A few random thoughts on the Substack situation: I haven’t decided whether I’ll ditch this platform or not just yet, but having just gone through something similar (i.e. white supremacists, extremism, disinformation, etc. ruining the platform) with Twitter/X, and Facebook before that, I’m really not enthused about being run off yet another platform.

Maybe it’s out of arrogance or selfishness, but I simply refuse to cede my place here to a bunch of assholes whose only contribution to society is thinking up ways to hurt other people.

Honestly, I’m not even sure my newsletter would survive the disruption of leaving here. Unlike those who have a team of folks helping them create their publications, or those who have tons of paid subscribers who’ll automatically follow them wherever they go, I’m a one-person show, a guy who thought, rightly or wrongly, that this was the best place to try and build something.

I have to say, it really pisses me off that the price of being on the one platform that has allowed me to do something I enjoy without going broke in the process is that I have to share space with Nazis and their ilk.

But you know what? I grew up in the South, so I was surrounded by people who thought like them. They hated us. They didn’t want us in their schools, their stores, their clubs.

I suppose my parents could’ve moved us some place where things were better, but they didn’t. We stayed put. And eventually things changed. Things got better. In the end, the good guys won.

So for now, I’m staying. Maybe with the help of others who also choose to stick around, my little newsletter can be a thorn in their racist sides, a counterbalance to the hate.

I’m going to keep publishing my thoughts here on American culture, anti-Black racism, and whatever the f*ck else comes to mind, if for no other reason than to piss off the Nazis and those who tolerate them.

~MSW