I Can’t Read the Comments

Thanks for your attention, and apologies for my weakness.

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

I stare at the words and feel the temperature rising behind my cheeks.

“It’s gross,” the comment reads, with a green vomit emoji as punctuation.

I don’t know whether those words were a comment on my opinion, me or the general theme of the story, catcalling.

But surely the vomit emoji was a little bit overkill, right?

Overcoming the critic

I knew I was writing an unpopular opinion, and that I was going to get some negative comments. I also think I deserved them, because I don’t necessarily think I should like being catcalled. I do honestly think it makes me a bad feminist, but my low self-esteem is stronger than my brain. That’s where the story came from.

Now, I know there are a lot of writers who try to annoy people on purpose. Social media is based on anger, and virality often comes from outrage. Medium isn’t troll-proof, by any means. In my case, I knew my story would offend somebody, but I didn’t publish it with that purpose. I don’t live for the outrage. I actually don’t enjoy it one bit.

Instead, I decided I wanted to be honest, no matter what it would bring along.