I Don't Want To Leave Twitter But...

I've been on Twitter since 2007. Not a pioneer but an early adopter (I think following on the tail of Dear Constant Reader Steve). When I first went on Twitter it was, for me, a mini-blogging platform with added conversational opportunities. I tweeted about high-minded things like Big Brother and Eurovision. There was a little group of people I interacted with and had quite a laugh. Hard to believe but I still think the vast majority of my tweets come from my first three years as conversation threads (not that they had such things for much of that time!) could go into the hundreds of entries.

Then the 2010 General Election happened. I started following Lib Dems. Then Tories. Even a few Labour folk. Politics gradually pushed out my non-political Tweeple until they disappeared entirely (realising the platform had changed and it was no longer for them). I want to blame the "normal folk" for "ruining Twitter" but I'm complicit and engaged in just as much annoying politicking as everyone else (including their dog).

For a time I thought this was a good thing. We organised. Same-sex marriage in this country came quicker thanks to Twitter. I've no doubt about that. It'd still have come, don't get me wrong, but the Twitterati got it moved up the agenda.

But ultimately... Twitter's popularity and the change to the way it is used has been to its detriment. Public shaming (as documented in the fantastic Jon Ronson book "So You've Been Publicly Shamed"), social justice warriors and the alt-right. These are terrible things. Things we shouldn't have allowed to rule Twitter.

I find myself actively disliking people. The people who insult each other. The people who think they are superior to other people. The people who think they are right. They are not.

I've been those people. I've done those things. I stopped going on Twitter for a while and felt tremendous but found my way back because... it works so well at helping me keep in touch with people, showing me stories of interesting things and randomly dropping pictures of hot men at regular intervals.

So I've said it before, and I'll say it again, but I'm going to be a better Tweeter. Focus on happy things. Be the silly, nonsense person who cares only about things that interests him and ignores the hate and arguments. Because if we don't do that, if we join in with the crazy people, we give them Twitter. The angry and the boring... they are taking over the internet. We need to fight back. We need to internet like we used to...