Things Could Get Worse
I'm not sure how, though.
To start off with, I am *still* ill with swine flu. I desperately want to go back to work tomorrow, but today, when I thought I would be all better, I'm still collapsing after walking as far as the local shops - and the bus stop is another block further than that.
I got banned from ILX today and I don't entirely understand why. A topic I was interested in (about eroticism - specifically about what kind of cues one takes for masturbation) got locked for no reason after only 4 posts, none of which were nasty in the slightest. On a board where it's perfectly acceptable to post about pretty much anything (there was at the time three separate thread revives about foreskins and circumcision so it's not like this is a prudish place). I asked why, kind of wondering, not just why the thread was locked, but where the line between acceptable and unacceptable was, on that board. The threads kept disappearing. A mod I know IRL said "oh, cause things like that always turn into clusterfucks" and I said, half joking, "stop being so repressed and English." Finally someone I didn't even know was even a moderator said "I locked it, and if you keep asking about it, I'm gonna ban you."
I left the mod thread, went back to a "joke" parody thread about it, said I really didn't understand what the hell had just happened, and said that I'd been told I would be banned if I mentioned it again - BOOM - I was banned.
And I'm... I'm near suicidally upset about this. A community I've been a part of for 8 years. Friends I've known for ever, in internet terms, and I'm suddenly cut off from them. For no reason I understand. I still don't get what was so outrageous about that thread that it was locked, and why I was banned for disputing the locking of it. And for this I'm kicked off the single longest-running cohesive... thing I've ever been a part of in my life? I've never had a job for 8 years. I've never had a relationship or a band for 8 years. But on the whim of some stranger, I can be excluded.
No, I am not happy. I'm feeling very fucking isolated and alone right now, thank you very much. I've been quarantined from the outside world for 5 days now, with the internet my only lifeline, and now that's been cut off. As if it's not enough of a slap in the face to realise - OK, you need medicine for this illness. You cannot leave the house. You are not actually even well enough to get the half mile to the shop, even if you were not quarantined. You have no housemate, no partner, no family within a hundred miles. You are not on good enough speaking terms with your neighbours to ask them for a favour. The one friend you have who lives in the same neighbourhood as you has gone out of town for the night. You. Are. Fucked.
And now some stranger has taken away your safety valve, your connection.
I know I'm out of the woods now, I'm no longer that ill, I just have the long boring recuperation to deal with. But it rubs home again, if I died tomorrow, how long before anyone would know? How long before anyone would care?
It opens up those big, scary questions. What the fuck am I even here for?
Oh, I've been spending all weekend remastering old Shimura Curves tracks. For what? I can't even get my bandmates to listen to them, how on earth am I gonna persuade the world? I set up a community board so we could all communicate. Only half the band even signed up for it. I put the whole back catalogue up on one of the threads to go through and pick the track list. A week later, I can see from the stats that only one person has even looked at it, and that's Chris at our label. What am I even doing this for?
What am I doing this for? To show off to a bunch of geeks on the I'm A Producer, Too forum? What for? "I've got a deal and you haven't." ? I lose, coz they've got a life and I haven't.
I don't know why I'm doing this. Everything seems pointless right now. Going to bed. Staying awake writing. Finishing the album. Shelving it again. Going to the doctor to get work certified. Not going to the doctor, not going to work. Living. Dying. Breathing. Stopping. This is fucking desolate.
To start off with, I am *still* ill with swine flu. I desperately want to go back to work tomorrow, but today, when I thought I would be all better, I'm still collapsing after walking as far as the local shops - and the bus stop is another block further than that.
