Posts you had second thought about and decided not to post - put them here

Racists have students loans too

Potential Samantha Fox comeback hit

Robyn iirc

…And actually given that I have had a number of men on ilx fixate on posts of mine/my inability to laugh at non-jokes, I really don’t think I need this pointing out to me. Not even just me experiencing that, the Tár thread was pretty fucking appalling with how Roz was talked over/to/about by a load of men.

it's the standard i get held to, right? you maybe don't mean to say it, you maybe don't intend to say it, but i hear it. i hear it loud and clear. mansplaining. i'm mansplaining women's experiences to a woman, who of course knows all about this, who isn't some johnny-come-lately to this stuff, who wasn't _socialized male_.

i am sorry. i am genuinely sorry for saying what i did in that way, i was responding to you and saying something that wasn't directed at you, and it was reasonable for you to interpret that as directed at you, and you being upset was absolutely a justified response. i made a mistake in how i phrased what i said, and i'm sorry.

tbh I think what you said was fine rushomancy

a lot of people have similar thoughts and experiences and sometimes they repeat things other people have previously said. And generally the intent isn't to talk over / ignore what the previous people said, but just to share their own thoughts and experiences, because it's their turn to share ... like, going around in a circle in some sort of group therapy exercise? It depends on the thread, though ... that masculinity thread sure feels like a group therapy exercise to me idk.

Xps there are cis women on here I’ve actively disagreed with in harsher terms. I just objected to the tangible experience that I’ve had on here being left out of the conversation, I’ve mentioned it a number of times and didn’t feel like doing so again on a thread about masculinity.

i mean sure. this isn't the first time recently that.. i've gotten the impression that you believe that i personally talked over your experience. the way i talked about my experience with autism spectrum disorder, for instance. you know at a certain point something starts seeming like a pattern of behavior, and when i feel like somebody has talked about things in a way that invalidates my lived experience twice in a month, i'm likely to start drawing broader conclusions.

Sorry what was the ASD thing, I honestly don’t recall that?

oh, it was just me talking about my selective mutism, honestly i probably read more into it than i meant to. i've gotten a lot of certain kinds of criticism and when i see something that _looks_ like that sort of criticism it activates me pretty hard. i'm not apologizing for being activated, you did misinterpret something i said and kinda go off on me yesterday, but i feel like i've done the processing i need to not take it personally.

I’m still trying to find the other example (selective mutism?) cos I am coming up short of examples of us even posting on the same thread in the past month.

i don't know, thread drift happens, the thread was nothing to do with ASD, maybe it was the ADHD thread? anyway the fact that you don't even remember it, to me that's a clear sign to me that i was reading more into it than was there, and that's kind of all i need to know.

Yeah I had a quick look back through my posting history going back to the 9th June and I didn’t see that I’d posted in that thread or about anything related.

no worries. maybe i'm misremembering. my memory is _extremely_ fallible. frustrates the hell out of me.

I mean, I get that you're jonesing, but as someone who's seen a lot of social media come and go, it's really depressing to get a popular alternative, with the momentum to make something happen, and the first thing that people think of is "Here's a list of ways that it needs to be more like Twitter"

my new straight-edge revival band, "the town squares"

i've put a lot of effort into engaging with that thread, when someone does a drive-by to say "lol this thread sucks" it doesn't exactly make me feel great about myself

i know i'm hypersensitive to criticism and i take generalized criticism personally when i shouldn't, i'm working on it

I was offended too.

this 'someone' does this in multiple threads

xps this is the second time this week you have taken something as directed at you when it wasn’t. Do I have to post “Scott Seward is ruining what were interesting lines of conversation with his shit” to avoid this? Because I will. And please, do killfile me, I don’t think you implying I was being dismissive about neurodiversity when we’ve never had a conversation about it was exactly great but I guess I should just wear that, right? Signed, “someone”.

gyac, I value your posts but these threads are meant to be digressive. I don't think scott killed the discussion -- it's still going.

i can stay away from that thread if you guys want. i do tend to babble so. can't hardly help myself. i'll stick to records.

i do learn a lot from that thread. i'll just read it.

