It's really interesting to me that new social media platforms more and more actively prevent you from Using Your Words.
LiveJournal and Tumblr are technically "micro-blogging" sites first and social networking sites second. They're meant for Talking About Things, and the platform is mechanically set up to do so. "#long post" is what they're designed to do. Tumblr's image-heaviness was at one point seen as an oddity.
MySpace gave you your own blog, as well as forums.
Facebook is set up to allow indefinite amounts of text. They'll look ugly, admittedly. But you very much can, and that is the default format.
Twitter has built-in to its foundation that you cannot say more than a single sentence without circumventing the entire basis of the site. You are not meant to be able to say anything longer than that, and if you try to get around it they will do their darndest to make your content impossible to read. Also, Twitter physically does not let you edit a tweet.
Instagram is. Pictures. If you're using it at base functionality there are zero (0) words. You can do a caption if you want but the thing it's designed for does not include words at all. Also, you can edit that caption but the bulk of your post (the image) cannot be edited; and if you edit your caption the engagement algorithm resets so, effectively, no one will ever see that post again.
Snapchat doesn't even let you do captions. You can circumvent it trying to prevent you from Using Your Words by putting a tiny strip of text across your image and that's the best you've got. (If you're visually impaired, fuck you.) Also, no editing whatsoever.
TikTok is "new tumblr" because at least you can convey a significant number of words - you just aren't allowed to TYPE them. (If you're hearing-impaired or visually impaired fuck you.) A platform where typed text effectively does not exist is the closest modern social media gets to actually allowing you to say more than a single sentence. Also, no editing whatsoever.
Anyway, my point being, like... of course there's no nuance in Twitter discourse. There's nowhere to put it whether you want to or not. Of course people get increasingly angry and polarised - there's nowhere to put a clarification or elaboration, nowhere to put even a couple words indicating your intended tone. In discussions where people are already sensitive or defensive, everyone's left to take the most negative reading of what they see because they have no basis for taking it otherwise. No one can go back and edit what they've posted, or in most cases even edit while they're posting, so if you realize that your wording was confusing, or more information leads you to change your mind, or you just have a horrible typo, you're shit outta luck.
New social media actively, intentionally builds into the foundations of their platforms Physically Not Allowing You To Use Your Words, and they do it more and more as time goes on. And, like, not to sound like a "social media is evil and fire is scary" boomer, but that's kinda worrying.
