I got mastodoned the other day. It made me smile. I was asking for help setting up grapheneos to minimise Google invasive behaviour. I made a throwaway comment about my first love, lineage. A kindly fellow, enquired why I had switched operating system. I explained that my school was enforcing use of outlook and Microsoft's authenticator. My new friend suggested that I change school.
My first thought was that this was a proper fediverse or FOSS baptism. I now think it is a bit deeper. Assuming the suggestion was sincere (and I think it was), I could see why it would be annoying. It is so unhelpful, so supercilious and so not to the point. On the other hand, it is just some guy (probably) with a very narrow focus. There is no hostility, just someone who doesn't know how to express solidarity with others in writing. It was kind, well meant and wrong.
It is easy to read the lack of solidarity as a put down, especially if you are of low status in that context, like I am, or low status in lots of contexts like any non-normative person. I do think that we have to try to see beyond the 'merely' linguistic before we judge interactions as put downs or exclusionary.
My friend probably thought that the suggestion was friendly, not supercilious at all. He (?) would change school because Microsoft are so terrible. To not speak up is to treat me as a special case. That would have been a real lack of solidarity and not just a failure to read the room.
#Fediverse, #Culture
My first thought was that this was a proper fediverse or FOSS baptism. I now think it is a bit deeper. Assuming the suggestion was sincere (and I think it was), I could see why it would be annoying. It is so unhelpful, so supercilious and so not to the point. On the other hand, it is just some guy (probably) with a very narrow focus. There is no hostility, just someone who doesn't know how to express solidarity with others in writing. It was kind, well meant and wrong.
It is easy to read the lack of solidarity as a put down, especially if you are of low status in that context, like I am, or low status in lots of contexts like any non-normative person. I do think that we have to try to see beyond the 'merely' linguistic before we judge interactions as put downs or exclusionary.
My friend probably thought that the suggestion was friendly, not supercilious at all. He (?) would change school because Microsoft are so terrible. To not speak up is to treat me as a special case. That would have been a real lack of solidarity and not just a failure to read the room.
#Fediverse, #Culture
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