SOCIAL MEDIA
Jeremy O. Harris: One of the things I worry about is that the little gay boys and girls I’m friends with don’t meet people their age IRL. They only know people through their oomfs, right? The oomfs run the world.
Danez Smith.: What’s “oomf”?
J.O.H.: An oomf is an “O.O.M.F.” — “one of my friends,” as in someone you know only in a digital space, from Twitter or Tumblr.
D.S.: Oh, yeah, one of my followers.
J.O.H.: The idea that people are discovering their sexuality and their expressivity online is a beautiful thing. I have a 12-year-old niece who’s a she/they pansexual, and she learned about all of those things on TikTok. But there’s also a troubling thing where people become only what you see in 160 characters.
Adam Pendleton: But, Jeremy, it’s even more than that because those spaces are mediated spaces.
J.O.H.: Yes.
A.P.: So if you find your way into something, you might never find your way out. It becomes a prison.
D.S.: Look, if I can make it out the church, they can make it out of Twitter. [All laugh]
—“What Happens when Your work Gets to Move Past Argument?” New York Times T Magazine
another eye opens 