Well tbh I was being pretty rude about it - it’s personal preference, if a discussion is interesting I prefer it to play out rather than someone feeling the need to post jokes or whatever? But two wrongs etc.

please, do killfile me

...and then I'll make a big fuss about everyone ignoring me

Why would I complain about being ignored by people I don’t have positive interactions with?

i can stay away from that thread if you guys want. i do tend to babble so. can't hardly help myself. i'll stick to records.

― scott seward

scott please do not stay away from that thread, i value your being in that thread and would actively like you to continue posting to it.

xps this is the second time this week you have taken something as directed at you when it wasn’t.

i mean that's a fair point! i genuinely don't mean to be snarky here but i feel like i did point that out explicitly in my post, that i take things as being directed at me that aren't?

Do I have to post “Scott Seward is ruining what were interesting lines of conversation with his shit” to avoid this? Because I will. And please, do killfile me, I don’t think you implying I was being dismissive about neurodiversity when we’ve never had a conversation about it was exactly great but I guess I should just wear that, right? Signed, “someone”.

― (who is an amazing ice cream maker by the way) (gyac)

ok since my initial comment kind of underexplained i'm going to completely overexplain here, warning i will use a lot of therapy talk, i'll try to do it in a healthy manner but if someone's not into that they might want to skip the rest of this post. i'm just super autistic and a big nerd about analyzing social dynamics and how they play out in practice.

i also do feel like responding in-depth like this has a pretty good likelihood of being counter-productive to you specifically, you've talked about having a long history of being mansplained to and getting the impression that you're being talked over, but i kind of have to let that go, because i'm talking for my own purposes and not to resolve any conflict we have directly

so as to your question i do think it generally is good if i have a problem with a specific person to address it to them rather than to generalize it. that said it's also something i find challenging, sometimes i take issues i'm having and sort of transfer them onto someone else (haha well maybe freud did have _one_ good idea once).

and that is explicitly my intent with my my first post in this thread this morning. i didn't name you specifically but i figured that you read this thread and that you'd know i was talking about you. this is sort of the default subtweet thread, but for me, i think it's good for sort of meta-discussion, talking about things that don't really fit in. i didn't name you simply because i didn't want to place an implicit obligation on you to respond, it was more kind of an opener than anything else.

because criticism _does_ have a tendency to come off as confrontational. it was important to me to... express my feelings rather than burying them, because that gets me in trouble. and i tried to do that in a healthy way without putting any obligation on you. that first post was textbook therapy-speak, honestly, in that it was entirely self-centered. and sometimes that does get annoying, that i'm always talking about myself, but particularly when i'm being critical i try not to frame it in terms of "you did this wrong, you did that wrong", the "when you x, i feel y" thing has a cause and effect but ultimately you're not responsible for my emotions, and that second para where i acknowledged my tendency to personalize generalized criticism was meant to underline that message.

and as it turns out other thread participants _did_ find your comment unhelpful and snarky and _have_ expressed that, independently from me, so i feel like it was good and appropriate for me to say what i said

the other reason that i said that is so i _don't_ essentialize you, i don't turn isolated incidents into a pattern of behavior, which, again, i do have a tendency to do. when i do post criticisms, i try to not do them in haste, in the heat of the moment. this was something i used to do a lot, this is kind of standard practice for discourse. this is sort of an issue i have with twitter is how _fast_ it moves, it encourages people to not wait until the initial emotional reaction passes, and that does tend to escalate conflict rather than de-escalate conflict. and that's kind of part of internet culture, unfortunately, that was part of this board's formative culture, part of the culture of usenet before that. it's a natural tendency for me and i actively work to not fall into that tendency.

giving myself that small amount of time, it can be as little as five minutes, to get past that emotional reaction is really helpful because a lot of the time when i get past that initial emotional reaction i realize that i don't actually need to make a response to whatever it was that created the emotional response. but sometimes there is an external reason that i feel like i need to address in ways that are directly critical of other people. that's scary and i don't like doing that, but in this case i felt like i did need to, and i do feel like i was right in doing that.

