Dear Internet,

Shut the fuck up. No, seriously.

I get that you have an opinion on everything and one of the glorious things about the digital age is that you have the power to share your opinion with everything and everyone, but there are many things that a) are not your business b) your opinion does not matter and c) you are ruining important things for people, all while you run your mouth about something that has no effect on you.

Case in point: Miss America Pagaent. An Indian-American woman won. Were you in the pageant? Do you have any chance at ever being in the pageant? Are you directly related to someone who was in the pageant? No? Shut the fuck up. Nobody cares about your racism or how you feel about the winner or who you think should have won. There’s a reason you’re not a judge in the Miss America Pageant. You know who this whole thing does matter to? The woman who won. Your shitty comment that you make in a moment of pique and then forget about? Has real consequences for her. Has the power to ruin what should be a grand thing for her. Shut the fuck up.

Do you think Quvenzhané Wallis’ name is hard to pronounce? Guess what. It’s not your business, and you’re never going to meet her, so you probably don’t have to learn how to say it. Also, she’s a kid. Leave her alone. Shut the fuck up.

Miley Cyrus isn’t complying with your definition of how women should act? Mind your own business.

Don’t like the hipster with the big glasses and the typewriter? Why do you care? Why do you think that we care that you care? Can’t you go away?

Like many people, I was bullied in elementary and middle school. It was nothing terribly serious; I was never afraid to go to school or anything like that, it was just part of the fabric of my public education. It was a thing that happened. And probably half of what I got teased about was my clothes, which in elementary school were largely hand-me-downs. When I moved to middle school, I begged my parents to buy me some brand-name clothes (No Fear and Mossimo were big at the time), and they did. I thought if I wore what the other kids wore, they’d leave me alone. But no. I got teased in middle school for my transparent and pathetic attempt to try and fit in, mocked for wearing the clothes that everyone else wore to fit in and be invisible.

In high school, I finally got the good sense to be annoyed, even angry, and gave up trying to make people like me, at least through my wardrobe choices. Because what the fuck, middle school classmates. Why do you fucking care what I’m wearing. What business is it of yours. We’re not friends. You’ve made that epically clear since second grade. So why are you even talking to me, about my shirts or anything else? Go away. Shut up and go away. Leave me alone. I’d rather be left alone than to have to interact with you on any level.

Some days I feel that way about the Internet as a whole. Shut up and go away.

Love,
Ella