Why can't we be happy for anyone anymore?

I have been staying a little bit clear of social media since the Christmas break allowed me to take a pause, reflect and re-charge. But as I slide towards the building momentum created by the events and projects due to take place in 2026, I have posted a few times and tried to keep up with things. Now, I almost wish it would cease to exist.

 

It’s just that I don’t see positive comments about anything anymore. The internet is awash with bitter jealousy, vengeful spite and comments designed to pull anything and anyone down. It’s always had trolls and bots ‘commenting’ on everything, but lately it’s got nastier and more humourless.

 

It isn’t just to be found in the cyberspace – there’s always been a whole culture of build ‘em up, pull ‘em down in this country – it’s just got worse. So, I am asking, why can’t we offer ‘congratulations’ or say ‘well done’ anymore?

 

I knew who my real friends were as soon as I started being published, writing and performing, because along came the unpleasant comments or treatment, with some people distancing themselves. I don’t solicit gratuitous praise all the time, but neither do I put myself on the line emotionally and creatively to be attacked. If you create anything for an audience, you take an enormous personal risk every time, and it isn’t one that everyone would or could take. It is especially true of someone like me who exposes a good deal about myself or my personality through poetry or fiction, or even the creation of a role. And I do want it to be seen, of course I do. I do promote it, because I didn’t just create it to put it in the cupboard for no-one to see – that’s the point of it!

 

Many of the people who scoff or deride people’s achievements are the ones who don’t have any creative talent or interest or have no understanding of the amount of work involved physically, mentally and emotionally to be able to get out there and do it. I always say they should ask themselves if they could do it, and if not, then they don’t really have any right to make a negative comment. An opinion is a personal like or dislike based on some evidence or personal taste, and nobody likes everybody; nobody has the same taste in everything; but even then, isn’t it better to applaud what they have achieved rather than take a negative stance? I try to, because I find that negativity rebounds on people – it breeds negativity and sends it right back at you. 

 

I once had members of my own family trolling about my achievements, suggesting I was ‘big headed’ and should ‘act my age’ because I wasn’t ‘normal’ or ‘appropriate’ for a woman of my age. (What IS normal anyway? And if they are an example of it, I have no wish to be it!) Recently I have noticed that every time anyone, including celebrities, do well at something, there’s someone in the comments to suggest it isn’t much of an achievement anyway – and it’s always from some loser who spends the whole day staring at a screen instead of getting up off their backside and doing something for themselves. But even when I have been moved to comment in defence of someone else, whether they are personally known to me or not, someone I have never met comes right back with the rudeness. And they don’t stop until you block them. Even if their comments are sexist or contravening the social media ‘rules’ in some way, a report never ends with them being banned – because AI does not comprehend human interactions properly. And yet I got a two week ban for mentioning the word ‘dr*g’ because AI suspected I was a dealer of illegal substances! (At this point I would normally make a playful comment that of course I am, but obviously I’d risk somebody admonishing me because illegal substances are no laughing matter!) Jeez, the very thought of it is ‘un-aliving’ me! Man, you can’t be playful or have any spark of humour these days…

 

I once posted that I was excited to have lost a bit of weight and achieved my unexpected goal of a smaller jeans size. Wow! The Sh*t I got for that! Cue a few metaphorical pens poised to rain on my parade. I didn’t tell people they should be thin or tell anyone to be negative about their body – but you’d think I’d launched a personal attack! I don’t care what floats anyone else’s boat – but I really wanted to do this and I was delighted – so imagine how ‘lovely’ it is to be ‘told off’ for encouraging people to have a negative body image, or that being fit and healthy is more important, or even – now this is the best one – ‘well sizes have changed these days, they are all sized up so, you’re probably a size bigger.’ Thing is, I have quite bad body dysmorphia, so this sort of feedback really upsets me. I wasn’t boasting; I wasn’t trying to make anyone else feel bad – I was just saying ‘hey guys, something cheered me up today!’ but no, I wasn’t allowed to have my moment. Even getting selected for the finals in an international book award caused some stranger to bark – ‘carry on with your self-published cr*p’. I did point out that it’s not ‘self-published’ and actually there are some AMAZINIG self-published books and many of the classic writers were, and that he should read it before assuming anything because I was developing it into a script– but he kept right on commenting that I was living in a fantasy world (even though I cited actual true facts I can support with evidence!) I left the page and blocked the person – what’s the point of arguing with a fool? I once mentioned that I did not personally like Jim Davidson, and that there were other acts who could also be shown at the Felixstowe Spa Pavillion as well as older, established comedians. Boy did I get a personal attack about being ‘woke’ for simply stating an opinion and a fact. (by people who are clueless about what woke actually means) Thankfully, I don’t LOOK like their perception of ‘Woke’, unlike the unlucky lady on another page who was told she was definitely ‘no oil painting’ because she happened to disagree with someone’s opinion about a pop star. This was, you understand, a fifty plus year old man getting VERY upset about Robbie Williams beating the Beatles record recently, and a forty-something woman saying ‘well done!’ Oh my goodness – you’d think he was Paul Macartney’s (very clean) grandfather by the way he went on. And that the poor female fan who liked both Beatles and Williams equally – ye gods! He laid into her for daring to have her own opinion. 

 

All of this reminds me of the 90s comedians, Newman and Baddiel – if you don’t know who they are, ironically, I’m going to tell you to Google it. In particular, their sketch of two eminent historians arguing and descending into playground insults – ‘See that insect over there? That’s YOU that is!’ ‘Well, see that lump of poo on the ground there? That’s your MUM that is!’ 

Perhaps the world is just a dark and unhappy place at the moment, and people are generally feeling grumpy, but it costs nothing to be nice. 

 

So, I’ll end this musing by saying to the miserable folk out there – even if you feel like that lump of poo today, you might feel better if you smile and say something nice. Be happy for someone. If you can’t, maybe just zip it…

 

V xx