Why I am still on Substack despite its hate speech problem

I'm tired of ceding spaces to harmful people from the alt-right.

Substack has a problem with hate speech.

You can read about this problem in the New York Times and The Atlantic.

I heard about it on Facebook.

As a creative entrepreneur, I wanted to know how Substack worked for people compared to a newsletter or a blog on my own site. What I was looking for was business support. What I got was an ethical debate about free speech.

Now, I can have that debate. I got a law degree focusing on the ethics of obscenity laws and arguing for free speech. That’s a debate I can have.

But that’s not what this post is about. Because plenty of people are already having that (see the NYTimes article above for references).

I did, however, find it ironic that we were having this debate on a platform that also hosts racists and hate speech, including people I grew up with and sadly see on my feed too often, even if I’m not friends with them. Facebook has this same problem, yet we’re willing to be on there?

Which platforms are left for us these days?

I could argue about the way different mega-corporation social media conglomerates are handing free speech all day, but the true issue for me is that I am tired of finding a place to build community only to have to leave it because the alt-right took over.

Blogging was my first love (as seen in my “Hey baby, ¿qué pasó?” post), and I’ve missed it for years. Writing my business newsletter never really had that same connection.

Then I was introduced to Substack.

And wow! Here’s where all my queer, feminist, body-positive, book loving, intellectual (read: nerdy) friends went!

I got to read

Lindy West

’s fat suit fart jokes again, reconnected with

Krista

from Effing Dykes, read

Carmen Maria Machado

’s thoughts on the Erotics of Erotics, hear more from

Jessamyn Stanley

about being a kinky yoga queer, and delve into

The Audacity.

by Roxane Gay.

It’s like all my elder millennial and Gen X friends got back together for an intimate blogger reunion.

(Remember that time I went viral for a cleavage shot I took at BlogHer and then talked about Blorgies and almost got someone fired?! Those were the unhinged wild days of the Internet that I miss.)

Add to that all the authors I admire, publishing experts I learn from, and letters of love I get (thanks

Elizabeth Gilbert

) in my inbox now thanks to Substack, and this felt like the part of the internet I loved and needed desperately right now in my life.

Because of the love and support I was finding here as a reader, I decided to start sharing my writing here as well.

Behind the scenes, I curled up in the morning on my sofa and wrote love letters to you. Educational posts to support you. Inspiration I found that I thought you might need too. And a few entertaining bits I found hilarious.

I wasn’t ready to post them, not just yet, I wanted to have a decent backlog before promising you anything, especially if I decided to go the paid subscriber route.

While I waited, I set up the backend of Substack, designed a bold and fun logo, and asked my Facebook friends what they thought the pros and cons of Substacks, hoping to get some insights into what people loved and hated about this platform.

And oh, did I get some insight!

Until this point, my only interactions with Substack were hugely positive, loving, supportive, and from people historically silenced in traditional publishing, media, and entrepreneurship.

Then I found out about the hate speech.

Specifically, I found out about Nazis, White Nationalists, and gay and trans bashers.

Ya’ll, that hurt.

It hurt like the time I came out to my dad and he told me to not tell anyone because “that’s not something you can take back” and “even if you get over this phase, they’ll always think of you [negatively] like this.”

It hurt like the time a dear friend told me that all gays were going to hell and gay marriage was a horrible sin, but she’d love to go to my wedding, all in the same breath.

It hurt like last summer when I held back tears walking through the preachers lined up along the walkway to Pride, one lady following me as she spat “lesbian witch at me” and shouted that she’d pray for my soul in hell.

It hurt like the first time I realized that my decades-long fight with self-harm was directly connected to being raised in a town that banned PFLAG but promoted born again Christian conversion revivals in the gym.

No, this wasn’t all in Texas or some conservative state liberals can look down upon and run away from.

This was all in Southern California, land stolen from the Kumeyaay tribe.

My home.

Little baby lettuces growing roots in my hometown.

As White Nationalism rises in the USA and marginalized communities find their rights slipping back decades, I see some friends fleeing to other countries.

And I get it. Save yourselves from a sinking ship.

But the United States is my home. I don’t want to cede it to the alt-right. I want to fight for the promise it was built on: liberty and justice for all.

A false promise from the start, but a promise none-the-less.

And I’ve gotta say, as someone who was raised on a border town and who still volunteers routinely with the refugees camping in our deserts, the “I’m gonna move to Canada” sentiment always rubs me the wrong way.

It’s not those most marginalized able to leave. It is so very privileged to be welcomed into a country with open arms and a visa.

Which makes me want to stay and fight for my family that’s stuck here. That’s set roots here. That’s built community here.

I feel similarly about social media right now.

I realize that there is a massive leap between “stay and fight for your country” and “stay on this platform that hosts hate speech” but Substack was the straw that broke the camels back.

Twitter was bought by an alt-right conspiracy theorist.

Facebook helped propagate election misinformation and start the January 6 insurrection.

Instagram is on Capitol Hill right now being grilled for its role in teen suicide.

TikTok … well that’s a whole barrel of worms right there.

These platforms don’t have an alt-right, white nationalist, Nazi rising problem. We all do.

In the same way deplatforming theses groups weakens them, changing platforms (and all the mental, emotional and energetic work that comes with that) weakens us as well.

I’m tired of leaving my community because hateful assholes infiltrated it.

I could get into a whole debate about the first amendment, free speech, and all of that. I went to law school just so I could have these kind of constitutional law arguments.

But I’m tired of arguing for my right to exist as a queer, fat, neurodiverse, genderqueer femme.

I’m too tired to move every post I wrote for you and every post you wrote for me to somewhere else.

Because I know they’ll just move there too.

I’ve finally found a part of the internet again that feels helpful and hopeful.

I’m not leaving.

Make those assholes leave.

Not everyone will agree.

And I respect that.

I might even change my mind later.

But for now, I’m staying where I found the queers and fatties and feminists again.

Because I need this community now more than ever.

With love and a reminder that we are all doing our best in an unfair and unjust world,

Lauren