I UNFOLLOWED someone on Twitter this week. It’s not exactly breaking news – there’s a function designed exactly for that purpose.
But it involved a fair bit more soul-searching than one would expect.
The unfollowing came a good few weeks after the reason for it. In fact I only knew the person had done something unsavoury because they posted a cryptic message, redolent with contrition without actually saying what they had done.
The response of fellow followers of the person piqued my reporter’s curiosity and I did a bit of digging.
What I found wasn’t pretty (in fact it was shockingly offensive). It also wasn’t recent – another case of old messages being dug up by someone looking for dirt.
The person said all the right things afterwards. They were shocked at themselves, remorseful to the point of self-flagellation – although the loss of work following the revelation probably accounted for that.
Many other people on the social networking platform have said far worse and been far from apologetic afterwards. I follow many of them for work purposes, so my Twitter feed is hardly the oasis of Radio 4 drama and dog gifs it may appear to the casual scroller.
Yet something niggled at me.
The main reason my timeline had been buzzing about the situation was the preponderance of honeyed words of reassurance from mutual followers that `everyone makes mistakes’.
This in itself was a response to the Twitter `pile-on’ that happens when hundreds (and too often thousands) of users publicly take someone to task for what they have said or done or are perceived to have said or done, or sometimes for what they have not said or done.
As a survivor of one such pile-on I know how distressing and sinister it can be. I can also well imagine having said something casually between four and 10 years ago at which I would be embarrassed now.
But I just couldn’t shake the feeling of discomfort. After all I am younger than the person but I didn’t hold those views between four and 10 years ago – or indeed 10 and 20 years ago.
The thing was I followed this person for light relief because they amused me – not because their opinions or work were inherently interesting or useful.
I asked myself, if I knew this person in real life, would I want to sit beside them at dinner or stand talking to them at a party knowing what they had `said’.
Realising the answer was `no’, pressing the `unfollow’ button suddenly became easy, especially when I reflected I have never met anyone who was nasty online but delightful in person.
Some people may wonder why I didn’t challenge the person or engage them in a dialogue. The honest answer is because I wouldn’t in real life.
In the real world I have found no merit in telling someone what I think is wrong with them and why I don’t like them. There are plenty of people who don’t know either of these things and their lives are none the worse for it.
Similarly I would be astounded to think that there aren’t many people right now who don’t think there is plenty wrong with me and have myriad reasons for not liking me. Frankly I’m thankful not to know the details – aren’t you?
At a time of relentless online attacks why would a stranger I used to find amusing welcome a po-faced finger-wagging from me? How would that have made me any better than her trolls?
Most of them probably believe they are being righteously indignant.
It’s unlikely she’d give two hoots about my private opinion either way.
Still, if you are feeling cross with me about some Twitter-related transgression, please bear in mind the likeliest of hoods is that I muted your account years ago or I really did actually inadvertently ‘like’ that person you don’t know’s tweet while scrolling mindlessly.
For what it’s worth.
