Worst Boyfriend Ever@TwinkBukowski
yesterday while doomscrolling myself to sleep—which i really really need to stop doing lest it be the end of my life, i happened upon a thread of tweets by a user referred to as QC. QC is a millennial chinese american man associated with SF rationalist/tpot circles. i have only interacted tangentially. he is a complicated figure, i’d say: he’s undoubtedly smart yet also-undoubtedly emotional, coddled, maybe even weak. a talented writer, plus a phd in math, and i once saw a video years ago he posted of himself Singing. takes balls. he’s not physically attractive, he’s got a problem with sex and women like most of us internet people do, and i will never forget a post by one “roon” (god, you have to be really online to get this paragraph, whatever i’m going on with it) — a poster i lightly admire in similar circles, attacking QC for being an “emotional streaker” whose “vibe sucks” and the takedown felt really … impactful. legendary, almost. because roon does not speak ill of others, ever, i gather, from following him for a while. see this exchange stuck with me because i often worry i’m doing the same thing as QC in his worst moments—taking off all my clothes and streaking the timeline. implicitly begging for sympathy in my self-destruction, promising to change, failing to deliver on that promise, ruining the vibe wherever i go. i thought i felt belonging for one moment in san francisco about a month ago until reality struck and i was banned from lighthaven for general retardation and i flew away with my tail between my legs. who was i kidding—i didn't belong there at all.
anyways, QC. i read a thread by QC last night. it was from 2021. it was apparently an infamous post. “my mom sent me $100k for my birthday and i resent her for it” — fantastic hook. you got me dude, i’m in. it’s so rare anybody writes something batshit enough to make me excited to read words online. excited enough to click the “show tweet though you muted this person?” button 20, 25 times, to see the whole thing. he took acid and unraveled some murky feelings about his parents and money. more specifically how the game of his life is not to “earn a living” like most people, but to maintain his parents’ good graces, because that’s how he gets money. that’s how they keep him dependent, on a chain, that’s why he’s like this. and the feeling is complicated, because his parents’ intention in giving him the money is not totally clear either. they give him money to keep him alive, because they love him, but, whether they know it or not, this lifelong coddling makes him dependent, weak, unhappy, his life becomes about pleasing them, which alienates him, cause that’s not something a lot of people can relate to—not a lot of people get handed 100k on their birthday. i don’t feel bad for him as i read, nobody feels bad for him, because many of us (especially the black people in the replies who show up with the all-too-characteristic “congrats bruh or sorry that happened didnt read can i have a quick hundo?”) have spent our entire lives feeling constrained by money, letting it corrupt our relationships, our health, our dreams, stressing over it, wasting our limited time here on earth worrying about how we’re going to convince the other humans to give us these little slips of paper so that we can get whatever it is we feel we need and feel some sense of security in this cruel lottery world. no, nobody feels bad for qc, in fact most vocal repliers seem “offended,” they feel something for him approximating hate. lots of women, specifically, digging up old screenshots in which he refuses to give a homeless beggar cash or something, saying he makes them sick, i could not help but indulge in all this feeling united in their hate. i felt i hated him too, in that moment. i felt that many many people must have this experience in their discovery of my blog and me. it feels good to hate, to be a part of a crowd throwing peanuts at somebody who has made a fool of themselves for attention. i don’t feel it often and i haven’t felt it in a while. this is the state of religious intoxication i assume most animals swim in, wade through daily. i noticed that it was midnight, closed my phone, and fell asleep.
i have QC muted on twitter. i don’t remember why i muted him. my usual flow for muting people (i never block, blocking is for cowardly worms and the fact that half of SF twitter has me blocked though i’ve never interacted with any of them just confirms my belief that SF is not the place for me) is that if i can tell they’re trying to bait my attention towards them enough times with no discernible payoff, and they do it successfully, and/or i feel like their influence will pull me further from my goals for any reason, then i mute them. i muted aella years ago, RFH too. dimitri, murray hill guy, bryan johnson, more i can’t remember. but what i have come to realize is that these people i feel drawn to mute, the people who are for one reason another capable of arousing me emotionally with text or images on the screen, make for the most valuable teachers. they are often the ones who are incomparable, iconic, who—even if i can’t admit it or even recognize it at first, inspire a faint sense of jealousy, for they have carved out a character, an inimitable niche and seem totally comfortable doing their bit, leaning fully in, often even profiting in the process. i wish i had that “fuck you, pay me” mentality in me, but i don’t, it wasn’t ingrained in my youth and so now that i’m aware i need it i’ll be playing catch up. the first step though, i think, for me, is to recognize that social media is a stage in the same way the world is a stage, and if you’re reading something then it’s for you, and the fact that QC was able to capture my attention in writing means that he’s someone i can learn from, and so i should un-mute him, and stop worrying about all these faggots in san francisco, who likes the work and who doesn’t, and just get back to making it.
