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Gargantuan social media mistakes

July 12th, 2021

Hi there, sorry about the massive wall of text. This one is a little political, left leaning, if that's not your thing that's ok, you can move on to another post and that's perfectly fine, I don't demand that everyone share my beliefs. I'm having severe anxiety about a post I made that I think may have caused a lot of emotional damage and a lot of people to be very, very angry with me due to miscommunications, and I was wondering if it would be possible to get rid of just the one post, or edit it somehow even after the thread is closed. I made a dumb post on reddit about a local Underground Railroad Waystation I grew up near because the topic of Civil War and slavery was brought up in the thread and I was in a nostalgic mood and stupidly shared the fact that I grew up around that Waystation in the very huge, international forum of reddit. I mentioned that certainly no one owes anyone alive a thank you, it was a different generation, but I did mention that i thought that those people have been kind of weirdly ignored by Hollywood and pop culture, which I still think is true, but obviously African-American representation and more active operatives of the railroad deserve top billing and a lot more movies and attention first, I was just thinking out loud about the situation. The reddit post got a lot of attention I think because that's not a thing people talk about a lot and it's interesting to a lot of people. I later made a politically inflammatory post when I was in a very toxic, depressed anxious state about all the wars we have going on, and feeling depressed about all of murder. If I'm being honest it probably also came from a place of feeling upset and guilty about all of the anti-American condescension going around these days, especially in a place like reddit. I of course realize that there are in fact very good reasons to be criticizing America these days, and others, and that I shouldn't have really had any reaction at all, or at least just kept my mouth shut, but in my bad mental state I made a post about wanting military isolationism and "I'd rather be an isolationist dickhead than a stupid murderous brute," and gestured toward military neutrality, which of course is a very terrible thing to say on a public forum, especially one as open as Reddit. I would never actually go through with pulling the rug out from allies in real life, though if I'm being honest sometimes I do get isolationist out of emotion, and there is still a little part of me that is annoyed how much we are characterized as stupid murderous brutes while a lot of people also relying on us for their national security. Of course that's no reason to actually go through with screwing them over or anything like that, I just get really, really grumpy about it sometimes. I know I shouldn't, it's kind of dumb, people have the right to criticize, I sometimes have difficulty controlling emotions and don't always communicate the best. I am still very uncomfortable with all this murder and bloodshed and war and feel unclear how to get away from it in a moral way that doesn't screw people over. It's a topic I am always going in circles in in my head. Anyways, I immediately felt terrible about the post and deleted that reddit account, which I think led some people to Google my name in search of more information, possibly to get a better understanding of the recent surge American isolationism, so this is of international interest, yes? I think this brought them here, where they found a bunch of stupid posts I also wrote. A few years ago, when I was panicking about the border situation during the trump administration I was in anxious mood and made mention of the Underground Railroad in another forum because I was kind of weirdly fixated on that part of my childhood home at the time, and I mentioned how I thought that I had thought we might someday have to reopen the underground railroad for sentient AI (not an original idea, I know, it's in Blade Runner and stuff, I find it super interesting) but in my anxious state I kind of thought of the idea of reopening for this anti-Latino border emergency, it was a dumb thing to say publicly, and stupidly said I on account of the border control emergency it would not be AI but "just brown people again." This was in the context of other people referinng to things like "brown people getting screwed over," I didn't pull the phrase out of thin air, but still, ooof, I know, it was terrible, TERRIBLE wording, I typed "just" truly only because at the time I was tired and fixating on the on the idea of sentient AI, I didn't mean it at all as to indicate that brown people as somehow being less deserving of such a service or in any way shape or form lesser to me. It came from a place of wanting to help those people, you know, reopening the Railroad to get them out of those detention centers and whatnot, but I didn't make my intentions very clear, it was a short, emotional dumb little post I made when I was freaking out about the situation and also fixated on that hometown Waystation in my head. I'm very proud of my hometown's history with the underground railroad and have no reservations about it having been for minorities or anything like that, it was just extremely stupid and I would give anything to go back and clarify that post, I can’t edit it or delete it and a lot of people saw it and