A review by dominic_t
You're Never Weird on the Internet by Felicia Day

emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted fast-paced

4.0

It's really sweet and charming. Some of her anecdotes were really funny, and it was neat seeing how some of her real life experiences made it into The Guild. 

She talks about her creative process and how she got started, and I found that really helpful. In particular, she talks about how she finally motivated herself to write by joining a support group for accountability. That's a tip that I may actually try. I found it pretty inspiring!

She also talks about her mental health issues, and I found it very relatable. I think it was amazing of her to talk about her issues with anxiety and depression because so many people go through life ashamed of these feelings. She did make the comparison that people are more sympathetic to physical issues, and that's really only true if your problem is acute and will be resolved. Sympathy for kidney stones (her example in the book)? Yeah! Sympathy for chronic pain? Maybe at first, but after a certain point, people will stop accommodating you.

Her chapter on gamer gate and getting doxxed is also really important and heartfelt. It was absolutely horrifying hearing about her experiences. 7 years after this book was published, that chapter is just as relevant as ever.

I want to make one giant point about the Gamer Gate chapter. She prefaced it with "That one time when having a vagina and a love of video games was not such a great combo." People really need to stop using "having a vagina" as shorthand for "being a woman" or "experiencing misogyny." Trans women also experience misogyny. Misogynists on the internet aren't nicer to trans women. Using "having a vagina" as shorthand for "being a woman" or "experiencing misogyny" also sucks for trans people who are assigned female at birth. We have a variety of different experiences with misogyny, so lumping everyone with a vagina into the same group isn't accurate or helpful. This might seem nitpicky, but it is important to make language trans-inclusive.



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