Friday Cannon Fodder: nuance

The internet is not the place for nuance. For most people online, everything has to be black and white. You love something or you hate it. You’re for it or you’re against it. You agree or you disagree. You are either friend or enemy.

There seems to be no middle ground anymore. You can’t agree in part, disagree in part. There is little room for respectful disagreement or polite discourse. People have to be the loudest. The boldest. The most outrage-fueled with the spiciest take and the biggest dunk.

And to paraphrase a go-to favorite tweet (to remove the profanity):

Person on the internet: “I like pancakes”
Other person on the internet: “Oh, so you hate waffles?”
Person #1: “No. That’s an entirely different sentence.”

Queen Elizabeth II leaves a complicated legacy. She was beloved by many, a unifying symbol, and a beacon of dedicated, loyal public service. Many Brits are mourning her passing.

She was also deeply disliked by millions across the world who were under the yoke of the British colonial apparatus. Regardless of how much or little she was or wasn’t involved, she is inextricably linked with British colonialism.

But we can’t really talk about, explore, and weigh that dichotomy / duality because we’ll get shouted down. That’s just the reality of most of the internet. I wish it weren’t so. It’s both a symptom and a cause for the increase in divisiveness in our society.