21 Comments

I do think Sarah makes a great point about it being an American thing, and now with tiktok it seems like its infecting more and and more people from outside of the US. American's have been fed the individualist attitude their whole lives that's how we get 'It's sad kids are getting killed in schools but they can't take MY guns away from ME' kinda attitudes and we're just seeing it more in different ways unfortunately

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ok but this is SUCH a good point

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Couldn't agree more to this! As someone from Germany who consumes most of her content in English, I find the American side of TikTok to be incredibly off-putting at times. A lot of the content is really self-centered with a very "small horizon", they don't look beyond themselves, nor do they want to - and a part of me is wondering, if they know how to.

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But what if I don’t want to read a newsletter telling me that everything isn’t about me? 😉

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hahahahahahahahahahah i was waiting for this from someone

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Brilliant, just brilliant. This answers so many of the questions I’ve had when scrolling through comments. 😅

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I was just writing about this for my newsletter. As an edutok creator, I get this a lot. Comments like: this is common knowledge to me, everybody knows, etc.

Algorithms give you distribution but not everyone seeing needs the work you create.

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ooey gooey this one's a doozy. it feels a lot like it lives in the same vein as "pick me" energy too. again, really drips of putting "the me in social media".

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Obsessed!!!! I saw this on your instagram and didn’t realise you were on subby until I scrolled the comments. This feels like a breath out and a beautiful reminder for my relationship to socials (mine and other peoples!)

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yes erica!!!! we love it here and love having u here!!!

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Sad to see the "I like waffles", "Oh so you hate pancakes?" Phenomenon that ruined Twitter spread across the internet. I wonder what a collectivist social media site would like like?

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I have rage quit social media multiple times because of a what about me comment. I’ll be having a perfectly good scroll and see a comment that makes my soul leave my body so hard that I have to leave the app for a while to go outside and separate myself from that point of view. But I do think this ties into our individual-centric worlds we’ve created where we believe friendships should have therapy level boundaries and scheduled sessions, and have lost our third spaces of just existing around each other

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THIS is exactly why I got of twitter years ago it was giving me high blood pressure. this is also solidifying my dislike for the clock app. 10/10 great post

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It's such a strange epidemic. I struggle to understand what possesses people to insert themselves into every piece of media they come across.

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I'm obsessed with this post - I'm not on TikTok and didn't know about Sarah's post, so thanks for sharing. I feel like sometimes with my friends in the sense of a competing timeline between people - who is getting engaged, married, having babies, etc. and people are like that's great for them but it's not happening to me and I'm sick of celebrating others. And while I fully get how it can be draining, IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU. Their wedding HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU sometimes I want to scream. If it doesn't work for you, you put up your own boundaries, but don't make your issue an issue for the bride (saying this as a single 31-year old who has been a bridesmaid plenty of times)

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I think that's part of the reason I deleted the app a long time ago. The "what about me" thing can be really frustrating.

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mic drop. so so good.

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Okay. But for real, what if I don’t like beans? 😂

So good, and helps explain the rage I feel when reading comments on Instagram recipe posts.

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Okay. But for real, what if I don't like beans? 😂 jk, so good and thank you for writing this. The comments on Instagram recipe posts are wild.

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This is such a useful explanation. It's a phenomenon that's been driving me crazy and seems to just derail things so quickly with no benefit for anyone involved. Love your work!

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