Quite some time ago, I lamented that the UK had gone post-truth. That was amid the chaos of Boris when facts no longer seemed to matter.

On social media, it’s all now started to hit new heights, or rather to plumb new depths.

How so?

Well, I recently commented on a Facebook article regarding a man who had slashed his ex’s throat. An unpleasant subject, granted, and I’d dryly noted that he was so incompetent that he wasn’t even good at attempted murder. I fired it out without a moment’s thought. One comment among millions of online one-liners.

No inappropriately waggish jokes about his pronouns being he/her (you have to say it out load), nor any other verbal high jinks.

I should have known better, though, as the bland observation plopped right into the slutosphere, which is a moshpit of twisted fury.

Cue an unhinged deluge of hate. It was an unbridled slew of daggers, culminating in an open discussion on how the assembled gaggle of demented droids would now be logging into Amazon and churning out 1-star reviews for my publications.

In a post-truth world, posting the truth is not how these cats roll.

Apparently, though, contributing  online means that I have ‘no idea how to publish (sic) books’. Well, I’m not demanding expert status, but every time an obviously deranged loon barks out a brownstar special, I get a spike in sales.

That’s because no publicity is bad publicity. As another reviewer pointed out, I must be doing something right if I’m triggering the usual suspects.

And we all know who they are.

So, I sold a few copies and trousered some unexpected extra royalties. The first offending review was swiftly removed, and Amazon will doubtless restrict the shitposter’s account for platform manipulation. 

I think that’s what they call a ‘win-win’.

Incredibly, one hapless turd even PM-ed me to confirm that they had bought a copy and would burn it on arrival.

Wow, that’ll show me.

Looks like I do know how to publish books?

It’s a classic example of the social protest paradigm, a theory in communication and sociology that explains how mainstream media and the public tend to focus on the behaviors and tactics of protesters rather than the reasons for their protest.

The unhinged psychosis from the permanently triggered suggests to a previously untapped mass of potential readers that I am on their side.

Meanwhile, the issue of violence against women goes unaddressed.

When will they ever learn?