Why I Left Twitter | The Renegade Coder

As of March of this year, I'm off Twitter for good! In fact, at the time of writing, my old account should be deleted. Let's talk about that! Standard Disclaimer As the famous phrase goes, "this isn't an airport; no need to announce your departure." I know that talking about leaving a social media site can often be dismissed as meaningless. I also know that anyone who announces their departure can be perceived as narcissistic. So, the question becomes: why talk about leaving Twitter at all? To be honest, the answer to that question is a bit selfish: I want to reflect on my experiences with the site. Of course, it's more than that: I want a chance to be vulnerable in a place where I have the space to do so. I also want to commentate on the state of Twitter, and I want to examine the effects of Twitter on mental health. In other words, while it's probably silly to talk about leaving a social media site with any sort of seriousness, I still think it's worth talking about. However, when I had planned to write this article, I had a lot of visceral feelings that I wanted to share. While those feelings were entirely valid, I can't seem to remember what they were. However, I still want to share my story—even if it's a long story short. A Long Story Short Originally, I had planned to write a long article about the various reasons why I left Twitter. It included everything from mental health to time wasted to bots to politics. I was planning to really go in depth about the ways that Twitter was making my life worse, but it's already been over a month as I left on March 22nd, 2025. The gift of neuroplasticity has made me almost completely forget Twitter's existence, and I can't really speak from the heart on what it was doing to me. If you're curious about what I intended to write, there is a stream of conciousness note I had been keeping that has all of my unfiltered thoughts in it. I'll drop that at the bottom of this article. Keep in mind that I was really hurting at the time, so the note is pretty spicy. Instead, I think what I'll do is point to Eddy Burback's recent video on getting rid of his phone for a month, which he conveniently released only a handful of days after I quit Twitter. In addition, I'll briefly comment on all the ways Twitter was making my life worse. It Started With Facebook To start, I want to talk about Facebook. Facebook was a site that I joined in probably 2008 or 2009 during my freshman year of high school. I used it for a while, but it very quickly started making me feel bad about myself. After all, everyone was using it to curate a version of themselves online that was crafted around some vision of success. Everyone was posting about their new jobs, achievements, and vacations—so many vacations. As someone who grew up working class (for the record, I was not necessarily poor or housing insecure but I famously did have a friend describe my house as one which looked like it had roaches), my family basically never went on vacation. The only vacation I really remember was to Disney in middle school, and my dad didn't even come with us. Beyond that, vacation was usually a 90-minute trip to the Cleveland zoo. In fact, one the coolest things I ever experienced was going to a Guardians game (the then Indians) against my favorite team, the Mariners. I also got to see the Globetrotters at one point too. To then go onto Facebook and see the same families going on trip after trip didn't really feel great for a developing mind. As I got older, I found that Facebook was also turning into a political hellscape. I couldn't go on there without seeing posts from family members sharing the most insane conservative memes. You know the ones. Just imagine the most vile things you could possibly say about the Obamas. It was not good for the mental health to see family members in that way. Not only that, but I regularly saw old teachers of mine posting stuff like that. It was hard for me to contend with this idea that my role models and idols could be so disgusting online. Every single one of them seemed to have broken their brains and joined this hivemind of conservative brain rot. So about six months into my life in Columbus, I deleted my Facebook. My last post read "Peace, Facebook" on December 19th, 2018. Prior to that, I deactivated my Facebook after my 24th birthday on February 6th, 2018. Seemingly, when I came back, I found no renewed value in the site. I guess I didn't miss it. Falling Out of Love With Twitter At some point, I moved from Facebook to Twitter. I quite liked Twitter because none of my family or friends were on there. I could post whatever I liked, and I wouldn't really have to worry about anyone I knew seeing it. I could also curate my feed to see more empathetic political content, and it was also a much better source of hockey news. Of course, Twitter was always a bit of a cesspit. It was always a place for brigading and attacking content creators you don't like. In a weird way, I kind of liked it because people couldn't really get away with posting lies. It was fun to get caught up in the blood sports, grab some popcorn, and watch drama happen in the replies of a controversial tweet. As with all good things, they seemingly come to an end. With Twitter, the end was expedited by our boy, Elon Musk. When he acquired the site, it rapidly got worse, despite what others might say. In fact, Benn Jordan does a wonderful job of outlining the history of changes that made the site objectively worse (for reference, it's the most watched portion of his video). Here are some highlights: October 2022: "Elon buys twitter" November 2022: "banned and suspended accounts reinstated" and "account verification becomes a paid perk" February 2023: API access closed September 2023: "'mark as misinformation' functionality removed" June 2024: "identity of 'likes' is hidden site-wide" October 2024: "'block' feature mostly removed" Not to mention that I personally recall basic features like search just not working at all. I also ran into so many issues of tweets not being able to be posted at all. It was incredibly frustrating. Naturally, as is the point of Benn's video, Twitter (I refuse to call it "X") also started having a major bot problem. It got to the point where I just assumed every reply was from a bot, especially the blue check replies that were prioritized. Apparently, when you make a paid feature that boosts your reach and can result in a paycheck, you attract a lot of bots. Who would have thought? But Wait, There's More! The bot issue was definitely a problem, but I got used to ignoring them and also just looking out for replies from people I knew. The problem got worse when Twitter introduced Grok. Then, all of the sudden, the dumbest people you'd ever met were using it "fact check" tweets. I couldn't believe my eyes. People were genuinely outsourcing a Google search to a text prediction machine and treating it as truth. As I got closer