---

anyway i'm not really interested in killfiling you, i do that only in extreme circumstances. i think i've done it like once, to someone who i believe has subsequently been banned from ilx. when i'm going to cut ties, set a rigid boundary with someone i _don't_ criticize them. at that point i've decided that there's no point in talking to them about anything. i haven't reached that point with you, though, and since i haven't reached that point and i don't _want_ to reach that point, i feel like it's best to address in as direct and honest a manner as possible situations that _could_ lead to that point. and that might be now! sometimes identifying a problem, you know, it can't be resolved. i'm just personally in a headspace where i'm wanting to let go of any hostility i might have in a way that's healthy and not destructive. that's what i'm trying to do, and i don't know whether i've succeeded or not. i feel like i've succeeded at that, to a significant extent.

Kate I think you're reasonable and always interested in what you have to say.

i will probably killfile gyac because although I think they're intelligent and provide a lot of great insight into threads, they rarely hold themselves to the same standards they hold other people and frequently thread police, even in very low stakes threads, and it's just fuckin tiring at this point. I've outright left threads I've been interested in because of shit like this.

feel like i did point that out explicitly in my post, that i take things as being directed at me that aren't?

they rarely hold themselves to the same standards they hold other people

it's just fuckin tiring at this point

Yeah that’s fine, I get that. But while I get you accept that seeing patterns is something you acknowledge isn’t always accurate, what am I meant to do with that? I’m asking honestly. I’d really rather not be involved in that, you know?

that's kind of the beauty of it, you don't _have_ to do anything with it, you don't _have_ to get involved. someone says something like that to me and i try to ask myself "what do i want or need to do with this feedback?" and a lot of times the answer is "nothing"! "ok fine she's upset with me for doing this and takes it personally and also acknowledges that this is a problem she has in particular, cool, nice story kate, i'm moving the fuck on with my life". i mean since you're asking me for advice here, that's how i'd respond to a post like the one i made.

And I do suggest blocking/killfiling people cos I do this myself & I’m pretty sure both sides of the equation are happier as a result.

sure, it's a reasonable suggestion, i don't think it's wrong to say "hey have you considered killfiling me". i've certainly suggested to other people that they might benefit from blocking me, since being reminded of my existence actively gave them SI. their response was, though, that they didn't feel comfortable doing that, and i mean, fair enough. that's their decision.

That’s all fair.

Recall being mocked for referencing the Troubles recently in a thread on a salient point

it actually wasn't a salient point -- it was you making things about you, as you have a tendency to do, like when you referred to the "boundaries" thread as "your thread" because you started it? That reminds me of someone who was permabanned for behavior like that. And now, it feels like you have assumed that role. All About Eve on ILX.

You thread police when things aren't discussed in the way you want them to be discussed, and heaven forbid people make jokes! OMG. How dare people make ... jokes?! You complain about being ignored and people repeating things you posted, when you brag about ignoring people and you, yourself, because you have killfiled people, will do the exact same thing ... because you don't read posts from posters you have killfiled.

The reason why you aren't repeatedly called out on your shitty behavior is because people are legit intimated and afraid of you, gyac. They don't want to be targeted by you. They want to have a pleasant experience discussing things on a message board ... as a respite from the bullshit of life.

Hey Sarahell I know for a fact you were told by someone else that that comment was fucked up so you acting brand new about it isn’t new. I have nothing else to say to you, except that if I had ever, ever in my life been crass to the point of cruel about a mass shooting that affected a minority community, I’d probably hold my tongue on the subject of others’ behaviour. I will live with and deal with my many flaws as a person, but I absolutely despise you and your insistence on interacting with me and I just want you to unambiguously know that.

And just so you can’t pretend about it, let me walk you through it:

Xyzzzz__ posted a story about an English woman who said she was made fun of in Northern Ireland for being English. Given the, idk, cultural context, I made a snide remark about it, which anyone who interacts with me on the ukpol threads will know is an issue close to my heart.
https://i.postimg.cc/g2N812cm/IMG-5330.jpg
For reasons unknown, you decided to make that comment, maybe because the idea of children being shot in the street for no other reason than their background was funny to you? I don’t know. I do know that three different people messaged me about that with variations of “What the FUCK?”

https://i.postimg.cc/3NxHS1tK/IMG-5331.jpg
I told you my specific personal history on it. You decided to keep going. You are apparently offended that I think this remark was disgusting. I don’t care, and I thought it was a reasonable ask that you not reply to me if you considered sectarian violence something you could joke about to hurt me. You disagreed and here we are!

