fetish and visibility

When I was masking more in the past, before I dropped it for a few years, I was reaching a point where I was getting swamped by people sending demanding, demeaning, and generally unpleasant messages. It was a small part of what made me feel ok about leaving masking for a little while.

Now that I'm back and being on platforms like instagram and facebook, I feel much more visible than ever, which carries some pros and cons.
Pros: I'm easier to find and it's easier for me to communicate with like-minded people.
Cons: Lots of unsuspecting people stumble across my content and will send me disgusted, hateful, or just mean messages.  

I've been telling myself that for every mean message or even every 10 mean messages I get, there's probably one person stumbling across my content for the first time and thinking "I don't know what this is, but I think I like it." (which makes me happy, cause I want to connect with more freaky freaks like myself)

However, many of the messages are from young girls who are surprised and horrified, which isn't awesome, but I can't blame them. It's hard for me to imagine how odd I must look to someone (generally a cis fem) who isn't expecting to stumble across me. So even though these messages aren't great, I can't hold it against them (mostly due to age). Although, it sometimes feels like someone walking into a sex-shop and recoiling in horror when they see a dildo. I mean, what did you expect? but still, they're young and it is the internet so it is what it is. 

In the past I used the mantra, "you know you're doing well once you start getting haters," as in, popularity and hateful messages are correlated, so the more negative stuff you get thrown at you means that your popularity (or at least visibility) is going up as well.

Now I think a little differently. Now, I think that these negative messages (from people who are not children expressing surprise) are from people who are just behind the times. I see people insulting me as being the same thing as someone thinking women are second class citizens prior to the women's rights movement or someone who used the N-word before the civil rights movement or someone who today will antagonize those in the LGBTQ community, since the gender ID and orientation movement is still happening now. These people don't know it yet, but society is changing and this way of thinking is antiquated (in my eyes) and will soon be extinct. 

So maybe this can help you too (if you experience this) to just look at these messages as the prolonged death rattle of a disappearing generation of close-minded people.