it makes me so mad that the shitty parts of the internet prey on awkward outcast children (boys), often with no real understanding of what they’re talking about, to drag them in and mold them into shitty, bigoted human beings. like we have a student who’s fourteen? fifteen? and he makes terrible, offensive jokes and memes that he flat-out does not understand and is just mimicking because he found them on the internet. he barely has a concept that gay people exist (and I know this through conversations with him), he didn’t know that “no homo” was a joke about gay people, and he recently asked annie if the holocaust really happened. not because he’s a denier or anything, but just because that’s where his level of conceptualization is at. I’m worried that he’s gonna get pulled into alt-right shit (which is especially going to hurt him because he’s autistic and not white) because he doesn’t understand what any of it means and thinks it’s just funny internet stuff.
it makes me scared and angry. I understand that he’s causing damage to people around him, but he’s also being preyed on. as an adult, that’s a perspective that I am able to have. and as an adult, I know that he is literally a child. I hate it.
my cousin is at this point and his father is an aggressive trump supporter to boot
at christmas he asked me about politics and we had a calm and fun discussion. he was honestly just curious and when i brought up points about lgbt+ rights or healthcare his response was often “oh really? how does that work with __? or never thought about that before!”
he was just honestly curious and was hearing ideas and facts he had never heard before and he loved it!! he just wanted to get informed on politics and the only prior sources he had had had all been super conservative. he wanted to hear all the facts before choosing his own policies!
then his dad interrupted us and started yelling at me about trump being great and to my cousin’s credit he thought it was just as embarrassing and ignorant as i did even though his dad is a big influence in his life (he’s a very overbearing father)
he picked up “trigger” jokes from the internet and i explained to him why they’re shitty and he was like “oh!!! that’s…. a real jerk move to make a joke about? sorry! i’ll make sure not to do it again”
so many of these kids are in vulnerable/curious points in their life and simultaneously getting swept up in shitty corners of the internet and i hate it it makes me sad. they are good and want to be friends with people like any other person (esp older people they look up to?) and there are people who take advantage of it