I can be rude. I can be aggressive. I do not take pride in picking at people’s ethnic or cultural backgrounds to hurt them.

I’m sorry is it now crass and cruel to point out racism and white privilege? Oops my bad

And the incident re the mass shooting actually was not on ILX… it was on slack, where you persisted on shit-talking ILX discussions and posters after I said “please don’t do this because of the harm it caused before.”

That’s really not what happened. But when has that ever mattered to you before? Btw the point about mocking a mass shooting directed at the Jewish community is not to go “NO U”, another person might be embarrassed about goading an obviously upset person from the locale and the community. But not you!

That’s exactly what happened tbh. You were shit-talking table’s response on ilx, I said please stop, you continued shit-talking, I explained where I live and how several people get shot every week and how they tend to be BIPOC so it doesn’t make the headlines in the same way and can lead to desensitization

I was not doing that, I’m not even sure I was in the initial conversation actually? it was other people, and you know what? I’ve got screenshots of the whole thing, I don’t need to argue this point. You are a piece of work, you tone policed a Jewish person for being upset about a shooting in their community, and have the nerve to say that people discussing that were the ones at fault? Keep going though, you can only look better.

The shooting was in an affluent suburb of Chicago and the person lives in LA, so ... idk, is that "their community"? I wasn't tone policing said poster. I was saying "stop shit-talking about another poster" and then you of course got involved.

That person's trauma about what happened, the actual shooting, I did not challenge or say, "whatevs" to ... it was the way they were talking about someone else's response that I took issue with.

and not even their response ... them as a "person" ... like, there's the behavior, and there's the person. If the shit-talking had just been about the post that person made and how it seemed unsympathetic, then I wouldn't have gotten as upset, and I might not have even responded, but it became about him as a person, and I was like, "don't. please don't. Or, have a discussion with him about it, and don't just engage in name-calling."

The last thing I have to say on this personally is: you were told the person was from that area and is from that community. I told you unambiguously as did others. I don’t feel like indulging this any further as it doesn’t relate to me, but I can tell you personally? I’d rather be called an edgelord any day than having violence aimed at my community belittled and handwaved. And also, that if you find yourself in two separate situations where you can’t help mocking violence aimed at ethnic/religious communities because you don’t like the people, maybe take some time to reflect about that.

Why is there always so much text?! it’s submit a list not a novella Jesus fucking Christ.

ugh “submit a post” not “submit a list”

Regardless someone who really appreciates conciseness as one of the finer skills in writing a want to gouge my eyes out.

violence aimed at my community belittled and handwaved

wait ... so, it actually doesn't matter to you that over 100 people a year get shot in my community? Some on purpose, some because they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time? Hmmm... sounds belittling and handwavey to me.

sigh. this is how it's gonna go down, huh? ok. this is how it's gonna go down.

this is how it always fucking happens. somebody is shitty and inappropriate to me and other people say, kate, no, you're not wrong, that other person is being shitty and inappropriate to you, and i don't accept it. i apologize, i conciliate, i exculpate. and i think, you know, maybe if i do that, maybe if i'm _kind_ and _respectful_ and display _empathy_ instead of behaving like the angry, cruel, sarcastic _man_ i was raised to be, you know, people can learn, people can grow.

gyac, you've learned nothing. no, no. worse than that. you've learned the _wrong thing_. you were shitty to me and i fell on my fucking sword and you apparently felt like that was some kind of vindication and now you're doing that shit to someone else. and as usual, _that_ and only _that_ is where i draw the line.

the way you talked to me was inappropriate and wrong. the way you are talking to sarahell is inappropriate and wrong. i'm saying this for the record, i don't know of any way to say it that you'll fucking _listen_ to. that's up to you, and you're not, no matter how much i hoped you would, no matter how much i wanted you to, you won't. fine. you're being shitty, and i'm not apologizing at all, but i was wrong to not call you out on it more directly earlier. it wouldn't have made a difference as far as you're concerned either way, but maybe i might actually start to respect myself if i practiced holding people accountable when they're shitty to me.

anyway, whatever else is gonna go down is gonna go down, i'm gonna head over to the trans march and try to not get heat stroke or anything.