my self-harm scars affecting you in some way? Why is it that these platforms and communities within them only want to give a voice to those who have already conquered their mental illness, who are already recovering? Why are the ones struggling the most left out of the very support group they need the most in that moment? Why are you advocating for Suzie’s generalized anxiety disorder when she’s already back in university, but not for Em’s cluster B personality disorder that has left them picking up the pieces of the life they once knew as their own?
Because you cannot fucking stand the feeling of being uncomfortable for more than a millisecond at a time. When our lives have been nothing but uncomfortable since the dawn of time.
Shame on you.
Crossing out my name,
ichigonya
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