Social Media is Rife With Misunderstanding... or, The Reasons I Left Most Music Therapy Social Media Groups
Disclaimer: This post was inspired by a vague post left by one of my music therapy acquaintances. I have no idea what the original circumstances were or what was said by any party or anything like that, so I am responding to the vague statements left by my acquaintance. I also do not believe that this situation is unique to music therapists. Read on for more.
Rant in 3...2...1...
Several years ago, I was a member of a specific music therapy social media group that purported to be a place where we offered each other support, spoke about issues that concerned us all, and was supposed to be a place of polite debate and discussion. As I continued to be a part of that specific music therapy social media group, I found that there was little to no support and lots of attacks on people. There was little to no debate or discussion. There were lots of accusations and "they hurt my feelings so they are wrong" attitudes, and I was just tired of the constant need to tiptoe around the feelings of a small group of people. So, I left that group.
It has been several years now, and I am pretty glad that I made that decision. I left and have wondered if it was a mistake a couple of times in the past years, but most of the time, I have not felt that I needed to get back into the group. I know it is there if I want to go back, but I do not.
I have found that music therapy social media groups are a breeding ground for anger, disillusion, misunderstanding, and contempt.
The breaking point for me (in the aforementioned group) was a rant that one person went on after a bastion of the profession made a post and referred to other people in a manner that is commonplace in the professional world but is not as politically correct as others insist upon. The original post was taken over by a small group of people who ranted and criticized and turned the post away from its original purpose. Accusations about the original poster flew hot and heavy. The original poster went back on, apologized for the language used in the first post, and then edited the language, but the nasty comments and criticism continued. The apology was criticized. It went on and on.
As someone who was caught up in a similar situation several years ago, I was disheartened. In my situation, I posted a link to an opinion piece about my role as an internship director and what I wish music therapy students knew about internships before they started. An opinionated person posted a response which indicated to me that the person had not read my piece accusing me of acting illegally, unethically, and being part of the oppressing structure of internships. The criticism included a disparaging comment about my implied age and just kept going. I engaged with the person for a short period of time, but this person was not going to be reasoned with or accept that there were differing perspectives to the same topic (which was not my original post or topic at all). So, I disengaged with the other therapist at that point. That therapist attempted to message me away from the group in order to continue to explain to me why my opinions were wrong. I blocked that person. The debate continued in the group with others supporting me as a therapist and reinforcing the idea that opinions were not facts and therefore were not something that someone else had to prove. I read the comments but did not engage. I also never posted a link to my blog in the group again.
It amazes me how each word in every post seems to be rife with difficulty in some music therapy groups.
Now, I find that these considerations happen in more than music therapy social media groups. We are not unique in this, as much as we think we are. I think that may be a different problem of us music therapists - we think we are the world's saviors and that we are in charge of how everything goes outside the world of music therapy (somewhat snarky comment there). We want more social justice in our communities? Let's insist that we change the part of the world that we have a say in - the music therapy professional organizations. Okay, I can get with that idea, but remember that changing our small professional organization is not going to fix all of the issues that are present in our current society. We are an extremely small faction in a much larger world. I'm not saying that it isn't important to change our organization, but having a new committee in AMTA is not going to fix inequalities in my neighborhood. It's not going to have any influence at all outside of the influence it has on me - perhaps that is enough. Perhaps not.
The vague post that started this entire rant out came from a situation that appears (remember, I don't know any of the details) to be based on a power differential between someone else completely. I find that most situations these days tend to be based on power differentials. The music therapy education program and system is rife with power - as are all educational and training systems, by the way. Professors have power over students, clinical supervisors have power over students, and students have limited power over how they progress in the system unless they accept the power that others have over them. There are some people out there who abuse that power and, because we have such a small profession, students and interns do not always feel that they will be listened to in their situations. There is a real fear about being blacklisted by the profession as a whole if someone is a whistleblower about any sort of situation. From my experience, the entire system is flawed when power is wielded in a way that instills fear but fear is what keeps the power growing rather than getting it squashed completely.
I have heard of situations where music therapy interns are doing entire caseloads of client contact without direct supervision. I have heard of situations where music therapy interns are generating revenue for companies who do not pay their interns from that profit - often without direct supervision from MT-BCs. The problem is that I have heard of these situations, but no one will take the step of telling AMTA that these things are happening - probably in fear of retribution. If the power differential is so great that interns are afraid to move forward to tell our organization about the issues, then the organization can do NOTHING. AMTA cannot act on rumors.
Getting back to social media - this is a place where everything is written and displayed in a visual manner. There is so much left that is not communicated. When I am talking to someone about my views and opinions, I communicate more than just my words. I am able to communicate my emotions, my hesitations, my deeper feelings. I am able to explain when I see confusion in the eyes of others. There is a connection that simply is not possible when I write. That's the way social media operates. There are so many ways to misunderstand each other and all of them seem personal. We take a couple of words and then filter it through our own experiences and biases - out comes vitriol and misunderstanding and power plays.
The old cliche, "the squeaky wheel gets the grease," is a perfect way (again - my opinion) for this type of situation. We remove things because someone is offended (or, we think someone is offended because of how they say what they say). We defend ourselves when we feel attacked by someone by what they say or what they criticize. We leave places where our voices and OPINIONS aren't accepted. We feel shame for the ideas that we present, and we try to erase what we wanted to convey. In the long run, this seems to be what social media is giving us - difficulty in communicating what we want to say.
This is one of the reasons that I write my blog - it is a place where I have more than 280 characters to convey my opinions about music therapy, music, therapy, and my role in the profession and the world outside this profession.
I got tired of reading complaints from other people about how I have to live my life because of the choices that those others made for themselves. I got tired of being challenged because I used person-first language in a post because of my opinions. I got tired of being placed into a box because I do not care what pronouns you use when you talk about me. I got tired of being constantly on edge about making a mistake - so it was easier to leave the places where those things were an issue than it was to stay and try to avoid offending everyone!
I appreciate a healthy and respectful debate with any and everyone about opinions, but I do also expect that the debate will be logical and will be civil. I respectfully disengage from any conversation where awareness that there is not one right answer for everyone is not present. This is how I navigate this world - you can do what you need to do. I will be over here with my own opinions and ideas.
Thanks for reading.
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