On Fucking Up...

On fucking up...

The house has been incredibly quiet since my dad passed. And that quiet turns into loneliness quite often for me. So last night I decided to use every spoon I had to go to the movies. I swallowed my social anxiety and went out into the world.

The theater had these recliners that sit on a raised step. But when you are actually sitting in the seat you can't see that step. Once the movie was over I forgot about the step. I got up to leave and my ankle caught it on the way down. I flew forward and crashed into the back of a row of seats.

A middle aged gentlemen saw this and said, "Gee buddy, this your first day walking?"

And the other 8 people in the theater gave a boisterous laugh.

I wanted to crawl in a hole and die.

Making a mistake feels bad.

Making a mistake in public is an embarrassing lesson in humility.

And making a mistake witnessed by 15,000 people is terrifying.

When you get something wrong and people call you out, your first instinct is to dig in. Everyone wants to dig in. Which is usually the worst possible reaction. You want to defend yourself. You don't want to believe you were wrong. And you start spewing out reasons why you can't be wrong. I think the current vernacular calls this "tweeting through it."

Over the years I have tried very hard to fight that instinct to dig in. To consider what people have said and recheck my facts to see if my original information could be inaccurate. And sometimes you find out you were right and strengthen your point of view.

But when you find out you were duped or misunderstood the information, there is nothing quite like that sinking feeling.

And when you are wrong in front of 15,000 people... that sinking feeling goes to the center of the earth.

You get sucked into a thought spiral...

"How do I fix this? Do I send a message to all 15,000 people? Do I just post a video of me repeatedly punching myself in the face? Do I delete the post? No, can't delete the post, people will think you are trying to hide your mistake. Plus all those reblogs."

You have to accept the fact that even if you publicly admit you were wrong, a lot of those people are never going to see it. They are going to believe the thing and possibly spread it to others.

You've created a runaway freight train and you just have to watch it crash into stuff.

The sad thing is I have learned this lesson a few times in my 10+ years of being a minor public figure. It has caused me to be so paranoid about passing along bad information that I will fact check things to death. Sometimes 5 or 6 sources. I'll look at reputable sources and disreputable sources. And I'll try to corroborate those disreputable sources just as an exercise to give me confidence I have the best information at that time.

But the other night I finished watching John Wick 4 and was high on action juice. I started watching every John Wick video on YouTube. My history shows about 40 videos. And at 2 or 3am I heard the director being hyperbolic in a podcast clip and thought a fun fact was too great not to share.

I thought, "I'm not telling people to eat horse paste for COVID. I'm not pretending I'm a submarine expert who knows exactly how to save people at the bottom of the ocean. It's just a flippy gun maneuver. I'm sure Chad knows what he is talking about."

So I posted the thing on my personal blog with sleep in my eyes and figured it was fine. And after 500 notes no one had really said anything, so I thought it was okay to share on my main blog.

And that was my biggest mistake. I deemed the subject matter to be trivial so I lowered my standards.

I forgot that damn step was there and flew into the seats.

There are dishonest people on the internet. Tons of them. People who will post dangerous misinformation without a care. People who have a pattern of lying. Grifters who thrive on baiting people for clicks. And I think it has caused us to react to bad information with hostility by default. People forget that there are still honest people who just make a mistake or get duped. Yet they can still feel the need to make people feel stupid for believing something that seems so obvious to them.

I have been guilty of this myself. I have called people out forgetting they are a human being behind that social media avatar.

The first person to call me out just said, "This is not true, LMFAO."

That's not helpful.

People made me feel like I was a liar. And I am very sensitive to that. For years doctors, family, and friends were skeptical of my Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. And when someone accuses me of being dishonest, I get very anxious and see red.

But I tried very hard not to dig in. I asked for more information--for evidence. Just point me in a direction so I can figure out what's true. But I got angry when all they said was that I was wrong without elaboration. Which is another form of digging in.

I guess I'm asking people to start with compassion before hostility. Maybe if we don't know the person or they have been a mostly reliable source, we can give people a chance. If the person has a history of deception, that's a different story. Bad faith is usually pretty easy to spot.

I remember for a long time I used to love telling people their blood was blue until it was exposed to oxygen. It was just the funnest fun fact I had ever heard and I *needed* others to know the thing I knew. Giving people knowledge can be intoxicating. But then I told my good friend who just became a medical resident and he was like, "I don't remember that in medical school. I think that might be an urban legend."

I still got that sinking feeling and I still had flashbacks to every person I told... but I was grateful he was so kind when he corrected me.

You can correct someone with kindness.

I'd ask that you imagine yourself in their shoes. Think about how embarrassing it is when you get something wrong. And just be like, "Hey, I think you got some bad information. Here's why."

When someone faceplants into a row of seats, metaphorically or otherwise, maybe ask if they are okay before laughing at them.

just a reminder that you do not know the names of most of the people in SAG-AFTRA. They are not multi-millionaire A-Listers, not even beloved D-listers with a cult following. They are ordinary people struggling to make a living, living paycheck to paycheck just like the majority of WGA members. The push for SAG to strike was from the bottom up and that is who we have to thank for this moment of entertainment labor solidarity.

Donate to the Entertainment Community Fund to support those striking, as well as teamsters and IATSE members affected by the strikes

(x)

This is a genuine question, so please don't just jump to being hateful and assuming anything about my beliefs.

When an abuser is particularly self-centered or narcissistic (not necessarily NPD, there just isn't a better English term for that level of self-obsession that I know of), it always seems they abuse in the same way. "It's like they're using the same handbook," I've heard before. As a victim of an abuser who followed all those same steps, here's my question:

What's a better term than narcissistic abuse? Because ableists will obviously use the term to demonize all people with NPD, but without a good term for it, it's harder for victims of this subsection of abuse to find one another and stand together.

(PS, tags are mostly for getting this to more people who may have an answer)

It's really funny that redditors convinced themselves that the stupid Tiananmen Square copypasta is going to get chinese people forcefully disconnected from their internet service or something while the UK government will get your ass if you complete the sentence "Soldier F is ___" and has actively worked with google and with social media websites to censor posts or search results about Soldier F

Fuck Miguel because HES actually the first anomaly. He abused his power/ability to travel between universes to take the place of someone else. Had he not done that, that universe and everything in it would still be around. But Miles? Miles ACCIDENTALLY got bit by spider that wasn't where it was supposed to be. How tf was he supposed to know that?