Is it ever "ONLY" words?!

I woke up to a really nice message, today.  That message came from someone who, a couple of years ago, had read a blog I wrote on here (about a certain book series I despise) and had disagreed with me to the point that she'd felt the need to attack me personally, in the comment section.  This person had contacted me to apologise and explained that she'd been going through some awful stuff and had taken her anger out on me and was wrong to have done so.  I told her that I had no hard feelings towards her whatsoever (because I genuinely don't), and I wished her well for the future.  I know that it's not always easy to own up to a mistake and to say "I was wrong," so I give her absolute credit for having the courage to have done so.  I really do hope that she will be okay and that she will have the wonderful life she deserves.

The trouble was, I didn't remember the comments she was apologising for.  And the reason I didn't remember them, was because there were so many abusive comments on that particular blog post, from so many different people.  When it feels like dozens and dozens of people are throwing stones at you, it's hard to remember which cut came from which rock.

And that's the thing: each and every nasty comment on that post was like a tiny weapon, sent to cause harm.  And whilst the person who messaged me to say sorry is completely and unreservedly forgiven as far as I'm concerned, I can't understand why the other people in that comment thread never stopped for a second to think "I shouldn't have said that."

People say "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me."  And that, dear readers, is utter rubbish.

I've written about the fact that words can hurt just as much as a physical blow before, but it never ceases to amaze me just how much damage they can cause, or how many people seem to think that words are simply meaningless things, to be tossed out with no thought for their effect on the person hearing or reading them.

I've known how much words can hurt, from a young age.

From when I was twelve years old, being told on the school bus (every single day) that I was so hideously ugly, that nobody - not even my parents - could possibly love me, and I ought to do the world a favour and kill myself, I knew the power that words had.

Because those words didn't just come out of the bully's mouth and then evaporate into nothingness.  They stayed.  They seeped into my brain and whispered to me, at night.  They played over and over in my mind, like an irritating song on the radio.  They clung to my clothes, so it felt like everyone who looked at me could see them.  They enveloped me until I became them.  And they hurt.

They hurt so much that it was like being punched in the stomach, or kicked in the chest.  I felt them.  I felt every syllable, slicing through me; a stabbing pain that left me utterly breathless.

But, according to some people at the time (a few of my classmates and even one or two teachers), what was happening to me didn't seem too big a problem, because it was "only words."

That's not a new thing, Ed.

Fast forward a few years, and 27 year old me found herself in love with an abusive man.  And this time, once I'd finally found the strength to walk away from him, it was me minimising my own experience.  Despite everything he'd done to me - every time he'd screamed in my face, or told me I was "weak and pathetic," or refused to let me touch him, because I made him feel "repulsed" - I found myself using the same phrase: "It was only words."

Because he never hit me, because he never raped me, it was somehow less awful.

Of course, it wasn't.  It was just a different kind of awful.  I know that, now.  But the very fact that I could minimise my own experience in that way, made me realise how common it is to think along those warped lines.  It's an excuse we make as a society too often: 

"They're just words, get over it."

"You're being way too sensitive."

"You really need to toughen up.  Just ignore them; don't read the comments if they upset you."

But words have a massive effect.  How many victims of bullying have to take their own lives, before we're prepared to accept that?  

A harsh insult, delivered with the intention of causing hurt to the person on the receiving end, is a weapon.  It may not look like a knife or a gun, but its impact can cause damage, all the same.  And it completely blows my mind that the people who post hateful words online, or who bully people in person, either don't think about the enormous damage that their words could - and often do - cause, or that they just don't care.

The person who messaged me, asked if I would mind finding her comments on the aforementioned blog post and deleting them for her.  She didn't stand by them and didn't like the thought of them still being there.  I completely appreciated that and I agreed to try to find them and get rid of them.

But, I had underestimated how difficult doing so would be.  You see, that blog post (Fifty Abusive Moments in Fifty Shades of Grey) has been read more than 1.3million times.  It's had 877 comments on it.  And, whilst some of those comments had been really lovely, supportive words from people who agreed with the contents of the post, there were many comments that were... Less so, shall we say.  In fact, there were so many that were hurtful, rude or downright abusive, that I had stopped reading any new ones, several hundred comments ago.  Finding this person's specific responses was going to be tough.

I won't lie to you; I didn't find them.

I did find a man calling me a "disgrace to writing."

I did find a woman telling me I was "utterly f*cking stupid."

And I did find one girl who told me "you should feel lucky that my phone cut off mid-rant, so you're only getting some of what I want to say to you," followed by a dismissal of the idea that I'd ever experienced abuse ("a real abuse survivor doesn't talk about it all the time - you're an attention seeker who just wants traffic to your pathetic little blog"), along with the charming end to her post: "YOU ARE A WHINY, SELFISH, PATHETIC, LYING, NASTY, CRYING LITTLE BITCH."

I Cribbins cried.

For context, let's just remember that the reason for all that hate?  Was because I was highlighting abusive moments from a so-called "LOVE story," and referring to my own experience of abuse when explaining why I think romanticising abuse in fiction is so dangerous.  Yes, what a bitch, I am.

Like I said earlier, it boggles my brain to think that the girl who wrote that despicably nasty comment, either didn't consider the effect her words might have on me, or genuinely wanted to hurt me with them.  And it's made all the worse by the fact that she also mentioned in her comment that she was a "real abuse survivor," so surely, she of all people should know what it feels like to be verbally attacked in such an awful way?!  She was probably angry, because I - a fellow survivor - was in a place where I felt able to talk openly about my experiences and I had regained the confidence and strength I lost, enabling me to firmly call out abuse for what it is.  Perhaps she wasn't there, yet.  Maybe she was still struggling to come to terms with her experience of abuse - I know I certainly misdirected a lot of anger and frustration, during my own recovery process.  But it's not an excuse to talk to people like that, without thought or apology.

I'd never noticed that girl's comment before, because, like I said earlier, I'd long since stopped reading the comments by the time she posted it.  But, once I read it, the effect was the same as it would have been, had she written it five minutes ago.

I felt that gut-punch sensation, that physically hurt as it took my breath away.  My head went light and nausea enveloped me.  For a few, horrible but brief seconds, I asked myself: "Am I just an attention seeker?  Was what happened to me abuse, or am I just calling it that to make people feel sorry for me?" (that was another of her claims).

But then I realised that all this had proved, in her apparently toned down comment, was that words have far more power than we can imagine.

They have the power to build people up.  To make them feel loved and safe.  But they have the power to break people down, too.  To make them feel frightened and isolated.  To make them feel worthless.

When a person is capable of doing that with their speech or their writing, it's not "only words" and it never will be.  Words can be used as weaponry, just as easily as they can bring comfort.  And it's not up to us to "toughen up" or "stop being so sensitive."

It's up to people to think about what they say, before they say it.  Or, like the person who messaged me, to think about it afterwards and offer an apology.

Words are wonderful things.  I just wish people considered their effect, before they use them to cause harm.