Day 24: My Facebook Feed

Facebook and Twitter rank among the least progressive social media platforms.

That's an odd blanket statement to start of with but they're also the two that get the most reach, which means they get the most traffic, which means they get the highest influx of people who only come online to spout vitriol.

And I use Facebook a lot, so I usually get a front row seat.

I have plenty of horror stories, from the recent hack of Lizzy The Lezzy's page which posted pornography and anti-trans imagery, to various alt-right spewings, to any given comment section on Nerdist or Metal Hammer, so while I'm not going to try convince you of Facebook's inherent toxicity via anecdote, I do want to emphasize this; Facebook can be garbage. Garbage with a lot of sponsored posts. It's actually beginning to become a problem.

So what's my facebook feed like?

Well, part of the answer is above. I wanted to preface this because it can go anywhere from entirely wholesome to entirely garbage. "Don't read the comments" is great advice.

But when Facebook's not being awful, it's actually kind of great. It's a great way to keep up with LGBTQ news, South African current events, memes, music performances, cat videos, buzzfeed quizzes, nerd news, various trends in politics, my favourite webcomic artists and so on and so forth.

Occasionally I even get to see a decent post from my friends.

It's gone through changes over the years, there used to be more friends and music and less politically charged articles and feminist pages. Right now I actually spend a lot of time in a nerdy group I found and it's a quaint little community with very little toxicity and that's what I like about it, it's usually people just posting opinions with civility or just gushfests about things they like. Wish more of the internet was like that but unfortunately there's so much toxicity everywhere that it's hard to escape.

And when pages mind their own business, they get hacked and used for porn and clickbait articles. Which can make the whole experience awful.

But I'm still holding on to my one little pocket. It's probably the only thing still keeping me on, because when you find a good community of good people, stick by them.

Anyway, that's me out.