I heard the word “profilicity” years ago and loved it immediately. I’ve been disappointed that it hasn’t caught on.
The idea is that, on social media, you profile-ize yourself.
You can be a “boy mom in Texas” or a “human rights lawyer who loves pugs.”
You can be a smile in a suit or dirty jeans at a festival.
But that’s ALL you can be. That one frame.
It flattens us.
We’re different as a culture now than before we started doing this to each other.
Confusion about the human vs. the brand was once a problem for celebrities.
Now it has us all.
Change
I knew who I was once. 160 characters felt like enough to sum me up.
It may have gone: “I’m a singer, and I love Jesus.”
A few years later, I was no longer her.
It ached – the feeling that someone wearing my body had embarrassed — no, slandered — me all this time.
Walking from place to place saying things I now find offensive.
And that people could still think I’m her.
When I deleted Facebook a decade ago, it felt like killing off this character.
I wanted a chance to be someone new.
Misunderstanding
Man, do I wrestle with language. Even now. It hurts to write this.
Language is an abstraction. I’m using words that inevitably mean something different to me than they mean to you.
Sometimes it’s a difference in connotation (e.g. the word “loser” being used to mean “failure,” not “uncool”).
Sometimes it’s a full-fledged misunderstanding.
Like if I say, “Elon Musk is autistic”–
You might hear, “Ann is noticing similarities between Elon Musk’s documented behavior and traits associated with autism.”
Or, “Ann hates Elon Musk.”
Or, “Ann thinks badly of autistic people.”
Or, “Ann thinks autism is an excuse for bad behavior.”
You won’t remember the actual words I said, just the way you filtered it.
I could say everything I’ve written here so far in 1,000 different ways.
But I can’t climb into your head to check that I’m understood.
I have a chip on my shoulder about being understood.
Key people in my life leaned a lot on denial.
If something bad happens and it upsets you beyond your capacity to deal with it, you can put it out of your mind.
But you might start doing it with everything you dislike.
Continually erasing your loved ones. Basic facts about them.
It’s like talking to someone with dementia, except I always think this thing is so obvious and essential and last time I explained it so well that there’s no way this could happen again.
It does.
Early in our relationship, my partner referenced something I said.
I suppose my life experience had trained me that this sort of thing would be forgotten.
I cried.
Happy tears.
I was understood.
I have this vision of falling down a well. Blackness. Thrashing my arms and legs against air. Screaming. But no one hears.
That’s what misunderstanding feels like to me. Hopeless aloneness.
The longer we go as a society assuming words are infallible carriers of meaning —
Where few ask clarifying questions —
The more doomed it seems we are.
Multiplicity
I started this essay by stating disappointment – does that paint me as a whiny person?
If I write a melancholy essay, will you expect me to be somber rather than loud and enthusiastic?
(I am both.)
People contain multitudes.
I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that most Twitter mobs are made up of teenagers.
The ones still simple enough for 160 characters.
Theirs is a view in which a fully formed villain goes through life leaking proof of their villainy (in old tweets).
But even disregarding how people change —
How often does anyone 100% agree with themself?
No “part of me thinks x; part of me feels y.”
My mind is an open mic with a full roster.
One part has the stage now, but they’re all angling for their time.
I can’t get myself 100% on board to eat a can of soup. It’s a lot of sodium. I should eat the vegetables in the fridge.
I’m 60% yes to eating the soup, and that’s good enough.
I might take a picture that reminds me of sunshine on my skin, today. But tomorrow all I see is stretch marks.
I might make a joke that feels cheeky and mischievous, today. But tomorrow the words sting.
Today, tomorrow.
Now, 10 minutes from now.
When I think of this, when I go to there.
I am an organism. I’m alive.
We can try to flatten ourselves, but we pop right back up.
The screens can’t capture us.