Something Was Wrong - S6 E4: Influenced | Arianna, Charlie + Jill

Episode Date: November 23, 2020

Tiffany interviews three of her longtime internet besties to discuss what it's like working as an "Influencer" professionally, online harassment, trolling for sport, doomscrolling, toxic masculinity, cancel culture and finding community online.Arianna - @rizosandrainbowsHaute Hair Studio Charlie - @CharlieCapenGish.comJill - @JillKraus.eJillkrause.com See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey, prime members, you can listen to something was wrong early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today. I'm Candace DeLong and on my new podcast, Killer Psychy Daily, I share a quick 10 minute rundown every weekday on the motivations and behaviors of the cold-butter killers you read about in the news. Listen to the Amazon Music Exclusive Podcast Killer Psychy Daily in the Amazon Music exclusive podcast killer psyche daily in the Amazon Music app. Download the app today. Something was wrong, covers mature topics that can be triggering. Topics such as emotional,

physical, and sexual abuse. Please, as always, use caution when listening. Opinions of guests on the show are their own and don't necessarily reflect my views or the views of this podcast. Please note, I am not a therapist or a doctor. If you or someone you love is being abused, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233. If you or someone you love is experiencing a suicidal crisis or emotional distress, please call 1-800-273-8255. For more resources, visit somethingwaswrong.com-resources. Thank you so much. Come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and meet me, come and me, come and me, come and Hi friends, I am super excited about today's episode because I'm having three of my best friends on today, so there will probably be a lot of laughing. I'm going to warn everyone in advance and I'm happy to have them on so they can share their insights.

They all are influencers in different ways and for those who don't know, I before becoming a podcaster was a quote blogger and then a quote influencer before coming into the podcasting space. And so being a part of that community, I have met and made a lot of amazing friends who also work in that space. And I thought who better to come on the show and talk about trolls and tech trauma and setting boundaries on the internet, then people who have to do it for a living. So thank you all so much for... Hi! Yes!

Hello. I appreciate you all taking the time to be here and I'd love to start by just introducing you guys. So why don't we start with you, Ari? We can go in alphabetical order. Ari and I actually met on the internet. I think you were my first internet friend. I ever actually made that I felt was like my real friend,

where I was like, is it weird that I love this person and we haven't met before? And now we have met and we've snuggled and we just love each other more than ever. And I'm so excited to have you on the show. Can you talk a little bit about who you are and your background and in what capacities you have worked or promoted businesses online?

Sure, so I am Ariana. I am located in the Hudson Valley of New York. I co-own two businesses. One is an event planning and design company and I own that with my mom. And I also have a little salon studio where I specialize in curly hair. So really my internet presence is selling what I do.

Selling my product, my service. And yeah, that's my little stick. Amazing. And you do such an incredible job. And of course, I will link everybody's insta's and all the things in the show notes so everybody can follow and find everyone after the episode is over. So Charlie, why don't we go? Why don't you go next? And Charlie and I actually met through our friend Morgan, who couldn't make the call today. She's here definitely in spirit.

But we met through mutual blogging friends, I think, and gosh, my favorite thing about you is that you love the 49ers, and also that you have an amazing heart and you share that online in such a brave and vulnerable way. So can you tell everybody a little bit about your background and what you do on the internet? Sure, yeah, I've been, you know, I've always loved storytelling and technology, and for me,

social media and writing and blogging, where a chance to marry all those things together. So, but it really all came together for me when I started writing about parenthood and I co-founded a site that became very, very fun and very big. And I've had incredible experiences because of it. And it was just by sharing my experience as a father and as someone who cares about their children. And I've gotten to speak at the White House before it became a hell-spon kitchen or whatever. Infested.

Infested before it was trumpled all over, is what I like to say. And I've gotten to meet incredible people like you guys and it's given me a life that I didn't expect. I spent the early part of my career acting and writing screenplays and things like that. And then when I found that I could build my own audience and write my own story, it really gave me a chance to jump off and dive in. And what it really allowed me to do also is have a different career, which was to create social media and digital strategy for other companies.

