Tumblr can
be a wonderful place if you’re interested in arts, music, fandoms, or social
justice. But it can also be very toxic sometimes, so please be careful and remember
:
- You don’t
like something? Blacklist it. Simple as that. Don’t be the kind of people who
send anon hate, or that simply keeps complaining. People will have different
opinions, and like different things. So just blacklist it. Unfollow people if
their blog makes you feel bad.
- Fighting
for equality between genders is great. But don’t think that all women are your
allies and all men your enemies. Also, if you’re a feminist, you’ve got to call
out misogynistic/sexist women (even when they’re POC) on their crap when you
can.
- Fighting
for equality between races is also a great thing. But don’t fall into the
perpetual victimization of POC that tumblr loves. Being a POC does not give you
a free pass to be a jerk to white people who didn’t do anything to you personally.
Just because a POC say something, doesn’t mean it’s right. <- This does not
excuse racist white people though.
- White
women don’t own feminism. But Black women don’t either. Actually, no one “invented”
feminism. Women (and some men too) of all
races, throughout all ages, have been questioning relationships between men and women. White/Asian/South
American… women didn’t wait for Black women (or for any other women) to become
feminists and to theorize it. <- This does not excuse racist white feminist
though.
- Being in
a minority does not allow you to be a jerk, be it to other minorities, or to
men/white/cis/straight people. No. Not under any circumstances.
- Never
feel bad just because you belong to a majority.
- Hating people
just because they belong to a majority does make you a bad person. Not only
does it help no one, your hatred will only consume yourself. There is a
difference between discussing privileges and injustices in your society (which
is a good thing) and deciding that men/white/straight/cis people are not sad
enough and should feel bad about themselves for this sole reason.
- POC are
not perfect angels. Even today, slavery and colonization are still a thing (though
unofficial) in several POC countries. Also, reverse racism in America does not
exist, but discrimination against white people does in some non-white countries.
Sorry to break it to you, but being white doesn’t mean you’ll never face
racism. White people are not imperialist by nature, and POC are certainly not
generous, open-minded victims by nature. <- This does not excuse racism in
white countries.
- You don’t
tell people what they should be emotionally invested in or not, and especially
not in the name of social justice. People will care about what they want. You
can’t ask people to be sad because they don’t struggle as much as you in life.
Let me elaborate a bit on this point.
You don’t tell people how to feel. You
can only expect people to be respectful (be it of your grief, of your
struggles), because everyone deserve respect and everyone should be respectful.
However : you can’t expect people to be sad and emotionally invested in
everything. It is wrong, unhealthy, and just plain impossible. I repeat it : it
is not possible to care about everything. You will only crumble under the misery
of this world. And you can’t ask people to do that.
Would you
randomly come up to strangers in the street and tell them : “How dare you be
happy ? My brother just died, killed by a car ! How come you’re not crying
because of it ? You were sad when your best friend died ! You don’t care about
me ! How dare you try to feel good and happy ?” No you wouldn’t. So why is it
okay to do this on tumblr ? It isn’t.
You don’t
make people feel guilty for not being sad about everything that happen on the
planet.
- Also, you
don’t make people feel guilty for being more emotionally invested in events that
happen close to them/to people like them.
- People
are only responsible for what they do personally. You don’t blame a whole
country for the way their media treat an event. Because spoiler : they don’t
control it. If you feel like an event is not covered enough, fine, talk about
it. But if to do so you try to make this country’s people feel guilty/passive-aggressively
complain about how over-covered other events are, you’re just a jerk. You’re
not helping anyone, and you just want an excuse to spread hate. You don’t make
a candle shine brighter by spitting on the others.
- You don’t
help minorities by hating a majority. And that is true whether you belong to
this minority or not. Seriously, don’t. Not only is it a dick move, you’ll only
hurt your own cause.
-
Celebrities don’t have to care about social justice if they don’t want to. That
doesn’t mean that you should excuse them if they do something really gross, but
other than that you can’t expect them to fight for other people/to be educated
on social justice. Also, don’t idealize them : you’ll only be disappointed.
- Actually,
no one has to care about social justice issues. Everyone should learn to respect
other people, in order to not cause more suffering in the world, true. But other
than respect, you can’t ask anything from anyone. People should only fight for social justice if
they want to. Caring about yourself/people like you first does not make you a
bad person. <- This does not mean you can be a sexist/homophobic/racist
jerk, though.
- One of
the most important thing : don’t rely on tumblr to tell you what to think, what
to like, etc. Even the most educated and moderate blogs sometimes make
mistakes.
Also, two
more things more fandom related :
- There is
nothing inherently wrong or transphobic with genderbending/rule 63/whatever you
want to call it, as it is something totally different from transexuel/non-binary/genderqueer
headcanons, and as one does not prevent the other from existing. Sure, the treatment
of genderbent character can be badly done (see for instance the
hypersexualization of some bent-to-female characters), but it is not frequent
and it doesn’t mean the concept of genderbending itself is wrong.
- You don’t
tell people what they can ship or not. You find a ship really gross ? Blacklist
it/politely ask people to tag it if they don’t. But people can ship whatever
they want, and if you think you’re some godly instance that can decide what
ship are problematic or not, you are mistaken. There is nothing wrong with any
ship (as long as they are aware that the ship is unhealthy, if this is the
case). People know the difference between reality and fiction. I’ll repeat it :
as long as you don’t shove it in other people’s face and you’re aware of the
(potentially unhealthy) dynamics of a ship, there is nothing wrong with any
ship. It’s fiction, people. If you can’t understand this, you are the one who
don’t separate fiction and reality correctly.
tl;dr : Fighting for a better world is a good thing. But if you only fight through hate, you don’t actually care about making a better world, you just want to spread hate. No one should feel bad about themselves for things they can’t control.
You don’t show solidarity towards people who struggle by hating people who don’t.
Anonymous: Hi! Can you help my friend who needs money for her cat surgery and reblog this post? This is all I ask from you. Thank you! raniaczka[.]tumblr[.]com/post/151556230401/can-you-help-me-raise-money-for-my-cat-surgery
hi!! of course i’m gonna reblog it, i’m also gonna try to donate as soon as i’m not broke anymore.
if u feel like u dont know what ur doing w ur life just remember that venus spins backwards and we dont even fuckin know why. just do whatever you wanna honestly
You don’t have to keep everything inside. Life’s too short to be anxious over trivial things. Don’t be afraid to speak, your words are not lethal. No one will think you’re stupid or annoying. Just be yourself. No apologies needed.
