Something has been bothering me for awhile, and darn it all if I need to get it off my chest. It’s like this. Sometimes, lord knows why, I actually like people. I know. It’s a weakness. I’ve tried electro-shock therapy, a frontal lobotomy…everything you could think of, and yet nothing can break me of the habit. Sometimes I like people because they have a great sense of humor. Sometimes I like people because they are kind and warm and giving. Other times, I like people for too many reasons to really verbalize succinctly.
It’s a problem. I know.
Now, here’s the real problem. Here in the world of social media, people are giving those of us suffering from, oh, what shall we call it…humanness? a bad name. For example, have you ever noticed that a person will talk to you and then suddenly drop you like a hot tamale as soon as a person with a bigger following comes along? Have you watched as kind of wicked people turn their charm up to sugar cookie level once a well-known person pops by?
I know you have. Don’t you even start lying to me now. We’ve been through too much together.
The real bummer is that sometimes I like people who happen to have a lot of Twitter followers. Sometimes I even like people who have written books or have been on the telly-vision. I don’t really set out to like these folks just because. There are literally millions of people who have millions of Twitter followers that I couldn’t give a rat’s poopy about. But sadly, I fear that my desire to reach out to folks in a real and genuine way is getting grouped in with the people whom I lovingly refer to as the social climbers. You know…the people who are nice because it helps them get one more step closer to…Twittervana? I’m not sure what they’re going for. But it helps them, apparently.
This ticks me off.
Let’s set the record straight
I realize that my word is only as good as a grain of salt, and probably not even a big lump of sea salt. But here we go.
If I’m nice to you, it’s probably because I want to be nice to you. I don’t care how many followers or fans or books or boogers you have. Well, maybe that last one could cause some problems, but even so! I have lived most of my life without Twitter, without Facebook. Heck, I lived more than half my life without computers, period. During those formative offline years, I learned what kinds of people I like and what kinds of people I don’t, and social media has not changed these opinions (if anything, social media has solidified them).
To this point, I’m afraid that even though people may view me cynically or with doubt, I’m going to continue being nice to the people I want to be nice to. If I want to write a smushy post about a friend of mine, I’m going to do it. If I want to promote a person’s blog post, I’m going to do that. If I’m going to talk to them about extremely important issues like the state of the world and the fact that there is a recipe for unicorn poop cookies, I will also do those things. If these people have 2 Twitter followers, I will carry on. If they have 2 million Twitter followers, I will carry on. And if people want to scorn me and think that I am a kiss-up or that I am just after linkbait or whatever, that’s cool.
But I hope that people I like know that I actually like them. I’m a simpleton that way. I just like people. Or I don’t. And you don’t have to do a darned thing about it. Numbers really don’t matter to me where people are involved. I’m not scheming. I’m not strategizing all over ya. I just think you’re fab.
Know what I’m talkin about?
Image Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/moffoys/3553322847/ via Creative Commons