Wednesday, May 10, 2023

Out through the In door.


You might have noticed I no longer appear on Linkedin. 

Oh, who am I kidding, no one notices I've been absent from that platform or any other. That's the problem with social media, we trick ourselves into believing the digisphere is waiting on our every clever word. It's not. And I have the thousand rejection emails to prove no one wants to see what I can cook up on a keyboard.

Hell, even the folks at Aha -- they, of famous ghosting fame -- sent me a rejection letter.

And it's not like I really need Linkedin. Now that I've been shoved into semi-retirement and have grown a bushy white beard thereby cementing my status as an unemployable old man. So while my needs have grown less vocational, I nevertheless lament the loss of a valuable social media platform. 

Particularly as it gives me a chance to school the unschooled masses. My new self-appointed, remuneration-free job. 

Which leads me to the circumstances behind my untimely dismissal from Linkedin, which to be honest, has become more like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. A result of the rapidly growing cultural chasm in this country, fueled by both sides. But let's be honest, it's the ones wearing the red golf caps who are throwing huge chunks of super flammable magnesium on the pyre.

Last week, a gentleman posted a meme that was clearly taking a potshot against the LGBTQ community. It was something along the lines of:

If you put 10 men and 10 trans on a deserted island.

And left them there.

In a hundred years you would come back to that deserted island and find nothing but 20 skeletons.

Funny, huh? I guess it is if Greg Gutfeld and the Fox Five is your idea of humor. To me it's not funny, nor is it insightful. In any shape or manner. 

No one on my side of the aisle is suggesting trans people can bear babies. Maybe they can. People who work wonders have figured out how to put hair on the former president. 

Naturally, all those binary folks who have no idea what non-binary is all about, were thrilled that somebody boiled their troglodyte thinking into a bite-sized meme. And were howling and cheering on the author. Also, naturally, I chimed in to offer an opposing point of view. Because let's face it, I can't spend all my day on the Peloton. Or at the local pool. Or at the dog park. 

I have venting to do.

One particular fellow in the "discussion" said, and I quote, "You sound like you're an idiot." I looked at his profile and replied, geographically accurate I might add, "You sound like you're from Florida."

Being no stranger to community standards violations, I assumed this was the comment that put me in hot water. It was not.

Another vocal member of the digital mob, one who is woefully uninformed on the fluidity of human sexuality and its nuanced gender expressions, went on to tell me there were Males and Females and nothing else. Heterosexual males and females, that is. 

Anything else was just a perversion.

It was my response to this comment that resulted in my permanent removal (at least as of this writing on Monday morning) to the Linkedin platform.

"Greg, the human brain is an incredibly complex organ. Yours, however, may be the exception."

That little bon mot, written in the style of Winston Churchill, if I may flatter myself, got me the boot. The seemingly permanent boot.

Will I miss Linkedin and my 10,000+ followers? Probably.

Will Linkedin and my 10,000+ followers miss me? Probably not.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Permanently booted? Really? Seems excessive.

Anonymous said...

Permanently? That’s a little excessive.