After the election of Governor Kathy Hochul this week, I took to Twitter and as per usual, was met with a flutter of content surrounding the win for Hochul and especially the disdain for Zeldin’s loss.
As an American who often exercises free speech, I chose to comment on the governor’s victory on her personal Twitter. I figured I might get some backlash but let me tell you, nobody could’ve predicted some of the things these other humans said to me.
Let’s begin with my original tweet: please remember my opinions are my own and do not reflect those of the entire staff of The Griffin. “Thank you for protecting our right to choose, Governor Hochul. I am proud to be a New Yorker.”
There was a moment of silence before the responses started flooding in. Now throughout my years I have grown a thick skin. Most of these tweets I actually found quite comical.
For the purpose of not being petty, I will not be sharing the usernames of these people, even if some of them are pretty colorful. With that being said, the first response to come through was pretty unoriginal and also pretty tame. “Right to choose what????” Short, sweet and to the point. I can appreciate it, in fact, she was probably just looking for information.
There were quite a few short and sweet ones as well, I will fire those off now.
“What a sick joke,” “Gross” and “Have you heard of birth control?”
There were a couple that were also hitting on the intelligence and impressionability of college students, something that is telling given Generation Z came out for this election in record numbers. According to TIME magazine: “The data is still coming in nationally, but from what we know, Gen Z-ers sustained their record-breaking 2018 turnout during the 2022 midterm elections, opting for Democratic House candidates by 25 points and limiting Republican gains. Voters under the age of 29 broke for Democrats and helped many win in battleground states. In the high-stakes Pennsylvania Senate race, which Democrats flipped by a three-point margin, Gen Z-ers supported John Fetterman by a 46-point margin and increased their share of the electorate from 2018.”
Now here is the point before I leave you with my final and favorite comment from the trolls. This article isn’t about sharing my particular beliefs about this very polarizing political issue. It is to prove a point. There was a multitude of other extremely hateful comments made on my comment. None of these people know me, and there is a great chance none of them ever will. They saw a buzzword and decided to attack after their candidate didn’t win. It took them seconds to craft a hurtful and often very grammatically incorrect message that could severely hurt someone.
And the moment you've been waiting for, my favorite troll said, “You're hideous. You won’t have to worry about an abortion.”
Think before you post, not everyone has thick skin like I do.