I’ve made my social media aversion abundantly clear at length, shouting into the void, publishing thousands of words on the subject that fell on deaf ears. That’s fine. But, as the title suggests, I had a secret Twitter account which I just shut down once I did what I set out to do.
I’ll explain:
I like to unwind, have a drink, and play some videogames at the end of the night. I’ve loved videogames since I was a kid, it’s what we had. I was already an indoor-kid, and then videogames and music came into my life, and now I’m pale to the point of translucence. That’s fine. But, I do still like videogames and try to keep up with the trends and news. I wanted a Playstation 5, but they proved very difficult to get.
Scalpers, those lovely go-getters, took it upon themselves to buy up massive quantities of the consoles and sell them for double, if not triple the price. Great, our society is doing just great.
Regardless, it was hard to get a PS5, and the pandemic was no help. Stores like Target, Walmart, and Best Buy would put them up for sale without warning as they received stock, and like clockwork, they’d be gone within a minute or so. I didn’t stand a chance, I had no idea when stores were releasing their stock, I always heard after the fact if I ever heard at all.
I read articles about how hard it was to get a PS5, and where to check for availability. But, I couldn’t spend all goddamned day refreshing a website in hopes that one time I’d see the elusive “add to cart” button. Fuck that.
So, at an article’s suggestion I rejoined Twitter to follow accounts that would alert me when the PS5’s went on sale and where. I did so under an assumed name, Chim Regaldi, a name I’ve been using since I went to Stevens Institute of Technology.
And there was Chim on Twitter. After several weeks on Twitter, it finally paid off and I managed to get a PS5 on Amazon for its regular price, scalpers be damned. Once I knew the order went through and wasn’t going to be cancelled, I deactivated that account.
But, I’m not here to talk about my PS5 search. I’m here to talk about what I saw on Twitter:
Twitter is a goddamned shit show. Everyone is angry, and no one has patience. An account would tweet out a PS5 stock alert and within minutes, if not seconds, receive hateful tweets blaming the account for the user’s failure to procure a console. Cursing, threats, insults – whatever would satisfy the user’s bruised ego, and all because they didn’t manage to buy something online.
Why are we like this? Why are people so mad? Why is everyone so quick to take personal offense at something that has nothing to do with them specifically? Twitter has got to be one of the most toxic public forums we have. It’s a jungle, it’s a god forsaken hellscape of ill-conceived opinions and closed-minded cretins. For so many, Twitter seemed to be the key to unlock their unbridled rage and total lack of tact. “Different view? You deserve to die.” That’s how Twitter operates.
One of the weirder things I experienced was that despite my account being under an assumed name, my profile picture being an abstract photograph I took and edited, and the fact that I never once tweeted a single thing, I had two followers within the first day of joining. I joined the platform for a specific reason, to get a PS5 – never contributed, but still, I had followers. Why? This is creepy. Twitter is a playground with way too many adults lurking around glaring at kids that aren’t theirs.
The end. Have a happy new year.
Christopher Goodlof 