My Social Media Hippocratic Oathfeatured

Even though we are not even halfway through the year, 2018 has been BIG! On top of starting this blog, I also started doing something called  #firesidechatswithMikki on facebook live. So far this year, I’ve been way more visible on social media than ever before and I have come to some huge conclusions!!

First let me explain my sudden jump into the not so green limelight. My husband is an immigrant and not one of those fancy “I came here with a visa” kind of immigrant, Hector is the opposite. He is in fact, the “I’m in fear for my life, so  I jumped a fence” kind of immigrant. Prior to us dating and getting married, I had no idea how our immigration system worked. I will go on the record by saying that the reality is that if you don’t HAVE to understand our immigration system, there is nothing WRONG with not understanding it. Over the almost decade my husband and I have been together, I’ve HAD to learn how our immigration system works, or in sad reality… doesn’t work.  Given our current political climate there is a lot of misinformation out there about the immigration process and system. At least once a week, I hear someone quote with certainty how they think the process works, yet they’re completely wrong. I started my #FiresidechatswithMikki as a way to educate my friends about how the processes and systems really work. I did one video which got a lot of likes and views, and then I had people calling me and texting me with questions.  So I decided to do a little mini series. The talks started with immigration and grew into a slew of other topics. The videos were liked and shared by others and next thing I knew, I was pulled into a lot of immigration conversations, frequently based on false propaganda. It was tough. It hurt my feelings to see so much hate out there for our fellow human beings. And eventually it made me really angry.

It probably won’t surprise you that I’m quick tempered! I was cursed (or blessed) with a quick wit and a sharp tongue and when I get angry, I can really slay. As we all know, it’s so amazingly easy these days  to destroy people on social media with a quick tap-tap-tappity-tap and send. In the beginning of my new found social media fame, I was really quick to fire off some super destructive one liners and then just completely ignore any response. . And then, the book,  Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone By Brene Brown happened to me.  I say, “happened to me”, and I MEAN happened to me. I downloaded it, unsuspecting, for a work trip.  It looked interesting, I almost thought it would have some survival guide type tidbits. And real talk, it did have survival guide tips, just not the kind I was thinking.  

What I learned might be something that normal humans know. But I’m not a normal human so I had no idea. Hurt, when left untreated, turns into hate. Brown dedicated many chapters to what hate is and how it develops, and the best ways to deal with it. What I realized was that when I shoot back at people in classic Mikki style,  I was shaming people for acknowledging that they needed help, and in many cases reaching out for help. Initially, I’d just thought that these people are being hateful and therefore, I felt justified slaying them.When I made this connection – the connection that I was shaming hurt people – it devastated me. I figured out that I’d been looking at and handling things all wrong… for years.

This revelation sparked a new way of doing things.. When I read something really hateful, and typed out my usual mean AF response, rather than sending it off immediately, instead, I’d delete it. If I responded, I responded with compassion by acknowledging  the pain that person must be in and sharing the hope that they would be able to work through it. And guess what happened? Nothing. When I responded to hate with compassion, 90% of people never responded to my comment. They might have been looking for a fight but instead they found understanding. In a few cases, people responded horribly. When that happened, I realized there was nothing I could do to help them, so I didn’t engage.  

In all of this,I suddenly realized something really crazy.. I discovered what I’m calling my Social Media Hippocratic Oath. We probably all know the gist of the medical hippocratic  oath…it boils down to FIRST, DO NO HARM. The world is full of injured people. The internet is full of a bunch of scared, injured children (Some in grown up bodies) who have no idea what is wrong and how to fix it. Using my quick wit isn’t going to help them figure those things out. But a commitment to doing no harm may, one day, actually help them. .  

Shortly after I committed to my new found social media oath, I read a story about comedian Sarah Silverman.  Someone on twitter was saying some hateful shit about her. Shit that might hurt the toughest women in the world. .  Silverman is a much funnier and quicker woman then I am so she had the capacity to fire back at the Twitter Troll … but she didn’t. instead she reached out to him and asked him if he was OK. He responded by telling her that he was in fact NOT OK at all. He told her that he’d  been molested as a boy and was, in fact, full of incredible pain. . This opened up a heartfelt exchange that would make the grinchiest heart double or triple in size. . Silverman ended up using her 12.3 million twitter followers to help the young man find the support that he needed.  

In the face of hate, it’s easy to be mean. It’s much more difficult to look past that hate to actually see and understand the hurt, to offer love over sarcastic, superior remarks. But that is just what the world needs. I want to be clear, I’m not 100% awesome at this yet and from time to time, I do forget about my oath to do no harm. But it’s a start…. And I would LOVE for you to join me!!!