cw: TERFs and general transphobia
For the most part, I avoid Reddit like the plague, but when I’m feeling sad, I find myself going on r/terf_trans_alliance, and then I feel worse.
I don’t know what drives them to participate, but the minority of trans posters are ridiculed, subjected to abusive comments, and mass downvoted for any attempt to get through to them in a way that isn’t absolute self-flagellating placation. Some things I noticed after just a minute or two of scrolling:
spoiler
- The term “TRA”
- Accusations of male socialization, with some gaslighting when trans people try to discuss their personal experiences about their upbringings that do not fit the narrative
- Accusations of “mansplaining”
- Assumptions that trans women are predatory
- Assumptions that trans women have an entitlement complex
- Accusations that trans women conform to rigid misogynist stereotypes, but also that trans women are too masculine to embody what they identify as
- Assertions that trans women defending themselves need to accept male privilege, comparisons to white fragility
- The comparison of being trans to a cultist religion
- The insinuation that upvotes or kind words “shields trans people from reality”
- Casual references to trans women, whether indirectly or directly to trans commenters/OPs, as men or males
- The likening of trans women to white supremacists
There’s this stereotype that Reddit is this liberal echo chamber, but I seem to know all of the many places where it’s not, and I seek out those places when I know they’ll hurt me.
For those of you just on Lemmy, what are your strategies not to stray back to Reddit?
I also have problems with moments where I stray back to reddit and even 4chan occasionally. I’m the same as you and do this when I feel sad or doubtful about my life. As the others have said, this is exactly what the hateful people there want. I don’t have any advice that hasn’t been said but what I do is just be very very conscious of that fact. They want you to come back, they want you to feel bad. You can just not do it. It’s not always easy. But making coffee, going for a walk, reading a book, doing some silly computer thing etc. are all things that make me happier than going back to those websites. They show me that I have a life worth living regardless of what people online think about me.
I had a really great offline routine going for years. I’d work out, I’d take walks, I’d practice piano, and then 2025 happened and now I’m addicted to social media again.
I think forcing myself back onto that routine would really help.