Thread by @JulieRohrYEG

A wee thread about how people in power can subconsciously try to diminish voices of others. Last night when I was sitting with @punchedfaceguy, chatting w the sheriffs who patrol the legislative grounds, one of them used the phrase: “twitter isn’t real life.” 1/

#Ableg #Abpoli

It was in the context of asking Albert "why are you doing this? What’s the point? Who will hear you?” Albert tried to explain: even if few people were ON the grounds to see him all night, there were still plenty of people watching/supporting online & it was important to him. 2/

The sheriff (who was, incidentally, very respectful, and simply doing his his job) was a bit perplexed and said something along the lines of “Edmonton has over a million people. How many people can really be online knowing about you – I mean, twitter isn’t real life.” 3/

I shrugged and responded. “I mean, this IS real life, because I met this guy through twitter, and now I’m sitting here in front of you.” Alive, in person, right there. I talked about the thousands of Albertans watching political debate online. ONLINE is the current arena. 4/

Later, when they left, I told Albert it was interesting I’d heard/seen certain UCP folks & people in my circles (mostly conservative supporters) use this very phrase: “twitter is not real life.” It seems an easy thing to say when you don’t like what you’re hearing on here. 5/

Around 7 million Canadians (of ~38 million) use twitter. About 6 million Canadians are under 14 so if we don’t count them, that’s about 22% of Canada using twitter. Give or take. Facebook is higher, at 19 million Canadian users. Here are a few interesting stats. 6/

Of course I understand when I’m speaking with someone online, I’m not SPEAKING to them face to face, so in that sense, the sheriff was right. But to dismiss ‘social media users’ as not being ‘real life’ is shortsighted & I believe it’s a tactic used to silence/undermine voices 7/

Very real social and political movements have started online in the past couple of years, some of them spilling out into the streets and marches, others existing mainly online, but many resulting in real public awareness and change in either case. 8/

When I chatted about it with Albert, he wryly said “two words. Donald Trump.” EXACTLY. The man lived out his unfathomable presidency via live-tweet, and while it was painful and horrible to watch, it was REAL LIFE, reflected online. For better or worse, this is where we are. 9/

Even aside from political or other activism, twitter has resulted in REAL LIFE friends for me. I have met up with dozens of you in person after only meeting on this platform, and have gone on to have ongoing, longterm, in-person friendships. I’m so very grateful! 10/

I DO recognize the echo chambers this platform (and others) can & do create. I recognize the difficulty of conversing on here, and I FAR prefer to dialogue face to face. As much as possible, for many reasons. Nevertheless, I’ve had real and important conversations here, too. 11/

PLUS, the whole world is now able to connect instantly, in ways previously unknown to humankind. This has its drawbacks, of course, & we’ve seen many of them in the past 15 months/4 years. But it also has its advantages, and we should not discount those. 12/

To summarize: I think it’s important to recognize these casual comments for what they are– an attempt to discredit individuals & grassroots groups who organize at this level. Social media is here to stay, like it or not, and it most certainly IS part of real life. -fin