February 17, 2017
One of the greatest challenges in my life is reconciling the part of me that likes to be a little shit with the part of me that wants to be a kind, loving, and compassionate person. So far, these two parts of me have been like oil and water. How can I manage to extend kindness to others while simultaneously fucking with them? It just does not seem to work. Unfortunately, I am unable to give up either my love for people or my love for fucking with people.
And nothing triggers these two head-butting sides of my personality like taking a stroll around the online neighborhood social network “Nextdoor.com.”
For those of you who are unfamiliar with Nextdoor.com it is a social media platform like Facebook. But, rather than connecting you to friends you know, Nextdoor connects you to people who live within a certain radius of your house, i.e., neighbors who you may or may not know.
Nextdoor.com defines itself as a “private social network for neighborhoods.” And, indeed, it is private – Nextdoor makes you provide proof of your address before allowing you to join the online neighborhood. And according to its mission statement, Nextdoor aims to “provide a trusted platform where neighbors work together to build stronger, safer, and happier communities all over the world.”
To further its mission, Nextdoor has issued a number of “community guidelines.” Perusing the community guidelines you can’t help but realize that you are definitely not on Facebook anymore. The “community guidelines,” or as I refer to them, the “castrating guidelines,” are a very extensive set of rules governing how you must behave on Nextdoor. Per the guidelines, a number of topics are off limits when interacting with your neighbors online. A few examples include, politics, inflammatory language, “controversial issues,” cursing, campaigning, and profanity. Although they don’t directly address the issue of whether posting a photo of your cleavage and trying to pass it off as a picture of your “face” is copacetic, I am guessing it’s not.
Excessive rules that try to micromanage my behavior function as Miracle Grow for the part of my personality that loves to cause trouble. And I probably should not have joined Nextdoor to begin with. Furthermore, a typical newsfeed on Nextdoor is about as captivating as the terms and conditions of a new Apple software update. There’s just no heart in the posts – and, gee, I wonder why? Maybe it has something to do with the billions of rules we are all supposed to adhere to that suck all of the life and passion out of this “online neighborhood community.”
I felt a responsibility to breathe a little life onto this anemic online forum. Additionally, with all of those restrictions on our behavior, it seemed to me that Nextdoor was just begging to be fucked with. And I was just the person to do it. Plus, I wanted to know how much could I get away with given the somewhat obnoxious and controlling standard of decorum Nextdoor wanted us all to abide by.
Operation: Fuck with Nextdoor.com, commence.
I started off slow. A rookie move would be to jump in too quickly and attract too much attention. An exceptionally terrible rookie move would be to pull a Nextdoor drive by and just type the word “dildo” in the comments section of a post – something I have dreamt of doing on more than one occasion. But, I had to hold myself to a higher standard here – When messing with my neighbors, I needed to be more sophisticated than my immature, 13 year-old boy side wanted me to be.
I needed to be calculated, so watched the newsfeed for a few days and got the lay of the land. I identified the regulars – i.e., the ones you do not want to fuck with straight out of the gate. And, instead of being a shit right away, I added thoughtful and smart comments to threads that had been started by others to establish my legitimacy. “Oh, you would like to see more censorship on Nextdoor because you are seeing neighbors being snippy to one another? I am sorry, but that would be a poor decision. Not only does it violate the spirit of the First Amendment, but silencing people is never a good long-term solution to mean-spirited speech” I wrote. “Oh, you are looking for a harpist for your daughter’s wedding reception? Well, let me connect you with my friend who used to be a harpist. I am sure she has connections in the area” I offered.
My sucking up period, when I set a precedent for being a smart, mature, and helpful neighbor, did not last long, however. Soon, the thoughts came creeping in: “How much can you get away with on here Julie?! Let’s see! Please, oh please! This website sucks! Someone needs to do something! And that someone is YOU!” The temptation was too much for me – I gave in.
“Mushrooms that look like penises.” My fingers could not type the words fast enough into the google image search box. After downloading the most phallic mushrooms image imaginable, I excitedly logged into my Nextdoor account. “Can someone help me identify this type of mushroom? These were growing in a dark and much-neglected corner of my backyard,” I posted.
I was filled with excitement and a great sense of satisfaction. I could not believe I had posted a photo of multiple throbbing penis mushrooms on the oh so classy Nextdoor.com! This was great stuff! But in addition to my glee, I was also feeling guilty and I began worrying. What if I have gone too far too soon?! Obviously I had to figure out and practice what I would say to any moderator who might admonish me for the dick-shrooms. “These mushrooms were growing in my backyard. I posted a photo of them to find out if they would be poisonous to my dog. Clearly, YOU are the pervert here because it was you, not me, who saw them and immediately thought of genitalia,” I rehearsed.
After about a half an hour passed with no responses, I started feeling a bit ashamed. Maybe I was just too crude and everyone was repulsed by my immaturity? But, the high from being so ridiculous quickly countered the voices in my head that were starting to shame me. In my head, there was an all out war between the mature and immature parts of myself and I was not sure who was going to win. My maturity whispered: “Julie, it’s not nice to play pranks on people.” My immaturity immediately retorted “Yes, Julie, but maturity wouldn’t know fun if it fell on maturity’s face and did a lap dance!” I heard them both, but I could not help but notice that immaturity did not whisper.
As time kept passing with no comments, I nervously waited to be scolded. But then the strangest thing happened. The scolding never came. Oddly enough, people started responding. They claimed familiarity with the mushrooms and to be able to correctly identify them. I could not believe it! Some people even posted Latin genus and species names for the mushrooms. In the end, the thread devolved into one want-to-be ecologist trying to outsmart another want-to-be ecologist regarding who correctly named the mushrooms – each fiercely asserting that he was right. The thread ended there.
In hindsight, I wish I had ended the thread by submitting my own comment: “Thank you all so much for your help, but a botanist friend helped me identify the mushrooms. They are called schlongus weinerus and they are not poisonous.” But, hindsight is 20/20.
I realized after the phallic mushroom post that I needed to up the ante. Clearly, I could get away with posting genitalia shaped anything on there. Noted.
