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unbrcakablc-hcart · 1 year ago

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What even happened? Who did what?

God, okay, so. This might sound pretty stupid. The first thing I think I should say is that this happened in a group chat off of Tumblr; I don't think many of these people have blogs. It was run/created by... uh. Someone I thought was a friend but I guess ain't anymore. Anyway.

Secondly is that this truly started off in such a dumbass way.

Like. Talking about some real mundane shit. I was essentially going "I wanna swim I've only done that like 3 times tops in my life because I don't want to dirty the water that other people where I'm from could be drinking" because. You know. I live in a desert.

This gets long so. Be ready for that.

tl;dr: lady wants to study my sisters and therefore me by proxy. I don't take kindly to that. She calls me weak and stupid and naive for not keeping my mouth shut in a place where I had originally felt reasonably comfortable with people. Only 4-5 people argue with her and everyone else just tries to act like nothing happened, and one person insisted that I should just try to find common ground and get along. She doubles down on her bullshit and I decide this is a load of shit and leave.

This person whose name I still don't know, so I guess I'm going to just call her Ox because that's the emoji she was using. She pointed out that I can't really be dirtying the water any more than any other creature that gets in it, which... like, yeah, fair, except the point is that I live(d) on a desert planet with very little water and there really ISN'T that much in the way of wildlife on No Man's Land.

Which I know she wouldn't know, because just as I know nothing about her, she knows nothing about me. So anyway. I explain that. And I also make the dumbass decision to mention that my sisters are generally responsible for producing a vast majority of the potable water on the planet.

Because by this point I've been pretty open about being a Plant, right? I don't really talk about it frequently because it's just not something that comes up often, but I'm not hiding it on purpose or anything either. It gets kind of tiring trying to explain the whole thing anyway.

I realize I've made a mistake because Ox talks about how sentient beings producing water is fascinating, and I'm a little on edge, so I go, ahahaha, I guess I probably shouldn't really talk about my sisters.

And Ox is like, "That's not the wrong way to go about it. If you want to protect something, it's best to keep it hidden. Lock it away, never to see the light of day. It's like the advice I'd given to that girl and her Aubade."

Don't know what the hell she's talking about, and I probably overreacted a bit by going okay, noted, won't share anything about myself again, because I literally did not ask for that advice, and do not care for it.

She replies, "It's foolish to announce you have something unique, don't you understand. Unwanted attention, conflict. If you're not cut out for defending it, you should simply lock it away and keep your head down."

Which, again, sure, except it's not like I'm entirely fucking braindead, I know that. That's how I've lived my whole life so far! But I don't care for the implication that I should also be locked away and keep my head down and hold my tongue, because, you know, like my sisters. I Am A Plant.

And this guy I was talking to, I'll call him Columbi, he also picks up pretty quick that this is fucked up and he's like. "People aren't possessions you can cage." Like a decent person, you know?

So Ox tells him that's a naive way of thinking.

Which pisses me 'n Columbi off. Obviously.

And she goes on to say, "It's simple to "lock away" a person. Downplay their capabilities, have them keep their heads down too. Strict rules about who they can and can't talk to, what they can or can't talk about. An open prison. Even if you don't lock them in a room by themselves, you can still keep them sheltered away from harm. The more open you are about their uniqueness, the more they become exposed, the more likely you are to draw unwanted attention. And if they're particularly important or special… you simply run the risk of losing them altogether, if you're not strong enough to protect them."

Which Columbi points out is abuse. Which I recognize pretty quickly as something Nai wanted to do to me to keep me safe, which wasn't what I wanted at all, because ultimately he and I both would ideally like to live without having to pretend that we're something we're not for our own safety, and I thought in a group chat full of people from other universes, I wouldn't have to worry so much about this shit.

I point out that it's real easy to be cruel and that I love (sarcasm) how she thinks the non-naive thing is to be an abusive shithead.

Ox says, "Of course. It's simplicity itself. But if you're powerless to take care of your most precious attachments, you scarcely have little other choice."

Which I disagree with. Of course. I think there are PLENTY of other choices that don't involve that kind of cruelty. And I snark that oh, I see, you're just as powerless yourself, aren't you?

And she goes, "You seem to believe I'm speaking from a place of experience. Which, you may have been right so many decades ago."

So what I get from this is that she's basically talkin' out her ass.

