I really, really don’t like Discord.

I have it. I use it, to some extent, daily. I actually belong to quite a few different Discord servers.

But I hate it.

I’ve been trying to figure out why for a while. The platform let’s you choose the servers you want to belong to and the channels on those servers you want to see. Unless you’re on an incredibly popular server (which a few of the ones I’m on are) it’s not terribly difficult to stay current with conversations. The service is reliable and outside of the occasional advertisement (which I believe you can avoid if you pay them) it’s not a massive, algorithm-driven marketplace.

But it still makes my brain hurt, and I have finally figured out why.

Discord is too specialized, and it’s far too easy to set up a channel for every possible topic that people on a server want to talk about. Every server I’m on, for example, has a channel for animal pictures, food pics, and memes. Every. One. It’s repetitive and annoying. Not only that, but god forbid that you post about a topic in the wrong channel. “Chimichangas are triggering for me! You should only post about chimichangas in the chimichanga channel!”

I get it, I guess. People want to talk about what they want to talk about and they don’t want to mix their chocolate with their peanut butter. Here’s my “old man shouting at the sky” take on that, though – By doing this we are continuing to perpetuate what I perceive to be the fallacious belief that all communication should be catered to the preferences of the person in question.

We seem to have lost the ability to just adapt and deal with it.

And this isn’t just happening online, either. I’ve seen far too many (i.e. more than one) people tell a group that they needed to change a topic of conversation because it was bothering them. Instead of, I don’t know, just not taking part until it passes or politely excusing themselves.

I’m not naive. I’m fully aware that there are cases in which that isn’t possible or where the conversation is so clearly unpalatable for polite company that it make sense to speak up, but most of the time? Just…get over it?

And this is what I see all over Discord. A whole bunch of tightly controlled conversations that stifle the desire to speak, enforce cliques, and otherwise put a damper on just making connections with other people.

Here is my most controversial take on all this – I’ve been told that what I’m speaking about is exactly why neurodivergent people enjoy using Discord. They want rules and expectations spelled out explicitly for them, and by using specific channels Discord scratches that itch. I guess I even understand why that might be appealing if I constantly found myself in awkward situations because I didn’t know what was appropriate to talk about and where.

Problem is? The “real world” doesn’t work that way, and I worry that instead of trying to figure out a way to communicate with others who are not neurodivergent they are just isolating themselves further by inhabiting online spaces that enforce the belief that tight rules around communication are the way things should be.

What do I know, though? I used the old man meme above for a reason. I’m a Gen-X kid who was told to suck it up and deal with it most of his life. I wasn’t officially a latchkey kid but I came home to an empty house for much of my childhood. I’m an introvert whose entire professional career (both of them) revolves around interacting with other people on a regular basis, and I’ve had to figure out ways to overcome that because it’s a “me” problem. So maybe I’m just over here eating sour grapes.

I guess I’ll go post this to #hotTakesFromGenerationX or some shit.

Whatever.