Twitter and I used to have a good relationship.

I’ll never forget the first giddy thrill of interacting with Clive Barker over a few precious tweets. A new Hellraiser comic was out and I was curious if it was an iteration of his long-gestating (and since published) Pinhead novel or if it was new material. I fired off a tweet to Clive (I feel like I can call him Clive now we’re Twitter buddies) without expecting a response and was shocked and delighted when he responded a few minutes later. No, the comic had nothing to do with his novel but thanks for asking.

So cool.

Over the years, my twitter feed provided me with news, celebrity gossip, interesting links and no shortage of hilarious non-sequiturs. I used it to promote my novels, to share blog posts, to answer reader questions. It brought value to my life.

And then Trump happened.

In the months leading up to the election, my twitter feed became clogged with increasingly more panicked sentiments of the ‘let’s all just grit our teeth and bear it till Hilary gets in and this clown can disappear’ flavour. When the unthinkable happened and Trump won the presidency my feed became an echo chamber of outrage, depression and (justifiable) anxiety.

It’s only gotten worse.

With the President routinely tweeting hateful, ignorant or downright moronic nonsense, anyone with a phone has the seeming tacit permission to spew forth their own venomous thoughts. After all, if the Commander in Chief doesn’t feel the need to hold himself up to any sort of public discourse standard than why should they?

Trump lowered the bar, maybe knocked it away completely.

Still, I would check in with Twitter from time to time but more frequently I would do so with a knot of tension in my gut. What horrible thing has the President done today? How much closer has he pushed the US towards a grim totalitarian state? There was still good stuff but Twitter now resembled a battleground more than a social network with each side of the political divide trying to score points off the other.

It took the latest US school shooting to force me to cut ties indefinitely with Twitter. After recoiling in horror at the loss of life, I was thrown into an impotent fury by the attitudes of the pro-gun lobbyists who took to Twitter declaring loudly that they still saw no reason for stronger gun legislation.

I randomly clicked on a dozen or so of these pro-gun fools, desperately trying to find an explanation for their objectively deplorable political stance and only saw more examples of bigotry and ignorance. I despaired that the world contained people like this. I felt soul sick.

And so I deleted Twitter from my phone.

I still have an account and maybe when (if) Trump slithers back into his swamp, I’ll check back in. Until then, I’ll happily get my social media fix via Instagram. Call me shallow, but I’ll take boring photos of Sunday’s breakfast and CGI instababes over hateful political rhetoric any day of the week. Now, I just need to check if Clive Barker has an Instagram account.

If you’re interested, you can follow my Instagram feed by clicking here.

M.J.

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