So I've been on all sides of that kind of table of influencer and client and agency. And I've gotten to fail a lot on my own platform so that I can then take that learning and help other people Build communities and build stories around what's important to them So I've worked for Fox and Netflix and wrote a book through Random House and Don't you know written for fast company and Buzzfeed in places, but You know now I do something that I'm really passionate about, which is helping to run the world's largest scavenger hunt for charity.

It's called GISH and GISH is the greatest international scavenger hunt, and it gamifies doing good. It gets people to play a game that also, whether you're a narcissistic A-hole who is super competitive or a philanthropic do-gooder, the result is the same. You change the world and you sort of change yourself by doing it. So I've shared a lot about myself on the internet over the past decade. I've had to sort of reformat some of that.

And I'm excited to talk about the side of the internet that maybe people don't talk about as much. Because I feel safe with you guys. And I have a stiff drink in my hand. And I've prepared for this moment my whole life. Jill, can you talk a little bit about your background and what the hell it is that you do on the internet all the time?

I mean, no, I can't really describe that, but I can try. That's just like the question now. And anytime somebody asks me what I do for a living, I'm like, why have I not figured out after like 12 years how to answer this question? So yeah, anyway, I'm Jill Krause and I used to blog at a blog called Baby Rabies.

And that was just sort of like this random adventure that I started anonymously like 13 years ago. I decided, you know, I wanted to get pregnant, which was a really weird pivot for me in my life. And I purchased babyradies.com at like two in the morning one night after I realized like, I had baby rabies, like I was like obsessed with getting pregnant. It was like my, this like project. I was type obsessed with getting pregnant. It was like this project.

I was type A and had left my job and was having a quarter life crisis. And so I was like, well, I guess this is my job now. And so I decided to blog about it because I realized how ridiculous I was. And it was really active on message boards at the time from planning my wedding and then baby message boards. And so it's just weird how this whole

trajectory of my like now career came together. It just doesn't even sound real. But yeah, now I have abandoned baby rabies because I'm producing no more babies for is enough for me. And I blog at Jillcrouse.com. But, that just like was a launching point for me to be able to do content creation for other brands, to do like freelance digital strategy for brands and organizations, to write books. I have two published books to sell my own products. So I sell ebooks. So I just do a lot of stuff, but it's all based on my platforms on the internet. I think you've won like a few hundred awards or something too or something, right? I don't know. How many is it now? I think like four Irish awards, yeah. Casual, casual. It's really cool. Our group of friends because we've known each other for so long

that we've all kind of grown up on the internet together I feel like and that's part of the reason that I wanted to have this Little group of friends on here because I think not only have I personally learned through my own experiences Online I've definitely learned as a spectator just seeing Experiences that my other friends and co-workers of sorts in the industry have experienced as well. Many of us have spent more time online than ever in 2020 given the pandemic. How would you describe the balance that you have tried to find between being online too much or too little, especially when you work online and you can't necessarily just choose to take a break

from the internet. I feel like I have two settings. It's either a rage quit or complete obsession. I'm just going to be straight up. I, no matter how many documentaries I see about the horrors of social media or the internet or, you know, our addiction to technology, it's hard to look away when things seem like they're on

fire. And the problem is, is I have this like intense, I recently did like a 23 in me and I figured out that my Irish stubbornness is like 99%. It's hard for me to walk away when someone's misrepresenting facts. It's hard for me to walk away when things are misinterpreted or taken out of context. And I know the context, not to say that I'm always right, but that when I'm presented facts and I see how much fabrication is going on or how much people are hurting, it's hard to look away from all of that. And if you have any empathy in you at all, it's hard to look in another direction. And the saving grace is realizing that real life, that there are people who are not posting a status update

about their needs and that you have to actually check in on them. So that always tethers me back to real life. But the state of the world is something that is uniquely compelling in a very terrifying way a lot of times for a lot of different people. And I'm in a category of person that is privileged. I have less insecurity in terms of just because of the color of my skin or the gender that I ascribe to. And as a he-him person who is born a he-him person, I'm not faced with

the trials of people erasing me in the same ways that other people are. And so if you have any feeling or any, if you're not a sociopath, it's a real shitty time, is what I'm saying. Yes. Thank you so much for sharing that. I think I know for myself creating the boundaries and knowing when I hit my limits, unfortunately, is something I still don't necessarily understand until I hit it. And then it's clear. And then I'm like, I'm very much at my limit. So I'm trying to sort of be just more thoughtful about when I'm in the right mental space to be online. Have you had similar, like, talks

with yourself, Charlie? I've had, I mean, the inner monologue, I think, has increased for me a lot, you know, gut checking what I say, looking at how I can be supportive without trying to co-opt too, because so many people who look like me are doing that right now. Self-care also, I've worn out every self-care methodology, I think, that's been invented at this point.

