alright i always feel Some Kinda Way whenever i see this post:
im not articulate enough to put all the right words to my feelings, but basically this post’s popularity is concerning because it makes light of the issues that arise from widespread age discrepancies between users in frequent and close communication with one another, and implies that those discrepancies are insignificant and can be overlooked.
tumblr users, especially adult users, absolutely need to be aware of their own age in relation to the age of those in their online social circle. if you’re 27 and would be uncomfortable discussing a particular topic with a 14 year old in person, you shouldn’t be doing it online. don’t send suggestive messages to minors, don’t RP sexual situations with minors, and if an underage person is the one instigating, it is your responsibility as the adult in this situation to stay uninvolved.
when you’re 15, that’s as old as you’ve ever been, so you don’t have the perspective to realize how vastly different high schoolers and 20/30-somethings are, but believe me if a 25 year old on here gets real friendly with you in a way that doesn’t obviously fall into a mentor/older sibling category, it’s a red flag.
aside from excusing shady and possibly predatory behavior, community wide disregard for user-user age differences subjects minors to inappropriately harsh treatment by significantly older users. ive seen well-meaning 14 and 15 year olds get publicly called out, dragged, and humiliated by grown ass adults who deemed a post of theirs problematic in some way. adults should not have the same expectations of children as they do of their actual peers, and children shouldn’t be encouraged by posts like these to see adults as their peers. yes, even when you’re just screaming about cartoons.
