you know, choosing to be nice is an actual *choice*. it's not easy to be nice. that's why the fandom is full of mean people. it takes patience and courage and a willingness to be misunderstood, because, haha, people will line up to believe all kinds of things about you--they'll believe anything other than that you sincerely want to be *that* nice. when the truth is that you have just as much potential to be mean as anybody else. it's how you choose to give in to that potential that sets you apart from all the people who routinely flame, mock, and/or belittle others.
and there comes a time when, no matter how nice you are, no matter how much good you try to bring to the fandom, when you have to say what you feel in order to continue having any amount of self-respect. After you've chosen to be nice, and air your issues civilly or not at all, for months and months and months in the face of someone who is continually offensive, and finally seen that they have *no* intention of respecting you when all you want to do is be left alone and ignored the way you have tried to ignore them; when they continue to mock, deride, disrespect and belittle you and your friends, and the things you care about...
well, when you've reached that point, you really don't care about judgments. You have to say what you have to say, and say it for yourself, in hopes that now you've made the offending person realize a few things, and, maybe because you need to show yourself that yes, you can be just as nasty and bitchy and mean as the rest of the people around you who are nasty and bitchy and mean on a regular basis. but you *don't* because you aren't like that. and if one absolutely sincere outburst can cause an end to months of private seething and holding your tongue because you're determined to be one of the people in this fandom who is consistently nice to everybody, then it's worth it.
and now you can return to the business of being sincerely nice to the rest of the fandom, with the knowledge that it's a choice, and that every day you make that choice makes you a better person, especially *after* you've gotten the worst out of your system.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
regna
(no subject)
Date: 2003-03-28 09:51 am (UTC)and there comes a time when, no matter how nice you are, no matter how much good you try to bring to the fandom, when you have to say what you feel in order to continue having any amount of self-respect. After you've chosen to be nice, and air your issues civilly or not at all, for months and months and months in the face of someone who is continually offensive, and finally seen that they have *no* intention of respecting you when all you want to do is be left alone and ignored the way you have tried to ignore them; when they continue to mock, deride, disrespect and belittle you and your friends, and the things you care about...
well, when you've reached that point, you really don't care about judgments. You have to say what you have to say, and say it for yourself, in hopes that now you've made the offending person realize a few things, and, maybe because you need to show yourself that yes, you can be just as nasty and bitchy and mean as the rest of the people around you who are nasty and bitchy and mean on a regular basis. but you *don't* because you aren't like that. and if one absolutely sincere outburst can cause an end to months of private seething and holding your tongue because you're determined to be one of the people in this fandom who is consistently nice to everybody, then it's worth it.
and now you can return to the business of being sincerely nice to the rest of the fandom, with the knowledge that it's a choice, and that every day you make that choice makes you a better person, especially *after* you've gotten the worst out of your system.