Perspective about humanity on the internet is hard.<p>People are complex, they have different experiences, sometimes all at the same time. Someone can be suffering from cancer ... and go for a swim. This might be jarring watching one video to the next, but that's on the viewer to manage.<p>I think people expect managed tonal shifts like a movie or TV show, but that's not life.<p>The folks most active on the internet judgment train don't operate like that, it's all or nothing, you're great, or you're horrible. Anything that reminds the judgment bots of past bad behavior, even by other people, you're all possible suspects the moment they recognize some "clue".<p>It's sad / scary stuff. I think most internet users aren't that way, but the ones who are, seem to be inexhaustible.<p>Same on Reddit for leaving that sub up ...
I suppose this demonstrates that the entire institution of Influencing is a corrupt one. Most people that are struggling with a disease are not exactly in presentable form, or ever were when they were fine, so this kind of fan-fare is not even possible for the vast majority of sufferers. So, that's one side of it. The other side of is, what do the consuming audience want exactly? Obviously most people don't want to be reminded of pain, so hard to watch videos of people in a hospital are not going to trend unless they have some marketable quality to it (<i>are you cute?</i>). So the whole institution is disgusting from all angles.<p>Cancer is very serious, it has to be treated with a certain honor. I can see how people are off put by it being thrown into the Influencer grinder. Likewise, those who consume this content are also parasitic and it shows. Reminds me a little bit of the Terri Schiavo horror show, where her vegetative state was used for politics. Some things are sacred.<p>It's impossible to paint the woman in question as wrong or bad because she is the one with cancer. Yet, I can't seem to entirely absolve her and it's not her fault. It's the <i>whole thing</i>, her, the fans, the mechanism and the phenomena of Influencing is just gross. Sometimes you have to realize the situation is bigger than big, and influencing and trending videos are <i>huge</i>, but this cancer thing is bigger. To her credit and young people in general, I don't think they know how to handle serious life things outside of the social media framework (<i>hey I just got shot, let me go live</i> - no, maybe have a private call with your loved ones about your final moments). What do they really know about quiet despair or quiet hope? For every viral video she made in chemo, there's thousands of others who wish they could get such fan-fare or even anyone to care or visit them. So it's very much in poor taste.<p>How do you teach a generation that hasn't been taught anything? Where do you begin?