Nothing makes me feel elderly like logging on to one of the social media platforms to see the same exact damn conversation I've been seeing for years. This weekend, on Twitter, people are debating how many people you should sleep with (prudes vs. enlightened). On Bluesky, the debate is over whether it is cheaper to make your own food or get delivery. I'm sick of repeats! Based on my decade of professional blogging, I can predict that next we will discuss either Irish goodbyes or washing your legs.
All of these discourses have, at their base, the tenor of a party question. They carry the same base-level severity as asking everyone after two beers whether they consider themselves mean or annoying. (The trick to that question is if you try to say it's complicated, you get auto-sorted into annoying.) Online, the goodwill of a fun conversation evaporates instantly. The aim becomes not to have a good time, but to win.
The thing is: You cannot win an online discourse. You are yelling into the void. No one is listening to each other. No one is changing their mind. Everyone has already decided that they are right and morally pure and will not be swayed.
Every once in a while, a new discourse does emerge to bless us with its ire. Last week, for example, people became very upset about ... translations of The Odyssey? This, I welcome. It's at least not regurgitative. It may be stupid, but at least I got to read a new Wikipedia page. Discourses like this are rare. More often than not, the discourse is stale before it even begins. Someone posts one of these questions, which have already been litigated to death on every platform, and the whole conversation begins anew with no new information and no new stances. The sides are the same. The talking points are the same. The outrage (faux or sincere) is the same. We exist in a Groundhog Day of online conversation.
Here are all the discourses I can remember, ranked by how much we do not need to have that conversation anymore:
- Is Die Hard a Christmas movie?
- How early you should get to the airport
- Tipping
- Do bisexuals exist?
- Body counts
- Booing
- Followback culture
- Polyamory
- Irish goodbyes
- Should a video game have a woman in it? (Gamergate)
- Who pays for the first date?
- Posting Twitter screenshots on Bluesky
- Picky eaters (adults)
- Is a hot dog a sandwich?
- Is "Baby It's Cold Outside" rape culture?
- Fare evasion
- Reading as a moral act
- Cast-iron pans
- Pit bulls
- "No teenager's favorite piece of culture is [classic book/movie]"
- Ordering takeout vs. cooking at home
- Washing your legs
- MFAs
- Are audiobooks reading?
- Using a top sheet
- Choosing not to have children
- Walkable cities
- Los Angeles
- YIMBY/upzoning
- Is it immoral to order things online?
- Reading 100 books a year
- Masking
- Ozempic
- Outdoor cats
- Age gap
These have been discoursed to death, and I declare them closed. Rest in peace to these discourses.
