Of course, Jenny. It’s a fair question and I think it’s beautiful to ask questions that come up. I don’t follow anyone because I believe that social media typically promotes ingenuine interactions. Some for sure can be genuine, but i feel like a majority of them come from a place of self promotion. Follow for a follow. Like for a like. There is a comment two articles ago on a post of mine that highlights this type of behavior. I think it’s a very subjective topic however.

I like to just stumble upon beautiful writers like yourself and read and support them in what feels like a genuine way to me. By taking the time to read their work and comment when it feels appropriate to. I have many other reasons for not following anyone but another big one is that social media can be a bit of an echo chamber. I feel overwhelmed when I think about all of the writers who I align with or should follow based on that alignment. I know that many of them have beautiful perspectives to share but I believe that I can truly support them without the follow, and remain open to new and opposing perspectives.

Medium is also the rare social platform that doesn’t guarantee that when you have more followers, each of those followers will actually see your writing. On instagram a post is guaranteed to show up to all or a majority of your followers where as medium, leans towards highlighting post based on your previous engagement and who you follow. I notice that when I read your own articles consistently, I see more recommended to me.

I’m just attempting to remain as open as possible from an algorithmic perspective. Algorithms can create a ton of bias, by design because their goal is to keep you engaged with content that you have shown to like. The goal is to promote consumption which can eventually lead to only consuming that which resonates with an individual’s echo chamber.

I could be over indexing on aspects of social media in this take, but I wanted to give an honest response. I can’t say that everyone who doesn’t follow anyone or only follows a low amount of people would say the same thing. I think that a lot of the not following people or following a low amount of people, can be an ego driven act. I won’t get into why because this response is terribly long, but would love to hear your thoughts on why.

I understand that people could see this choice of not following and see it in a very different light which is why I’m glad that you asked that question, and are open to discussing it. I’d love to hear your perspective on pro following people. And what specifically perplexes you about seeing people who do not follow others. I too like to ask questions and hear other’s perspective :)