So I look to the internet for both, like, there are terrible things and there are truly inspiring things. And I think when we first all started this, I mean, I remember connecting with Ari or Jill or you and how naive we were to think that the social media space was going to be something where, I mean, the best metaphor I know for this is

when they invented the television there was a lofty goal that now everyone could have education for free. Anyone could learn anything anywhere when the TV was invented but then we like fast forward to what TV is now you know and I'm not saying like reality television is terrible but you know we're they're playing on these intense emotions in a really methodical way to keep you hooked to the next thing. We're binge watching, we're doom scrolling, we're fixated, and I feel it in me, and even recognizing it, doing something about it is another thing. Yeah, so many good points. The doom scrolling concept is new to me.

I recently saw a post about it on Instagram, but can you kind of explain what that is for people who don't know Charlie? Sure. Well, if you've ever found yourself sitting in a position, either on a toilet or not on a toilet, looking at all the bad things that are happening and checking in on the bad things that are happening,

and then checking in again, and just continually, infinitely scrolling through the carnage, the intellectual carnage of people who deny facts, the literal carnage of people who are peacefully protesting being beaten, of fellow citizens of the country you live in being hurt for no reason other than the pigment in their skin or the person that they love and and continually scrolling to try to find some answer in that that's that's essentially what I think doing scroll is. I think that's a great great way to summarize it. I

appreciate you taking the time to do it because you did a much better job than I could have quite frankly. I know that was that was pretty impressive. Two more drinks and none of this for myself. I can't wait. Jill, I'm gonna put you on the spot a little bit, but this year, earlier this year, you had rented an apartment. And who knew renting an apartment could be so controversial?

Can you talk a little bit about the experience you had? Yeah, so a little bit of a backstory is that, again, I'm coming from a place of extreme privilege here, but my family, just like so many families, we were hunkered together for shelter in place. And as a default parent in our relationship, it really took a toll on me in terms of my ability to balance my career, my mental health,

the time that I needed to dedicate to my kids, my relationship. So it was a radical act of self-care to say, I need a space for me that is all my own for about two nights a week. And here's the thing, there were a lot of people at this point that I knew in certain circles who were renting hotel rooms once or twice a week to go and have this alone time because we were all sort of at this breaking point. This was in June when I decided to do this. So an apartment made more sense financially, and I just went ahead and did it. And it was really from a place of meeting space

to focus on my job, space to get away from my kids, because I was there trying to work and then parent at the same time. And so no wonder my kids had no idea what my boundaries were. So, it was very obvious when their dad was working at the table with his laptop up, daddy has work hours from this to this. Well, I'm trying to work

just like whenever I can get it in and they are, you know, bombarding me all the time. And it was really stressful and I, and then I'm taking my frustration out on the kids and then I feel like I'm not present with the kids when I need to be, I'm not present with work when I need to be. So they just needed to be more clear boundaries in my life and my family's life. So that was the decision that I made. And then I knew that I was going to have to share about this in some way just to like let people know because the house and the apartment look completely different and I'm likely going to create content at the apartment. I planned and I was doing a series of Facebook lives over the summer for a client that I intended to record at the apartment. And so I just knew I was going to get questions anyway. And I'm just kind of the

person where my authenticity matters so much to the voice that I have online and I value my own personal authenticity so much that I really don't like. I mean, I don't share everything about myself all the time, but things like that that are pretty obvious, I would just rather be upfront about it. So I just shared that, you know, I was getting a space, and I shared that the reason I was getting it is for me and my mental health, and I was putting myself first, and that I intended to not only be there two to three days a week, but also to be there a couple nights a week. And I expected a little bit of pushback, but I actually got quite a bit more than I was anticipating. And what was interesting from that experience, though, is that at least two to three women that I can recall who in the comment section really came for

