Since I don't participate in any social media, the only time I have to witness the cheap tawdriness if not downright vulgarity, and transparent fakery that is part and parcel of social media, is when I am reading something that provides a link to a tweet, or video. I scroll through the comments a little way before I have to stop because I can't take anymore - same with You Tube video comments, and many comment sections of random websites I visit. These commenters are NPC's, most of them empty of brains and souls, hence fakebots. I'm an NPC, myself, in that I only offer the real me to very limited exposure - a small number of friends, a few workmates, and my family with whom I socialize, plus a handful of websites, including your Substack and a few others, where I enjoy reading the comments and posting a few myself. I don't have time to be a brand. It's all I can do to just be me. Thanks for your essays and commentary on our culture, John. I really enjoy hearing your opinions, probably because you explain so well many of my own.
I hate to play the Luddite card all the time, but this essay validates my continuing decision to limit my engagement in social media. I don't have a smart phone, which makes me a retro crank to others. No Twitter, Instagram or Facebook for the reasons/examples John gives. My brand would probably be "leave me to hell alone," I wouldn't even fly the "Don't tread on me" banner because I don't want the attention. I think that's why progressive owned cars are festooned with bumper stickers; mine has none. Just yesterday I was talking to a couple of friends, face to face, and I said to each; "if you could go back and change something, like Sarah Connors tries to do in Terminator 2 when she decides to kill Miles Dyson to stop Skynet, would you try to kill the internet for the coarsening and dumbing down of our culture?" Throwing out the baby with the bathwater, maybe, unless that "baby" has already been drowned? It certainly has infantilized our whole society.
Since I don't participate in any social media, the only time I have to witness the cheap tawdriness if not downright vulgarity, and transparent fakery that is part and parcel of social media, is when I am reading something that provides a link to a tweet, or video. I scroll through the comments a little way before I have to stop because I can't take anymore - same with You Tube video comments, and many comment sections of random websites I visit. These commenters are NPC's, most of them empty of brains and souls, hence fakebots. I'm an NPC, myself, in that I only offer the real me to very limited exposure - a small number of friends, a few workmates, and my family with whom I socialize, plus a handful of websites, including your Substack and a few others, where I enjoy reading the comments and posting a few myself. I don't have time to be a brand. It's all I can do to just be me. Thanks for your essays and commentary on our culture, John. I really enjoy hearing your opinions, probably because you explain so well many of my own.
I hate to play the Luddite card all the time, but this essay validates my continuing decision to limit my engagement in social media. I don't have a smart phone, which makes me a retro crank to others. No Twitter, Instagram or Facebook for the reasons/examples John gives. My brand would probably be "leave me to hell alone," I wouldn't even fly the "Don't tread on me" banner because I don't want the attention. I think that's why progressive owned cars are festooned with bumper stickers; mine has none. Just yesterday I was talking to a couple of friends, face to face, and I said to each; "if you could go back and change something, like Sarah Connors tries to do in Terminator 2 when she decides to kill Miles Dyson to stop Skynet, would you try to kill the internet for the coarsening and dumbing down of our culture?" Throwing out the baby with the bathwater, maybe, unless that "baby" has already been drowned? It certainly has infantilized our whole society.