Earlier today, I spent altogether too much time getting lost in one of the strange rabbit holes of the Interwebz... in this case, how the continuing development of social media is shaping not only our behavior patterns, but also our senses of self and our emotional/psychological well-being.
I should start by saying that I am definitely no expert on sociology... but I have been watching the Human Condition — as a "hobby," you might say — pretty much since my college daze.
Since the whole thing first came about, I have always felt that social media somehow represented a "complexification" of our lives. It started simply enough... the early days of social blogging amounted to little more than "online journaling with an audience." You wrote the basic stories of the events of your life and people within your "circle" would occasionally stop by and leave a few words of encouragement or suggestion.
By most measures, these seemed like normal interactions between people, in writing.
Then came MySpace. Then came Facebook. And something changed.
From where I am sitting, it marked a major quantum leap in The Great Dumbing Down. What I mean by that is that the relationship between the effort put into social content and the reward earned (likes, comments, etc) changed in such a way that people would get their "dopamine nuggets" in exchange for far less effort and — in particular — far less thought than previously.
What does that have to do with anything?
One of the things that seems to happen when systems become more and more complex is that we struggle to wrap our brains around how to manage them. And this weird thing happens — originally explored in Rebecca Costa's groundbreaking book "The Watchman's Rattle" — that we start to substitute beliefs for knowledge and facts.
The particularly scary thing about that is the growing number of people who would much rather operate purely at the level of beliefs, rather than deal with the underlying facts and realities of a situation.
Consider the many "movements" we have in today's society that are based on little more than a few opinions, that likely have no roots in any kind of reality, whatsoever. And yet they attract millions of followers.
It becomes rather problematic because simply because someone wants something to be true doesn't actually make it true. It might make you feel good to pray in front of a purple crystal, but it's very unlikely to actually cure your cancer. And that's just a very mild hypothetical...
As I have written here before, these social technologies we are increasingly getting embroiled in are specifically designed to make us some kind of addicted to them... and while we continue to pursue the whole "more reward for less effort" angle like it's a good thing, we remain blissfully unaware that our ability to engage in the kind of critical thinking required to solve the world's increasingly complex problems is being compromised.
"Yeah, we can talk about neighborhood violence, but first let me post another selfie!"
It's not going to work... we need to do better! And running away into the metaverse and refusing to come back out is probably not going to be the answer...
Thanks for reading, and have a great week ahead!
How about YOU? Is there an aspect of social media that's trying to addict us to NOT being able to focus or think? Comments, feedback and other interaction is invited and welcomed! Because — after all — SOCIAL content is about interacting, right? Leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation!
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Created at 20220214 00:07 PST
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