me and judged me in a way saying, you know, I get you working there during the day, but why do you have to stay the night? Or like this just just so selfish. Message to me either the next day, the next week, or one of them just messaged me like last month, and apologized, and said, listen, at the time I was just so frustrated with my own personal situation,

and reading what you had done for yourself. I was just consumed with how much that would help me and how I can't do that for myself. My reaction was to judge you for that choice when really I really applaud you. That's pretty amazing. I think that's really a wonderful thing when people can take the time to reflect, but it takes like a real person to apologize, especially to a stranger where they could easily just, you know, keep it moving their whole life and not take the time to like let you know that they were wrong. Do you feel like it helped? Do you feel a little bit better about their

judgment? Well, here's the thing. I think once you've been in this work for so long, you know this about people already. So while I say like I got more pushback than I was expecting, I can't say that that pushback hurt me a whole lot. I definitely talked to my therapist about it because then I was like had this moment where I was like, oh my god am I selfish? Am I crazy for doing this? You know, kind of talked through it, but I think that when you're a content creator or an influencer or you write for a living online, part of the professional side of that is understanding how people operate and how you expect that they're going to respond to this content that you're

creating and trying to understand it from a psychological point of view. So I knew deep down that that's where these reactions were coming from. But yeah, it's of course always good to hear. And then I just ended up having wonderful connected conversations with these women and like one, like a profusely apologizing, like three times and I was like, it's fine.

Like let's talk more about what's going on in your life. Like are there resources I can connect you with? Like, you know, clearly you are also very frustrated right now. So like, let's talk about this. And that's really, for me, the best part of what I do on mine is making authentic connections with especially other women and giving them some little bit of my knowledge or resources that I have in my back pocket to make their life a little bit better as a

woman and as a mother. And I think you do it very well and I think one of the things that people are really attracted to and why you've had so much success online is that you don't front you've always been like here's my messy fucking house like and here's my messy fucking house. And here's how I cropped it to make it look like I have a beautiful Instagram Pinterest house. For you, I just love that you, you're just who you are

and you always try to do your best to encourage other people and lift them up. And I think that as much as I've seen people be really shitty towards you, I've also seen so much support and so much like community come from your audience, not only like the connection that they feel that they have with you but with each other. And I think that's one of the most beautiful things about the internet is like meeting, meeting those people that you wouldn't necessarily meet in IRL, that you have those really connected interests with. Absolutely. Can I just say one thing, like Ari is one of those people

to me. I had this moment, I don't know when Ari, you and I, were on a Zoom, and I just, for some reason, and I didn't, I even said this to Ari, by the way, guys. So I'm just gonna like spring this right now. This is my confession. Yeah, one hundred percent. Ari, like getting to know you and the person you are,

like if we had walked down the street, I don't know that you would have paid attention to me and I don't know if we would have like said, how do each other, but I know you want a different level because of the internet and there's something hearing your life and story and also just being able to see your babies. I was just gonna say you're just here for the baby.

I hit 100%. You do have like exceptionally good looking children. I'm not by any... Unreasonable amounts of good looking happening with your babies. But I just don't on me the fact that yes, trolling, yes terrible, the internet responds terrible stuff, but how thankful I am to have had it so that I could even just be connected to you and be able to follow your story and have you share your perspectives.

It just helps me get outside of that human bubble that we are in real life, which is harder to permeate in some ways than it is on the internet. For sure, oh my god, Charlie. For sure, for sure. But Ari, I on that note of like talking about Ari and how cute she is, I'd love to talk about your experience promoting your businesses online because I think what you do is a little bit different in that you typically use Instagram

or websites or Facebook or whatever social media site we've been, we're on at the time to promote your businesses and your services. Can you talk a little bit about any learning curves that you had either personally or things you saw through other people's experiences and how you make the decisions on what you're gonna share and how you build your platform online?

I mean, God, like 2020 has kind of been a shitshow for both of my businesses. So, you know, like it killed any content that I could have come up with because I wasn't doing weddings. All of my weddings got pushed to next year. I wasn't doing here because I couldn't do hair. Like I couldn't have clients. But, you know, it's just, it's really about... Is that the birthday girl? That's my baby. Is that Miss Grace? My choice.