She goes on to say, "I'm quite proud of the strength I've cultivated. I simply cannot condone the actions of those who would brag about their unique abilities or their special treasures without the capability to back them up. Truthfully, your reaction may have been the right one. If you think you're simply too weak to protect your attachments, your possessions, you're simply better off keeping them to yourself and locking them away."

For the record, my reaction has nothing to do with whether I'm too weak to protect the people I care about or not. In my opinion, that's missing the point entirely, which is that I shouldn't fucking HAVE to. Which I guess makes me stupid, weak, and naive.

I'm also pretty sure that I could hand her ass to her, but again, not my point, and it's another thing I feel like I shouldn't have to prove to anyone. But I do tell her that if she gets close to me or anyone else that I care about, that I'll put her out of all of our miseries.

And this is when things start to, in my opinion, get worse.

To summarize at this point: random stranger tells me I'm stupid, weak, and naive for sharing information about myself and being uncomfortable with the response she gave me, after quite a few people pointed out that's just Not Something You Should Say To Someone.

Only three people - two of whom are friends of mine that I know in person, one of whom is a stranger - stand up for me and go this is fucked up. A fourth person is saying this is fucked up but I think she's missing the point but she's also a friend of mine and I guess right now she's okay.

I leave to try to cool off. It's not really that successful but whatever. Everyone just acts like this lady didn't just say some fucked up shit.

Two 'n a half hours later this other gal(?) named Roon says, "While we're all together like this, wouldn't it be best if we tried to get along?"

One of my friends asks how she suggests that to happen, given the circumstances.

Roon answers, "Hmm... I suppose I'm not the best person to ask about this. But it might work to establish some common ground, at least. That might be a little difficult in a space like this, but I'm sure it's possible."

Which I take to mean as, "I don't understand what the problem is, why don't you just be the bigger person and be understanding?"

Because like. How else am I supposed to interpret that.

And because I feel like no one is really understanding why I'm so damn upset, I try to spell it out, and I explain, "All I really wanted was to feel like I could be open about myself and try to make connections with people, only to be in no uncertain terms that I am weak, stupid, and naive for doing so. Right now it feels like my options are to either leave, or to stay and say nothing and lie and lie and lie and say nothing of any real substance and pretend that's fine with me. Given my options, I'd rather tell y'all that it's been real, and that I'm going to spend my time with people I know give a shit about me and don't want me to hide everything about myself. I shouldn't have to fucking prove a goddamn thing to be worthy of the luxury of comfort. Because at the moment, I don't particularly want to be open and establish common ground when it'll be seen as stupid and naive."

Roon says, "I can't stop you from doing that instead, and neither should I. I just wanted to float a second opinion~"

Which. Again. Kind of pisses me off because again, the way I'm reading this, I feel kind of like she thinks I'm overreacting, and that I should just accept the way I've been spoken to by someone who is a stranger to me, who expressed some interest in studying/experimenting on my sisters and by proxy me.

Three hours later, Ox comes back, and instead of even just apologizing insincerely to me, she says, "Apologizing doesn't undo the fact that it's been said, nor do I mean to act like I didn't mean it. If you're strong enough to protect the things and people you care about, by all means. But backing down the second someone makes a comment about it implies to me that you're uncertain if you could. Of course, I even think you're being defensive about it for naught. You are but lines of words upon this relic's slab. I can't even guarantee you're real, or if you're just a fabrication by the relic to amuse me."

The fact that she doubled down on all of her bullshit was the final straw for me, especially with being told that I should try to find common ground and "just get along", so I decide that I've had enough of all this shit, that I don't have to deal with this and that I'm under no obligation whatsoever to prove myself, and I have no interest in trying to convince someone who isn't even sure I'm a real person to give me basic decency, so I left the group chat pretty much immediately after that.

And now everything just really fuckin' hurts emotionally and it's intense enough that it's affecting me physically in a lot of ways and while I could have been kinder and more polite in the beginning, I really do not think that would have improved anything, and I still am under the opinion that I did nothing wrong and definitely did nothing to warrant being treated like that, and finding that a lot of people I considered close friends didn't even want to say anything! Fucking sucked!

I know I shouldn't really be surprised, but I am, because I thought things could be different. Better. And... well. Guess things weren't as good as I thought they were.

So. Super cool. Loved that.

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