Manu Moreale reflecting on a Mastodon post that attempted to simplify the world into effectively good and bad people:
I keep thinking about this tweet because to me it embodies one of the core issues I have with general social media discourse: the lack of depth.
This fits with a theme I’ve been blogging about throughout the year. In a stressful, divisive world, we are quick to label other people. We dig our heels in without nuance, vilifying our perceived enemies. As I blogged earlier this year:
I’m drawn to blogging about divisive topics, but it would probably be healthier to avoid it. People can be so tribal now that everything is either good or bad. Our views have become extreme caricatures of the truth.
And after my post recently about Mastodon, someone reminded me of when Wil Wheaton was run off Mastodon. Wil Wheaton, really? Moments like that make it easy to see why newcomers to the fediverse often feel like unwelcome outsiders.
I want to err on the side of defending good people even when they are caught up in overblown drama online. Yet I often do so in roundabout ways, from a distance, because engaging directly is a losing battle that makes everyone feel worse.