I got banned from ILX today and I don't entirely understand why. A topic I was interested in (about eroticism - specifically about what kind of cues one takes for masturbation) got locked for no reason after only 4 posts, none of which were nasty in the slightest. On a board where it's perfectly acceptable to post about pretty much anything (there was at the time three separate thread revives about foreskins and circumcision so it's not like this is a prudish place). I asked why, kind of wondering, not just why the thread was locked, but where the line between acceptable and unacceptable was, on that board. The threads kept disappearing. A mod I know IRL said "oh, cause things like that always turn into clusterfucks" and I said, half joking, "stop being so repressed and English." Finally someone I didn't even know was even a moderator said "I locked it, and if you keep asking about it, I'm gonna ban you."
I left the mod thread, went back to a "joke" parody thread about it, said I really didn't understand what the hell had just happened, and said that I'd been told I would be banned if I mentioned it again - BOOM - I was banned.
And I'm... I'm near suicidally upset about this. A community I've been a part of for 8 years. Friends I've known for ever, in internet terms, and I'm suddenly cut off from them. For no reason I understand. I still don't get what was so outrageous about that thread that it was locked, and why I was banned for disputing the locking of it. And for this I'm kicked off the single longest-running cohesive... thing I've ever been a part of in my life? I've never had a job for 8 years. I've never had a relationship or a band for 8 years. But on the whim of some stranger, I can be excluded.
No, I am not happy. I'm feeling very fucking isolated and alone right now, thank you very much. I've been quarantined from the outside world for 5 days now, with the internet my only lifeline, and now that's been cut off. As if it's not enough of a slap in the face to realise - OK, you need medicine for this illness. You cannot leave the house. You are not actually even well enough to get the half mile to the shop, even if you were not quarantined. You have no housemate, no partner, no family within a hundred miles. You are not on good enough speaking terms with your neighbours to ask them for a favour. The one friend you have who lives in the same neighbourhood as you has gone out of town for the night. You. Are. Fucked.
And now some stranger has taken away your safety valve, your connection.
I know I'm out of the woods now, I'm no longer that ill, I just have the long boring recuperation to deal with. But it rubs home again, if I died tomorrow, how long before anyone would know? How long before anyone would care?
It opens up those big, scary questions. What the fuck am I even here for?
Oh, I've been spending all weekend remastering old Shimura Curves tracks. For what? I can't even get my bandmates to listen to them, how on earth am I gonna persuade the world? I set up a community board so we could all communicate. Only half the band even signed up for it. I put the whole back catalogue up on one of the threads to go through and pick the track list. A week later, I can see from the stats that only one person has even looked at it, and that's Chris at our label. What am I even doing this for?
What am I doing this for? To show off to a bunch of geeks on the I'm A Producer, Too forum? What for? "I've got a deal and you haven't." ? I lose, coz they've got a life and I haven't.
I don't know why I'm doing this. Everything seems pointless right now. Going to bed. Staying awake writing. Finishing the album. Shelving it again. Going to the doctor to get work certified. Not going to the doctor, not going to work. Living. Dying. Breathing. Stopping. This is fucking desolate.
posted by Masonic Boom | 8:04 pm
5 Comments:
I would suggest a holiday in the sunshine in a strange place. It won't help with any substantive problems but it'll buy your psyche some time to fix itself, like a medically-induced coma.
Funny you should say that. I've been looking at 1) courses in learning Turkish 2) books about persian carpets and the mosques of Istanbul and 3) planning a holiday spent shopping for carpets and marvelling at the Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque. I think it would be good for my soul.
If you go the week of September 14, I'll stand you a mint tea!
You may have noticed that your banning has created something of a storm in the ILX waters. Suffice to say, the people responsible have unbanned and explained/apologised and so on. It's probably not much consolation, I know.
God, how many years was it that nobody got banned ever, unless outright racism/offensiveness?
"Abuse of power comes as no surprise" as someone once said.
I know. But even since unbanning, I've kind of lost the urge to post. I kind of half-heartedly lurk, but it's kind of lost its sense of... I just don't feel engaged with it any more. Disconnected, like I don't really belong. Like I'm being judged and coming up short - though judged by whom, I don't know. Someone much less experienced and more judgmental, I suspect.
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