It is, it is. Yeah, she is, she's on strike, she's on sleep strike, she's just, she's hanging right now, so... It's because she's had cake now, she knows what real life is about. There's no return. Sorry to interrupt you. Continue. I just heard cute baby sounds and I just got really excited. I should have, you know, I should have just put a disclaimer on that. She is, she's doing laps around the living room here with me right now. But everything that I do, I feel like is contingent upon the other person being okay with me sharing it, be it their wedding or their hair, even though I don't know, it's just, it's, it's, it's all like very artsy,

but it's, it's my, that's, that's my creative outlet, you know? It's like your space to, to show the work that you're doing off of essentially. Right. Without it, without it, I definitely feel like, you know, I wouldn't have as many clients as I do. So, you know, I feel like it's definitely, it's a must have thing. Like everybody's always looking to see your work when you're in the space that I'm in. They wanna see what you've done in the past and they wanna see, you know, what you can do for them

or how you can improve upon something that you've already done. Because that's the whole thing. Everybody's always grabbing pictures and saying, well, what about this? And I like the way that this looks, but maybe you can do it in the different way for me, you know? Can you talk a little bit about what you've kind of learned through being, I mean, you have so many friends that are influencers that I'm sure you've seen a few things or learned

a few things. Can you talk a little bit about what your experience has been from that third person perspective? I mean, it's kind of wild to watch it, you know, sometimes. And you get a little defensive and protective and it's like, wait a minute, how dare you? If I can sit around and just watch celebrities and keep my mouth shut. Why can't you keep your mouth shut? It's just, it's interesting because I feel like, you know, a lot of times I probably have more insight than some commenters do, but it's never really like my place to say anything.

So I generally tend not to get into like comment wars with anybody. That's just, that's not who I am. But instead, I'll kind of like rally around my friends and offer my support. I'll shoot a text or whatever it is just to let them know that if they need me, I'm here. You are a very supportive person and a very supportive friend. And I think, and I think that is a really great point because you don't have to go fight with people on the internet to show your support for your friends. You can simply show your support sometimes by just showing up for them and letting them know that you see who they are and you appreciate the work that they're doing or the effort that they're putting in. And like, that is super important, especially this year, yeah, you're right. Like, let's be more kind. I'm trying myself to put more kindness out into the world.

So just random, I love you, techs guys. Like, let's make that a movement, shit. Yeah, I saw like a meme about like normalize, like loving your friends. Like, it's okay to like hug and love your friends and express that. And like, I always tell my friends, I love them. And it's okay to like hug and love your friends and express that. And like I always tell my friends I love them and it's no different in this group. I feel like we have such a such different lives. We all live in such different places and yet we connect every single day on the internet and like that's fucking beautiful especially this year. Charlie you were gonna say something.

Oh no, I was just gonna say that I I try not to do it because I make it weird, but I I agree with you. I think I think for men too, especially like we don't we don't express love and compassion as much as we should nearly enough. I mean I know how weird I mean how weird is it to see you know two men hugging for other men, it's ridiculous. We can't even, we have to shake and then hit each other while we hug, is that what we have to do? That sounds super great. You just had a recent, are you comfortable talking about your recent Instagram posts

that you got a bunch of whack comments on about Harry Styles? Yeah, yeah. I don't wanna put, and I wanna put you on the spot, but we've just discussed this Tiffany. We haven't discussed this yet, we actually haven't discussed this yet. But I saw your posts about it and like what what the shit was that you people got mad because you posted a picture of Harry Styles vogue shoot in a dress. So yeah, Harry Styles appeared in a dress, which is totally his prerogative.

