Twitter makes me miss the pub.
In pubs you can always get a sense of a person. You get the pleasure of enjoying the company of others without feeling like you’re being subjected to any anger or vitriol. You get to talk things through with candour and with all the smiles or eye rolls that real life offers. You get to look at one another and gain a sense for the kind of day each of you has had. Good or bad.
In the pub you can assess rising frustration before it explodes into swears or you can temper bad feelings among people by sharing a beer with them. In the pub, you can appeal with verve, passion, exasperation or even indignation and it’s not considered a spat, but a conversation. In the pub you can resolve petty grievances by the next round without an audience of faceless hecklers.
You can get refreshments in the pub. You don’t need to upload those refreshments as a flat screen lure to show anyone your admirable ordering skills. If you’ve made the better order, in the pub, you can show your companion with a self-satisfied grin.
Twitter makes people bray about what they know without showing that they’re listening too. Twitter encourages displays of positivity with fake hearts. In the pub we can do that with smiles and laughter or the clink of a glass.
In the pub it’s all much simpler. In the pub people don’t check metrics or validate their views by counting how many people crowded around to watch them brawl.
In the pub people can see the difference between someone slurring their words compared to those making valid remarks. In the pub we are all better people for being able to level one another with our eyes.
I don’t even need to mention the beer. After all, we can talk about beer as much as we like on Twitter. But we can actually taste it in the pub.
“Mind if I try some of that?”
“Sure, go ahead.”
