I Am Completely Serious

Okay, sorry I did not realize to read "Tumblr" as "Homestuck fandom part of Tumblr." I move in different fandom circles where yes, I have definitely seen 20-somethings who are very into constant performative outrage (it gets them followers, after all), but I both try not to cross streams and try to avoid them entirely, so I won't be providing links because I don't save them. My personal "do not engage" list on Tumblr is a mile long and everyone on it is mid-20s+, but that is of course anecdotal. Being in a constant state of rage and engaging with people who are in a constant state of rage exhausts me and prevents me from actually accomplishing things, so I don't do it anymore.

I have felt that in general, people on Tumblr of all ages are quicker to jump to assuming bad faith in others over the most trivial, politely-phrased things, and quicker to jump to personal insults when disagreeing, regardless of what the topic at hand is. Having been on a bunch of other social media platforms over the years with similar age spreads in my corner, I'm inclined to think it's something about Tumblr's format that encourages it/discourages civil disagreement (I could speculate about a) the social impact of reblogs and b) the really high follower counts when compared to something like LJ/DW, a discussion forum, or a mailing list). But that's not something either of us can (dis)prove, so it's not really something I want to argue about.

As I said, I'm not judging the healthiness or not of performative rage among teenagers. I was simply objecting to the common assertion that Tumblr is a site dominated by teenagers, as I had no way of knowing you were referring to a specific subset of Tumblr that perhaps is.