I I struggle to understand how people can be outraged about it. But people are people think that it's diminishing masculinity in some way, which is, again, ridiculous. I just don't understand how people have the patience, not the patience, how people have the goal to get up in arms about it. So people, I posted something saying the outrage about this seems ridiculous,

and in fact, it makes me now want to wear a dress just so you can more easily kiss my ass. And it evoked a response. Not all of the responses were good in terms of support. I would say they were not good choices. And they were, the go-to thing for trolls, especially with guys, is to call them sort of betas or use gay vernacular to try to like take people down because they think

somehow that is a slur in some way, which is also ridiculous. And I've just been doubling down. I'm a cis-het white dude. I, A, don't need to defend myself to anybody in terms of, you know, my masculinity. I think masculinity is defined however you want it to be, but the trolls are really trying to seize on the concept that I somehow must not be man. And honestly, if I'm super transparent to follow Ari's lead, I should be more kind, but I definitely, it gets my hackles up when also dresses have been used for Centuries by multiple cultures with men and

The it's so arbitrary to me, but yes, I had people coming after me and coming after Harry Styles who obviously maybe doesn't need support But it got me going because you know if one of my children decides to be gender fluid one day And or not decides but realizes that they make that decision outright and declare that. The worst possible thing a parent can do is to see the child in front of them and ascribe something to them that's not theirs, project things onto them that has nothing to do with them and withhold compassion and love. I think it's a critical failure on people's parts to look at others

who are different from them in that way and decide that they're somehow diminishing culture. So it was interesting because I got into it and I actually following Jill's lead, Jill really you really taught me about being explicit about certain boundaries in my posts, which I came in and commented essentially that, you know, I've lost a lot of followers for this, oddly enough, over this ridiculously benign thing of Harry Styles wearing a dress. And I'm okay with it. I absolve you. I release you from having to follow me and go ahead and leave.

I think, go. Goodbye. Seriously, just leave. I'm good with that, and I don't give a shit in any way. So it's also good to say that. Yeah. It does. And I would, if you can also just maybe hold a little master class on setting boundaries in that way, that would be great for me, for my benefit. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery's podcast American scandal.

We bring to life some of the biggest controversies in US history, presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our newest series, we look at the Kids for Cash Scandal, a story about corruption inside America's system of juvenile justice. In Northeastern Pennsylvania, residents had begun noticing an alarming trend. Children were being sent away to jail in high numbers and often for committing only minor offenses. The FBI began looking at two local judges, and when the full picture emerged, it made

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the line was crossed and you felt like somebody actually made an active effort to either like emotionally abuse you or leave a comment or send a message that was like clearly an emotional attack if that makes sense. So I can speak a little bit to that experience. Earlier this year I wrote a blog post called Fuck COVID School and it was just out of frustration. We were a few weeks into distance learning. And so it wasn't just as a perspective as a parent, but also seeing my friends who were teachers. And all of this like collective like WTF,

like just not just not understanding what we were doing, why we were doing it and seeing how we were just compiling all this extra stress on parents, on teachers, on caregivers, in the name of saying, oh, we're going to make school happen still. So my point of view was sort of like, just freaking forget it. Let's just like not. And let's like let these resources be used for students who really need these resources versus all of us making sure our kids are logging on to do this stuff every single day. And I got some intense blowback from that

that was centered around me the anti-teacher, which is, you know, I'm not anti-teacher. Like I completely respect the work that teachers do, but for whatever reason it was perceived that way by some people, certainly not by all teachers. And it became pretty viral. So it was republished on some large sites. It was shared by a lot of sites. I got a lot of traffic. So it was read by a lot of people. And anytime anything goes viral, in my experience, I open myself up to some really aggressive and volatile messages from people. And this time around, I got my first

you should kill yourself messages. In my comment section, I also got like some really shitty private messages as well along those terms. And here's the thing, I was mentally healthy enough to like disregard that. But what's an interesting piece of the spec story is in January, I was suicidal and part of this sort of cross this journey I've been on this year has just been like radical self-care because of recognizing where I was in January and what I needed to do to get out of that. And so by March or April or whenever this had gone viral, I wasn't a much better place.

But like thinking back about like getting comments like that, if I had published in January, it was really upsetting, you know, and to know that like that person would feel involved in to say that to somebody else as well who maybe doesn't, I mean, I'm incredibly lucky in that I'm so connected, it's the online community in terms of knowing where to go for mental health help. I mean, I'm just like talking about mental health

is just part of what I do. So I'm aware of it, but like, you know, not everybody is. And so that was, I think, more upsetting for me, not in like how it made me feel personally, but how it made me feel thinking about that person going on and saying that to somebody else who may not be in as good of a place. Yeah, I just don't understand why anybody in any fucking capacity ever of everdom would need to tell somebody else that they should kill themselves.

