Fucked Up Is Alive & Well And Thriving On Social Media

Like most everyone, I have a love-hate relationship with social media. And have had this going on for about 10 years or so now.
During that time I have been active on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and beBee. I have written well in excess of 1000 long format posts on at least half a dozen blogging platforms, and have done tens of thousands of shorter posts, dozens of meme series and zillions of comments.
It’s been a lot of fun and sometimes a lot of Fucked Up.

Friends and stalkers and weirdos and trolls and scammers and hackers and Nigerian princes. You could say there isn’t really any sort of Fucked Up I haven’t experienced at least a couple of times.
I don’t really mind the Fucked Up , mainly because I’m a writer and even if it’s Fucked Up, a writer will always look for the point of view that’s being expressed.
A lot of times there is no point of view in all the Fucked Up. But the very absence of it is making a statement of its own.

Why Is There So Much Fucked Up In Social Media?

There are a lot of reasons, and, as usual, I probably have not provided a complete list here. So free to add your own in the comments.
1.Anonymity: The anonymity of social media is one of the key reasons why there is so much Fucked Up here. People just post whatever they want knowing that they can hide behind a fake profile and none of the people they are offending with their Fucked Up shit will ever be able to do anything other than tell them that they are Fucked Up too.

2. Narcissism: Social media is the ideal place for anyone who is Fucked Up in this particular way. Mainly because you can spend your whole online life posting things that are about nothing but you.
Selfies, funny stories that may or may not be funny, all the reasons why you’re so incredible. Sounds ludicrous but just a quick cruise through Instagram will confirm all of this in spades.
3. Exhibitionism: As everybody knows, the Internet has created an entire subset of the population of who are attention junkies and will do whatever Fucked Up shit they need to do to get people’s attention.
This is where the concept of “Epic Fail” came about. Because while normal people would talk about their achievements, the Fucked Up will actually think that you are impressed by seeing them doing a belly flop onto the surface of a frozen pool. Or slamming their nads into a railing when they slip off their skateboard, doing a maneuver they have never tried before.
4. Bullying: This Fucked Up started off being directly related to Anonymity but then morphed into something more specific. Sometimes this is a form of trolling. But more often it’s a whole group of people with something in common, just plain being cruel to someone they think is uglier/smarter/more talented/more beautiful/more popular/more of a misfit than they are.
5. Sadism: There are a lot of Fucked Up people who just like to hurt other people. They would never actually act that way in person because most of them are cowardly or timid. But the anonymity empowers them and they simply lash out. I believe that any shrink worth his two hundred bucks an hour will tell you this is really more a form of misdirected self-loathing. But then again, quoting Bruce Springsteen, “I guess there’s just a meanness in this world.”
6. All the Isms…Fascism… Naziism…Totalitarianism…Nationalism…Populism…Jihadism… Sexism. And worse. The internet is filled with a wide variety of Fucked Up conditions and causes that paint a glorious picture but are really all about destruction. And the trouble is that there is a virtually endless supply of the Fucked Up to support these isms and even convert to them.

What A Fucked Up Stew This Is

Of course, if you apply the 80/20 Differential here, it really skews heavily towards the Fucked Up being on or below the 20%.
But a little Fucked Up goes a long way. And it’s that same 20% or less of the Fucked Up stuff that attracts 80+% of the news and entertainment media and keeps the Fucked Up top of mind with most people.
This is a big part of the mechanism that, especially in the US, has allowed them to keep popular support for their ongoing War On Terror, which of course is the main trough at which the massive US Military Industrial complex feeds and has fed pretty much since the founding of that country.

Hey, It’s Not all Bad

The skew of Fucked Up to not Fucked Up in this post illustrates that Fucked Up is a whole lot more interesting and in need of being written about than the not Fucked Up.
I mean there’s really no need to warn or caution anybody about all the good stuff that people post. And we all take for granted that there will always be a lot of it to see,
Because the majority of people will always be posting interesting, informative, entertaining and insightful stuff.
But I would argue that the fact that the Fucked Up stuff is in the minority is what makes it stick out all the more.

What’s The Point, Jim?

I have always been fascinated by things that are Fucked Up. I have always been astounded that there are so many high functioning Fucked Up people out there pushing their crap, deflecting accusatory comments and basically ignoring just how Fucked Up they really are.

You could, in fact, argue that without the Fucked Up, we would not have a really well-defined idea of what ‘good’ is.
So my advice is this. You cannot avoid the Fucked Up in social media. It’s always going to be there in terms of some troll, or moron or creep or fanatic who want to engage you.
And that’s the slippery slope. you need to avoid. It’s kind of like spam email. Once you respond to it you can never really tell what will happen, but it won’t be good.
Jim Out. Have a great weekend.

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