have been screaming at me. I'm sure some of it also comes from me not having much experienced with diversity, I grew up in the middle of nowhere with plenty of those types around and sometimes I probably sometimes find myself expressing in ways that could easily be misunderstood because I'm not very accustomed to talking about stuff like the Waystation, most people are very hush hush about it. For most of my life I've felt an intense emotion connection to place while not really having much opportunity to discuss it. Sometimes I do think it would be better to just talk about it more. So I'm thinking some people who saw that Reddit post Googled my name and found the other, terribly worded post, perhaps thinking I was trying to emotionally abuse people with a history out of hatred for black people or was just a soulless monster in general or something. It was nothing more than a dumb, poorly thought out mistake. It's not like I used to think that way and have since come around, it was just poorly phrased and thought out post, in which I was focusing on the AI aspect and forgot to clarify my feelings on the other aspect. I started seeing comments all over on Reddit and even some conversations in the news I'm thinking may have been referring to myself. The timing and context was very clear. I think it went viral in a huge, maybe even international way on account of the military isolationism and emotional Railroad history, and at one point I even had my computer speakers seemingly taken over when I was watching YouTube video and some person screamed at me "STOP APOLOGIZING FOR BEING TERRIBLE AND JUST STOP BEING TERRIBLE," probably as a reaction to me realizing what happened, freaking out, and going all over Reddit and the other thread and trying to apologize for the dumb posts I had made, like I did earlier. I imagine at this point we might be at something of a "damage done" situation, but I would love to input from people on how I might best go about apologizing or what the next best steps may be. It know, it was stupid and I should have been far more care with my wording, I'm a poorly educated rural fellow with limited diversity experience who is terrible at communication, and I was really fixated on that Waystation in the middle of Trump's horrific treatment of Hispanics at the border and I combined the two ideas in a really thoughtless way, and then far later accidentally sent a BUNCH of people to that post from Reddit. I imagine that could have been horrible and painful for some people. To be honest, I have been swimming in extreme misery and guilt about the situation for months now and it's just not going away and I can't get it out my head for five minutes. Sorry to dump all of this on you, I know I've been terrible and stupid in my word choice and communication, it's been an extremely difficult few years and I've been mentally unwell and anxious and depressed and angry and somehow irrationally upset at all of the anti-American sentiment even though I know it's warranted during such terrible political times, and that other countries should have the right to free speech too. That toxicity and anger took me to a dark, thoughtless place, and I've been reeling in regret and anxiety over that threatening message. Any advice you might be able to give me on the situation would be appreciated, I just don't know what to do and can't stop worrying about all of the emotional damage I may have accidentally caused, and hatred that may be being directed my way, some of it probably fair under the circumstances. It’s not hard to see why such a post could be taken poorly. Any thoughts you have would be appreciated, there is nothing I would like more than to undo the damage I have done here. For whatever the claim is worth, I really am interested in the Railroad as it related not only to hometown pride or whatever but far more importantly how it related to racial equality and some of the best values humanity has to offer, but I can see how people would look at my string of terrible posts and think I'm a monster, which I sort of was being in my mentally unwell state, which is probably led to that horrifying voice message I received. It couldn't have been further from my intentions in posting about the Railroad, I meant it in a spiritually supporting way, but I'm pretty sure I failed spectacularly at that. I can't stop feeling extremely terrible about it. I'm a bit of a mess these days. I have not been well. There is nothing I wouldn't give for a time machine right about now. Any thoughts or advice on the situation would be greatly appreciated, there is nothing I would like more than to undo the damage my thoughtlessness has done, especially during such turbulent times.

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July 12th, 2021

I posted some stuff from another conversation in there, that but about editing posts and whatnot is not relevant here, I can’t seem to edit it. Just looking for general thoughts and recommendations on the situation.

July 12th, 2021

Talking to some people, I think i may be misinterpreting events in my mental state, I’m not sure, it this may be an unnecessary post.

July 12th, 2021

This thread can be deleted, I think I'm just being paranoid about the response. I still feel bad about approaching such delicate topics with such thoghtlessness though, I am very sorry and will be more careful in the future. I do care about all of you out there, whoever my may happen to be.