to deleting my account, I moved from a passive consumer of Twitter to an active poster. Within the last month of my use, I was regularly retweeting accounts with posts that I thought were stupid to dunk on them. Of course, you know how this goes. Half of the posts were probably by bots, and I wasn't really getting satisfaction out of the dunk. I was just getting more angry and found myself hunting down new tweets to get angry about. To prove it, here's several tweets of mine, some of which even advocate for civil disobedience (or worse) in less than sly ways: "I love living in a society where property is valued more than people. Really wish we had an attitude more like the French." "Not writing your own commit messages is crazy. Burning down the rainforest to generate them is insane. Do y’all do anything yourself?" "BuT EFfiCieNcy??!?!? My brother in Christ: tell me how efficient it is when you can't get mail in your town because it isn't profitable." "Every single American in this thread is dying to have their own Brexit moment. “If you just let the states do it, it’ll work.” I’m sure true American patriot bible school will go hard in Florida. Just send your kids back to the mines already." "Ghouls everywhere lmao just truly evil people walking among us." Obviously, this is all out of character for me, even if I still agree with the sentiment. While I enjoy the dunking, I know that it's not productive. I know it's doing nothing to convince the other party, and in all likelihood the other party is a bot. When I had that realization, I felt really pathetic. Like, why am I yelling at a literal bot? It can't feel. There's no way to hold it accountable. Looking Forward Quitting Twitter was actually surprisingly easy. I very quickly forgot about it, and the benefits have been incredible. I no longer have this constant need to check my phone or pull up a second screen. I'm able to focus on a task, and I've been spending a lot more time doing nothing with my kiddo. I can't say that I don't miss Twitter. I certainly feel out of the loop. Like I have no clue what is happening in hockey anymore, and I have to get my news in other ways. I also feel myself filling the void with sites like YouTube and Reddit, especially around topics that drive me nuts like generative AI. But, I'm much happier now. I'm able to get work done in a fraction of the time, and I can even write here more. Looking ahead, I think I'll have more free time as I slowly ween myself off the idea of social media. You will not catch me on Bluesky. I will not be getting on any other traditional social media or even short form media, like TikTok. If someone wants to get a hold of me, they'll have to get my number. With all that said, I think the part where I get vulnerable (especially around mental health) will have to wait for another time. Pretty soon I'll be heading abroad, and I will certainly be writing a few posts about that. I haven't been outside the country since maybe 2017, so I'm really excited! On a side note, I did spend a lot of time trying to get folks to go to Twitter and share their solutions to my old Python challenges. I'll have to go back and fix all that, which seems like a solid summer project. In the meantime, if you enjoyed this, I'd encourage you to read more of my work, such as: How I Almost Built a Twitter Bot The Social Media Cleanse Why I Deleted Most of My Social Media You can even support the site a bit more by checking out my list of ways to grow the site. Otherwise, take care! Alright, now here's the sort of unfiltered note I was keeping about this article: Preface with “I don’t think anyone cares about this. Why would anyone care why an individual would leave Twitter. Everyone has heard the airport meme (you don’t need to announce your departure). It comes off as narcissistic.” Maybe frame it as 3 reasons for quitting Twitter: mental health, the end of speech protections, and Elon is a dipshit. (Also maybe used it to experience sports and other things through other people, also maybe everyone is bot) People make this joke about video games, but I don’t think I’ll ever be on my deathbed thinking, “I should have posted more” I got off Facebook in [insert year]. I think that was the start of the post truth era. People were curating their own “realities” by posting about their vacations and trips. Everyone looked like they were having a great time, which made me feel inadequate but also angry. I wasn’t going on trips because I couldn’t afford it. That anger has come back in the form of Twitter. What used to be a fun site for jokes, memes, sports, and generally commentary became a place for nazi apologia, right wing propoganda, and bots—so many bots. This anger turned to posting because I was starting to feel like speech was no longer protected, so it was no longer “cheap.” There needed to be people taking risks and speaking out, and felt the need to fill that role. I also felt like Twitter had been “colonized” in sort of a funny way. All the folks I used to enjoy on the site moved to blue sky. There were so few left, and I felt like it was up to me to be like “hey, we were here first! We can’t just turn it over to these people.” But as I posted through it, I started to realize that even though I was getting some attention that the cost to my mental health just wasn’t worth it. I realized that when I was laying in bed posting through it at 2 in the morning. Like, what am I doing? I surely could be getting some sleep and using my time off my phone for literally anything else. Looking back, there were definitely moments that should have caused me to reflect. I was writing tweets in the car. I was writing tweets in class. I was writing tweets during a dissertation defense. I think an anarch capitalist hellscape is the good ending right now. Talk about the student who cited Candace Owen’s Talk about being uniquely vulnerable me in this article. Talk about hating your job at GE and cs program. Talk about group therapy and meds. But more than anything, Twitter is a place for screaming into the void. It accomplishes nothing. Talk about the election. Talk about sb1. Talking about Kamala and the democrats being cowards. Talk about cuck Schumer. Talk about positionality. Talk about hitting every checkbox that meets the rights requirement of being white, male, a parent, rural fly over state, etc. Talk about the phone calls from my dad worried about losing everything. Talk about how everyone seems to treat life like a fucking game. Talk about universities being cowards. Talk about friends losing jobs. This is not a game: when I spend time on Twitter, I get the feeling that people think politics is a game. They treat it like real sports. Also I have a daughter and it’s like “bro log off don’t you have kids?” So, yeah! Those were some of my raw thoughts coming off Twitter. I would encourage others to do the same because it isn't healthy. I'm already leagues happier by just being off of a website. Welcome to 2025.