My Girlfriend Is Too Cool For Social Media

i work in social media so it’s literally my JOB to be online but I also enjoy a recreational hour or so of doomscrolling a day, tiktok is my drug of choice. my girlfriend is one of those people who “doesn’t really do social media” and treats my usage like it’s a moral failing. she literally cuts me off when i start to say “i saw this person on tiktok who—” and says that’s not real life and she might as well be talking to an algorithm. she does not have any social media accounts. she talks about my screen time like it’s smoking. am i actually too online or is she just judging me for something that’s normal for people our age? i’m 28 and she is 40.  i do feel lately like……maybe she’s right, maybe my brain is destroyed, maybe talking about tiktoks is talking about nothing and i should read more books. 

Valerie: She sounds incredibly dismissive in a way that is not healthy for your relationship, in my opinion. She can not have social media all she wants, but it’s not like you’re trying to tell her what ChatGPT said (which would be like talking to an algorithm). TikTok is full of real people with real stories worth talking about. I understand that there is definitely such a thing as “too online” but I also think there’s such a thing as too OFFline. I learn so much about other people and myself through social media. I learn things about myself and my neurodivergencies through other people talking about it. I learn things about the way other people’s brains work. I learn about other cultures and countries and people I might never have encountered. I get recommendations of books I otherwise might never have heard of, no matter how often I was reading. I can’t even blame your age gap because I’m almost 40 and and a lot of my conversations with my friends involve at least one thing we learned from or heard on TikTok. She has every right to decide to not be on social media, and good for her or whatever, but that doesn’t automatically make her better than anyone else, and doesn’t give her the right to shut you down when you’re trying to talk about an experience you had, even if that experience was online.

Summer: I loathe to admit it, but an hour or two of idle social media scrolling is the norm in most developed countries. I do think it’s the kind of activity that could be considered problematic or risky if we look at it with a level head. But we’re not in a level-headed society anymore — social media already saw to that.

Even if your social media use is problematic, being incredibly judgemental and outright rude about it isn’t helpful. Shaming you into the ground isn’t a good way to align you to a ‘healthier’ path even if it was necessary. I don’t know enough about your social media use to remark on whether it’s actively harmful to you. I just think your girlfriend’s response is harsh and unhelpful. If you took a decision to pull away from social media, that should be made on your terms and she should be a supportive actor. I don’t think it’s her place to take charge of your intervention and shush you before you’re ready to reduce your social media usage.

Nico: I don’t see how you could work in social media and not recreationally use social media in order to stay current. That would be like being a sommelier who did not drink wine or a fast food cook who never ate anything fried. Fried foods and alcohol are both technically bad for us, but these are things many people enjoy in moderation, much like scrolling on TikTok, and if your job is reliant on knowledge of one of these mediums, then it makes more than a little sense to me that you would spend time outside of work seeing what’s out there and refining and expanding your tastes.

So, while it doesn’t hurt to read more books, that is not a reason for your girlfriend to treat you this way. Social media is your job and a big aspect of your life, but even if it wasn’t, treating interests she doesn’t share as somehow immoral is unhealthy behavior within any relationship, especially a romantic one. Showing contempt for a partner can be emotional abuse. By devaluing your interests and work, she is committing character assasination and belittling you, putting herself on the moral high ground. You bring up smoking, but I think that the same would apply to someone deriding a partner for smoking — contempt is not a healthy way to handle it.

The internet and social media also do very much affect real life. People are on or offline to various degrees, but it still exists even if one does not pay attention to it. But honestly, arguing about that is way less important to me than the simple facts regarding your reported treatment from your girlfriend. I don’t like that she cuts you off, that she establishes herself as your moral superior, that she takes no interest in your interests, and that she belittles you. I hope you can try talking to her about this. If she cannot see that her dismissiveness is actually problemetic, then, honestly, I think it might be time to move on.

Riese: Well, on the one hand, TikTok is definitely harming our brains and meanwhile, it’s definitely true that reading books is good for the brain. On the other hand, TikTok is quite entertaining and she sounds really judgmental and I hope that her judgment does not extend to your literal career! And there are some aspects of social media that are good insofar as they enable us to bear witness to the lives of people we care about but don’t see enough (it helps to turn off suggested posts on instagram to just keep your feed to people you follow). I fear scorn at this level is often a stepping stone towards behavior that can be a bit more controlling. She’s waving a yellow flag that might be worth noting. Also, perhaps you’re just not particularly compatible?

I’m a trans police officer. How can I best exist in queer spaces without alienating myself by being truthful about my job when asked what I do for a living? Would it just be best to lie?

Valerie: Don’t lie. It’s not a secret you can keep forever, and it would be worse for someone to find out you’re a cop AND you lied about it. My question would be: is there anything you’re doing as a cop to actively reform the system from the inside? Not just by being trans, but by participating in or leading programs or advocating for change in a big way or actively dismantling broken systems? If so, you can talk about that. If not, you’re just a cop and a lot of queer people aren’t going to want to be friends with cops and that’s just a reality you’ll have to deal with. To them, you represent the system that is biased against them and other minority groups, more so with every year of the current administration, and for a lot of people that’s not something they can set aside or look past to form a friendship. Some people might be able to, but you can’t be dishonest in your quest to find them.

Summer: Damn we really doing Assigned Cop At Birth (ACAB)? lmao

I’m going to reserve my complex judgments about how ‘all police participate in a repressive, self-serving system while being a useful defence in their role under some circumstances’ because I think you’ve heard that. I’ll start by concurring with Valerie. It’s not worth lying about and it’s not worth living a lie. It’ll cost you friendships and connections, but you’re trans, so you should know that living an honest and authentic vision of yourself is more important than concealing a large part of your life.

The more optimist in me recommends that you use your reach and authority to (legally) support your communities of practice and loved ones. All cops participate in a repressive and violent system, but there are good cops. Those facts can coexist. And if you turned your means toward building the community, aiding people, and doing the best you can as a servant to society… I don’t think you need to bear any guilt for your job title. Be the change, as they say.

Nico: Don’t ever lie about this — it’ll be worse when (not if) you get found out. Being a cop is a public job and someone is going to spot you sooner or later. As my colleagues have said, there are going to be a number of people who do not want to associate with you, and that is the price of the job you chose. However, you do have the option to hold yourself to the highest possible moral standards and do your best to reform from the inside, as Summer suggests. As a trans person in the police force, you have an opportunity to try to educate your coworkers and to advocate for trans and queer community members. I also think that if you feel like you want to stop being a cop, that you can start working on education, training or licensing, job searches, graduate school applications, starting a small business — whatever is going to clear a path toward your next step. If you don’t want to be a cop because of how you feel about it morally and from a community perspective, it’s never too late to change your mind. I know multiple people who’ve left law enforcement or adjacent backgrounds, transitioned to other career paths, and done the work and proven commitment to living up to high ethical standards that has allowed them to integrate with queer community, including leftist queer communities.

Riese: Yeah, don’t lie! I don’t think queer communities are a monolith, there are some where many aren’t interested in forming relationships with police officers or being around them, but there are also some where it won’t be a barrier. But with both I think people would hope you’d And I do know there can be a lot of complex factors that go into choosing that career path. That all said, I agree with my fellow advice-givers here, what work are you doing to reform the system from the inside? I think that’s a good thing to think about no matter who you want to be friends with.