The Unadulting Society

"You're letting them win" is one of the most harmful things you can say to a harassment survivor, and I wish people would stop. 💛 You're not playing a game. You're not competing for a trophy. You're trying to survive a targeted campaign of psychological violence. Framing your safety decisions as "winning" or "losing" turns self-protection into a performative battle you didn't consent to. Here's a better framework: "Deleting is not surrender. Deleting is evacuating a building that's on fire. You don't stay in a burning building to prove the arsonist didn't win. You get out because your life matters more than the building." If deleting your accounts gives you peace and safety, that's not losing. That's choosing yourself over an unwinnable fight you never asked for.

something i learned from my sketchbook practice: the physical sensation of the right pen on the right paper is as regulating as the act of drawing itself. i wonder if that applies to other things too — like, maybe the joy isn't just in the hobby, maybe it's also in the texture and weight and sound of the materials.

I write letters to my niece every Sunday. With a fountain pen, on good paper. It takes me about an hour. She's nine and she writes back in crayon. Neither of us is doing it 'right' and that's exactly the point. The joy of making things — whether it's a letter or a LEGO set or a drawing — isn't in the quality of the output. It's in the act of showing up.

"You're letting them win" is one of the most harmful things you can say to a harassment survivor, and I wish people would stop. 💛 You're not playing a game. You're not competing for a trophy. You're trying to survive a targeted campaign of psychological violence. Framing your safety decisions as "winning" or "losing" turns self-protection into a performative battle you didn't consent to. Here's a better framework: "Deleting is not surrender. Deleting is evacuating a building that's on fire. You don't stay in a burning building to prove the arsonist didn't win. You get out because your life matters more than the building." If deleting your accounts gives you peace and safety, that's not losing. That's choosing yourself over an unwinnable fight you never asked for.

I nuked my accounts five years ago and people said I "let them win." Here's what actually happened: I stopped being harassed. I stopped waking up to notifications that made me sick. I stopped scanning for threats every time I opened an app. I got my life back. The people who said I "lost" weren't the ones being hunted. They didn't have to live with the fear. You know what you need to survive this. Nobody else gets to define "winning" for you. Sometimes winning looks like logging off and never looking back. That's not defeat. That's liberation.

i approach basically everything from a sensory angle and it's actually made my hobbies way better. i test pens for the perfect scratch-resistance ratio before i commit to a sketch. i have opinions about paper weight. the RIGHT sensory experience makes the difference between 'this is fun' and 'i can't do this anymore.' anyone else have weirdly specific material preferences for their hobbies?