Neo – plasticbagger

January 20, 2022

i’m sick of people standing up for friends who keep getting talked over. i’m annoyed by those who meekly accept their waiter fucked up an order because they’re too sympathetic to say anything. it’s not that i’m an asshole to service workers. i do those things too. but i don’t get in front of a camera to record dialogues about it. i don’t vlog about my 700 self-diagnosed dissociative identities. i don’t try to convince pre-teen audiences that their favorite anime character has hijacked their minds and is now in control of their bratty behavior. i don’t put “disabled” in my bio for having IBS or anxiety. i don’t have Irritable Bowel Syndrome. i don’t post about political stuff i care strongly about for three days after reading a moving headline. i refuse to post 1 AM admissions of felonies i’d evaded arrest for. i cringe at the fact there’s entire communities dedicated to not getting laid. i try not to fixate on fads popularized by weightlifting podcasts. buttered coffee is not a silver bullet to good health. neither is walking barefoot. i’ve learned the hard way. thousands of requests for “mutual aid” later, i’m wondering: what’s mutual about sending 20 bucks to a stranger? how many of these damn sob stories are true? do they really need 40 grand for a kidney, or to escape an abusive home? if so, how abusive? i’ve gotta be skeptical — now more than ever. judging by how most of those pleas get left unanswered, it seems many already are. the most needy have the least clout.

i’m tired of the stone throwing between blue surgical masks and red boomer hats. i’m sick of zoomers saying they’ve been radicalized when the only thing that’s changed is a hammer and sickle being added to their account names. i’m blinded by every aspect of life getting presented in the best and worst lights. i’m worried about people who make their profile pictures brutal dictators or any of their cronies. I’m annoyed by pseudo-passionate statements. i hate this sense of the same old conversations being rehashed, but said as if this is the one, this is the preachy post that’ll pull the wool out of people’s eyes. opinion, opinion, opinion. fucking fuck all of these fucking opinions. the more plugged in, the more addicted to opinions. having opinions. sharing opinions. trying to tell others that the thing everyone accepts as bad is good actually. or vice versa. circlejerkers circlejerking the fact they don’t circlejerk. irony a pleasant, yet overdone lifestyle. 

the older i get the more weary of virtual heroes i become. i post pictures of strangers in dinosaur costumes walking into donut shops in the dead of the night. seagulls picking up scabs of trash on the beach. empty movie theaters on a weekday off from work. normie shit, the suboxone of a former poster. yet how many times throughout my life have i tried to regurgitate a contrarian take for a mere 5 likes? everyone in this stupid discourse is plagiarizing a different set of hour long video essays and debates by Twitch streamers who don’t leave their rooms. outside this ridiculous metaverse though, what are we? those who love a person the most often engage with them the least online. everyone’s cooler face-to-face, even when they’re not. because at least then you see their true colors. so stop pretending to be a revolutionary on a publicly traded platform. stop the sloganeering if that’s all you’re going to do. stop sarcastically dunking on randoms in their sweatpants, who are also depressed and on a diet of microwavable foods. i don’t call myself a threat to the corporate art world while having an agent, lawyer, and expensive merch. posing for a photo with a gun is incredibly trashy. there are days i don’t care about any of this. on others, i’ll gladly throw in my two cents, regardless if anyone reads it.

recently, my heart skipped a beat. the connection between my mind and body felt like it lapsed extremely briefly. the crowd in the rainy storefront of my neighborhood became a neon blur. every breath felt fuller. i’m probably exaggerating things in hindsight. my pharmacist friend said i’m fine if it doesn’t happen often. it never has before. but i’d stopped whining on the timeline. i muted all who talk about being hot and interesting in one post then, in the next, fantasize about being found dead by their polycule. i’m sick of people making memes about throwing molotovs and hating cops while having a brother who is a prosecutor. i’m amazed there’s so many on the Internet who have their dogs on the same antipsychotics as them. i’m saddened by how there are 2.2 million people in the world who’d listen to a 15 minute manifestation asking them to envision how it would feel to have all the money in the world. “keep them closed, live in that feeling fully,” the voice says over steel drums and an image of a remote beach. a wojak one second. chad the next. mostly i find myself feeling like a soyfacing hypocrite. 

i still have my little delights in this online world. feeder fetishists making a buck by dripping hot cheese on their bellies. adults interpretive dancing while captions on-screen ramble about nurturing one’s damaged inner child. 20 somethings treating crumbles of black tar heroin and years of living in a drug den as part of a personal aesthetic. it’s hard not to feel bad for these people. but not really. they’re not me. they’re not friends. they’re not family. thank fuck. many of them aren’t even followers. on social media, a delusional follower is dangerous. they quickly turn to obsessed haters. but a dead mutual’s a badge of honor. before logging off, they smashed that FOLLOW. they’re fans forever. the last post of a dead follower is usually something banal. a “lol” response to one of their acquaintances. half-answered questions about overseas shipping. a post about how the two of us never got the chance to speak would do good numbers in our niche online community. humans love stories about discussions never had.