Like I honestly just think like that's hateful and Is speaks more to the person saying it than it definitely does about you, but like Such a good point that like you don't know where people are at and just because you see them online doesn't mean you actually know Who they are or anything really about their life. They're sharing a small piece of who they are and yes That piece can be a really authentic piece and you can feel a real connection to that, but it doesn't entitle you to harass people or say hateful things like that just because they do something that you don't like or don't share an opinion that you do. Absolutely. You can't ever predict the level to which a commenter, I mean YouTube especially and YouTube comments for a long time as like a strategist you hear like YouTube comment basically was vernacular for just the most garbage fire

Shit you can think of. Yes, the first time I did a Buzzfeed video with Morgan who's not on the call But isn't here in spirit The video came out and I felt so good about it and I was so excited and I'm like, oh my God, I did some shit, like I was so proud of myself and then I read all the comments on YouTube and I literally went from feeling like you didn't fail at something to like, you should just die because everyone hates you

and you're the worst. It was like zero to 105 seconds. And I went to Morgan. I was like, so this, like I went to the comments on the video and she was like, no, never, never YouTube. It's notorious. Don't ever read the comments unless you want to feel horrible. So yeah, I learned that the hard way, but continue. All right, so I had a similar experience where I had a post-go viral about sort of a male perspective of miscarriage. Men don't often share amongst each other, let alone, you know, I think sometimes with their partners.

What their state is because a lot of times, you know, obviously it's not happening to them directly. And I think, you know, for us to be good partners, we want to be a support, you know, backstop to all of the stuff that's happening, whether it's the medical procedures that have to happen or moving through trauma and grief. But I decided in partnership with my wife to write about it because it was something that I think men struggle with how to deal with in as a bystander. It's sort of you're just sort of there watching things kind of unfold and

trying to be a good good solid person, but you also are struggling because you have your own reaction to it. So I wrote it and obviously I showed it to my wife before I shared it. It got shared around a bunch. I think Ariana Huffington decided to share it or someone of some audience decided to share it. And I got, for the first time, I got the first, you should go kill yourself. But then I also got, God is punishing you for using contraception, which for us, luckily I had written, I had made a decision to write about stuff not in the thick of it because I needed to have that boundary and the sort of like force field around me to protect me from my raw emotion of

it. And I knew that if I didn't do that, that there would be a negative outcome, that I would react in ways that would make me look bad and just be more than normal. Understandably that's fucking horrible. Like that's so traumatizing. Like for sure. And I'm so sorry that happened, that's horrible. I appreciate it. I think, you know, seeing someone try to use God as a weapon for my grief and what, it

made me more angry about what it would mean to my wife because again, I did not go through it, but I went through having to watch someone else go through it and care about them and care about their state and care about that life that we were going to have. And we were in an area, you know, at the time where there were also minimal medical instruments to be able to help her through that. We were away on a trip in a state, which I won't name, where they didn't have certain tools because they didn't want to touch the concept of prenatal life sort of being taken away. So there were less instruments to be able to help her and I I was really angry because she couldn't get the medical attention she needed But to see commenters like that faceless nameless commenters come in and say that God wanted it this way and I deserved it Was something that I it was hard for me not to internalize at some point and I think that's the risk that we run

By sharing anything vulnerable is that people will comment on something that is personal to us And if we don't have those walls and boundaries where we need them, you know, it's can be a Bad recipe at least for me. Yeah, 100%. It's just hard for me to wrap my head around like, what, why somebody would behave that way or say something like that. Or like even the concept of trolls for me, I just, it makes me sad for the person in a way, because it's so hateful, but it's just like what has occurred for that person in their life that they also think that behavior is okay.

