March 5th, 2026
Internet culture has evolved a lot over the years, and more and more the trend seems to be in favor of isolation and partisanship. It's become normalized, even encouraged, to refuse engagement with people you're not already in agreement with. The challenging of one's beliefs is not treated as a natural part of developing society, but rather as a personal inconvenience that is to be avoided.
At the heart of this culture is the "DNI list." DNI is an acronym for "do not interact," and it's used most often in social media bios and introductions to say what kinds of people you don't want interacting with you. I find this practice to be fundamentally counterproductive and anti-intellectual, for a few reasons.
The DNI list is used primarily as a tool to stop discourse, not through resolution, but through disengagement. For example, you'll often see DNIs pertaining to specific debates, such as "DNI if you support mspec lesbians," or "DNI if you're pro-ship."
I find this to be counterproductive, and an active detriment to our wellbeing as a society. Conversing with those you disagree with can be uncomfortable, sometimes frustrating, but conversation is not fruitless; it's a means of change. The historic Supreme Court ruling of Obergefell v. Hodges wouldn't have happened without extensive, national conversations about queer marriage. The earlier emancipation of slavery within the United States of America would not have happened without extensive, national conversations about the humanity of Black Americans. By refusing to have these conversations, we're dooming ourselves to a stagnant society, one which is disinterested in evolving itself, and disinterested in interrogating it's own faults.
The only people who benefit from this walled garden approach to discourse are the people who are already winning. Especially in the current political landscape, we can't simply stop challenging dangerous beliefs. The people who want you to do so are the ones who reap the rewards. I'm sure the President would be very happy to know how many people simply refuse to talk to his supporters. I'm sure J.K. Rowling would be very happy to know how many people refuse to talk to TERFs. It perpetuates an echo chamber.
An easy response to that statement is "I'm not homophobic," or "I'm not racist, therefore I am not part of the society that needs fixing."
Something that we, by and large, need to understand, is that we are all participants in society, whether we choose to be or not. It's easy to think of society as the thing on the other side of the window that puts people in prisons and takes cuts out of your paychecks, but society isn't merely it's ills; society is us.
When you interrogate someone on a belief that you disagree with, you are not merely a partisan acting against the other side. You are acting as a member of society, engaging with another member of the same society. You're interrogating society just as much as you're interrogating them personally.
By claiming that society is flawed without cooperating to address those flaws, you can only be pointing the finger right at yourself. You may not be homophobic, you may not be racist, but you are, ultimately, a member of society. The society that we are all in, that we all share. It's our collective duty to make said society the best it can be. You cannot opt out of this obligation. You cannot exit society.
One instance of "DNI" that I do find to be reasonable is "minors DNI," or "MDNI," specifically in the context of an account that posts primarily pornographic or otherwise adult material. Using "MDNI" because you find minors to be annoying is a whole other conversation, but that's besides the point.
The reason it actually works in this instance is that you can assume good faith of both parties. An adult posting porn on social media has a valid reason to want children off of their profile, and said children should be capable of respecting that boundary. However, most uses of DNI are... less stable.
Very often, DNIs are employed against people who have little, or even negative interest in respecting your personal boundaries. People often treat a DNI like it's some kind of barrier against certain interactions, when fundamentally it's the same as telling someone "I would prefer if you stopped talking to me."
"Creeps DNI" is one that I see fairly regularly, and it consistently astounds me. You're expecting someone to see that, self-identify themself as a "creep," and then have the good will to not interact with you? It's, to put it bluntly, pointless. It only serves to perpetuate the anti-intellectual culture of DNI lists.
Do away with the DNI list. "Don't talk to me" is a boundary that should be set on an individual basis. It's a reasonable concern that some people won't want to listen to you on DNI-worthy matters; in that case, you can block them individually and move on to the more receptive minds. By casting broad barriers based on beliefs, you're excluding many people who may genuinely be interested in listening, or may genuinely have their minds changed. We can't improve a society that we refuse to participate in.