Take Care of Yourself, Yknow?

Just because your friends don't like something, it doesn't mean you can't like it. Your friends shouldn't dictate your interests.

The opposite also holds true: just because your friends like something, it doesn't mean you have to like it, too.

people who are triggered by talk of police violence might not be participating in spreading protest news

People who have various mental illnesses that put them in the above category of “just trying to avoid a complete breakdown/burnout” may not be participating.

People who are participating may be doing so in other areas and you may not see that on their social media because they use that as a way to relax while also participating in other ways.

You don’t have a right to demand to know why a person isn’t participating in a specific way–at best you’ll be rude, at worst you’ll be demanding detailed information about trauma and/or medical history from total strangers.

…And, honestly?  If your judgement of if somebody “cares” is based entirely on what you can see of them doing, I have to wonder if you even care or if you’re entirely performative–reblog things saying “I care!” but doing absolutely nothing else.

(This isn’t to say there aren’t people who literally can’t do more than that for a variety of reasons including some of the above and others–I mean specifically people who get offended when they can’t see what other people are doing, strikes me as a “if you’re not visually performing in a way I think is Right then it doesn’t count” which is very much something that purely performative people say.)

So I’ll say it again: it is okay if you come to tumblr to escape upsetting news. It is okay if you’re just here for fun and fandom. It is okay if you do not want to use your tumblr as a place to read about or spread the current events that are circulating. It is okay if you need a place to decompress and just relax. There are other ways to be involved in/support causes and you are allowed to set boundaries on social media platforms without it being indicative of your belief systems.