The Lottery—will you be stoned next?
Ever feel like you’re not wanted around when you walk into a room? Forum? Facebook page? Youtube commenting section? I’ve had that feeling recently, and it was no mere intuition. It was complete clairvoyance of the situation. I walked into a Detective Conan forum about several months ago, and me being me, I went into the General Discussions area to chitchat. I had just started back up watching Detective Conan anime, and was on the DCTP TV (Detective Conan Translation Project Television) watching it, which was great. But it suddenly stopped. And so I moseyed my behind over to the DCTP website.
I like forums generally. It’s an interesting way to connect with fans, though a great majority of the time I get banned for double posting in my excitement, being “too mean” in a debate, or simply “having two accounts” because I am an identical twin, and apparently in the world, twins are the same person. In the case of being a twin, there is often no way of knowing if the two accounts are the same.
Though wouldn’t that apply to anyone, even if they weren’t an identical twin?
Anyway, to get to the point, recently I was banned from the DCTP forums. And because I am a twin. Yes, people didn’t know whether I was one account or another. And yes, my twin sister can be a troll when it comes to things she doesn’t care about. But that is not the the REAL reason we BOTH were banned. I know the real reason. I actually felt it long before “sock-poppeting” was used as an excuse.
On those forums, I am the type of person who seems to disagree with whole populations of people, especially people in authority. I don’t know, maybe it’s because I’m Black, and Black people like me seem to have that bad. In this particular forum, I strongly disagreed with the canon couple of the anime. Well, you know how large anime “canon-couple” boards can be. And trust me, most of the mods are considered “strong fans”.
Me, being a newbie, I spoke my piece about my opinions on the lead female love interest and how I felt she lacked depth and served little role but to support Shinichi (the lead character). Of course, they didn’t like it.
Later on, my sister also joined the boards. I suppose people felt we were like backyard bullies by then, scheming to gang up on them to “argue” the point. My sister was just simply there to make fun of them because she doesn’t take this anime seriously. So, about three members (my estimate) decided they would eliminate the problem: Me.
I always seemed to disagree with the mods and other “important” figures on many parts of this particular anime. My sister only showed up in General Discussions. I was all over this board, probably the only board I actually went on frequently. I mean, giving it its props, it’s an organized board, they got their shit together. And the forum mod is cool as hell.
But these three other members decided they would get me banned. They actually planned this for a month before I was banned. One even PM-ed me and I had to tell him off. And one stalked me in the forum trying to find anything on me that would get me kicked out. Eventually, those two cooled off because I showed them my Facebook…and they realized I was an identical twin. But there were still two leeches, and I know who they are. One is a serious fan of the lead love interest, and one is an obvious and complete enemy. They may or may not be mods, but they certainly DID NOT want me around to stop them from being Know-it-alls.
I used to post long paragraphs like I do here, and I would offer legit arguments. I suppose they didn’t like it. Instead of bravely coming up with a good debate to counter-argue, they decided, “We’ll just eliminate the person making us look bad”.
They decided they were going to tell the Mod just how I was “sock-poppeting” with two accounts. Now, I wasn’t worried because I knew that I wasn’t doing this. But I suppose when the majority is great in power and targets the threat, the king has no choice but to go with what the public wants: eliminate the weakest link. Thus, we have The Lottery. If you haven’t read that story, it’s a good read. A Jewish woman wrote it, how she was targeted for being Jewish and not celebrating Christian Holidays or doing normal traditions. The story is very real. When you are the only one who seems to be different, you will be targeted, especially if you are not afraid to stand up for yourself or speak up, even at the cost of being hated. There are people who are not afraid to choose a side, not in fear of being disliked for having opposing views.
So if it was about me spamming, or my sister trolling, I would accept, but because it’s not, I refuse to go back. The odd part is, for three months, I had the feeling they didn’t want me around. They would always comment back saying stuff like “Do you even read/watch this anime?” or “Yea good to see you soragirl6, I mean soratothamax” or “Came back to give faded logic”? And two of the three times, I ignored it. But apparently, the trio have won, and I, the victim of the “lottery” have the red token. I was stoned. What do I do?
1) Refuse to go back to the forums, even when the ban is lifted, giving them EXACTLY what they wanted. Not to be around people who won’t accept me, and to have anyone who wants to talk to me come find me.
OR
2) I go back to the forums when my ban is lifted to show them that it didn’t bother me, and that I’m still going to be me, and that I’m not going to let them ruin my fun.
Which is better?
Has anyone else ever felt this way or has anyone else had to decide between the two? Which do you think I should do?
Generation Next 
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