Like I feel like, I don't know. We, I think there are a few documentaries about trolls that are really important to watch, because the pain and trauma that people have and the bullying that they've experienced, there's definite transference. That's definitely a case for a good amount of commenters, people who are in a bad place and they want to take it out on people for sure. There's another part of it though that I think we've really come to understand more in the

past four years and the last elections and all that, which is trolling for sport, trolling for to influence other people and make public sentiment change. The elections have been last year, last cycles elections were influenced by all these sort of this trolling of the entire country to the point where a troll themselves was put in office. There are people in parts of the internet that see trolling as a sport and it's a spectator sports, so they'll come back almost like hunters with their win when they've gotten a reaction from people. It's documented in 4chan and other parts of the internet where not everybody goes,

they literally make a game out of getting a negative reaction from someone or getting attention from people, and it's a sport. So we fall prey to it thinking that those are thinking-feeling people when they're not. I don't know if any of you have been canceled, but I mean, I should be. I mean, if we're just straight up. If we're being honest.

Yeah, if we're all. But have any of you been canceled or felt like you were canceled? Like has it ever come to that point online? Jill, have you ever been canceled? I don't know that I've been canceled. I mean, I think I've certainly said some dumb things and learned and I hope grown from it. I've been called out. I've been called in, but I don't know that I've been canceled. I've definitely witnessed from the out like tangentially being attached to somebody who has been canceled and that was really hard, but also like a super educational moment for me.

But I mean, hey, maybe I have been canceled and I don't know about it because here's the thing. I also actively do not Google myself. I do not go to message boards where I know they're talking about me or subreddit or whatever. Like I don't seek out that criticism about myself. If somebody takes the time to email me, message me, even like leave a comment with criticism, I consider it. I also consider the source. I think part of getting canceled in some ways is ignoring when people are calling you out or calling you in.

So trying to learn from those moments versus being indignant and standing in what you feel is your truth and not listening to input from people who matter. And your guys' opinions like from your purview, do you think like that sort of cancel culture has its place? Do you think it's effective? Do you think that it can bring about positive change? What are your perspectives? I mean, I personally feel like that it's not super productive.

So it's like two, there's two different sides because I can understand that the people who are doing the cancelling in many situations feel very justified in their frustration and their hurt with this person. And so I don't want to invalidate their feelings. On the other hand, I believe that people have the ability to grow and learn and change. So it's just like so many things in our life. It is especially our online life right now. It's nuanced and it's unknown and it's something we have to work through. And I think just the act of saying you've been canceled, it makes it oversimplify it. In a way, cancel culture has been around forever. You could not read a book by that author anymore.

You could stop watching that television show, whatever. I think we need to give people space for their emotions, for their anger, and we also need to give people space to learn and grow and become better. Yeah. Ari, what are your thoughts? and become better. Yeah. Are you, what are your thoughts? I'm, I'm, I'm not super, super down with the cancel culture, at least not in this kind of like vocal outrage where I'm like,

oh, we can't, whatever with this person or they don't deserve whatever. If I just, if it's not resonating with me, if the message is not in line with my values, which is something that I really had to reckon with, especially this year, as in Afro-Latina, as a mom of black children, like where I spend my money, who I'm following, who I'm interacting with. Like that, that matters. So I'm not going to make a big stink about it. I'm not going to sit and like trash anybody online or, you know, try and throw around

wait and be like, Hey guys, we should go after this person. But but you know, I may be only one person, but for me, it's more about like that kind of hit him where it hurts like the wallet thing, you know, like I can I can make a statement with where I spend my money, I can make a statement with who and how I'm interacting online. I think that's such a good point that like we can speak up for ourselves and hold people accountable in different ways. I just wanna say thank you guys all again so much for being on the episode and sharing your own insights and I just love you guys all so much

and I'm really thankful for all of your friendships and you taking the time to share a little bit of your heart and your experience. Thank you for having us. Oh my god. I love you so much. It's fun, the reunion. You're thinking of me.

You don't know me. Where have I let go? You're thinking of me, you don't know me well at all. Something was wrong is produced and hosted by me, Tiffany Reese. Music on this episode from Glad Rags, check out their album, Wonder Under. If you'd like to help support the growth of something was wrong, you can help by leaving a positive review, sharing the podcast with your family, friends, and followers, and support at patreon.com slash something was wrong. Something was wrong and now has a free virtual survivor's support form. That's something was wrong.com. You can remain as anonymous as you need. Thank you so

much for listening. No me herbeto't know me, you don't know me well You think of me, you don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know Hey, prime members, you can listen to something was wrong early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today, or you can listen early and add free with Wondery Plus in Apple podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey. by completing a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey.