February 8, 2024
much space in the collective maelstrom of discourse is taken up by liberals (note – i have been told that i should not use the word liberal as a stand in for everyone left of center and instead differentiate the ideological groups i talk about. im not doing that sorry!) who blithely claim that the kids are fine and any issues are due to structural factors or to the interpretations of the older generations, or conservatives who spout sky-is-falling rhetoric that the kids today are woke privates in joe biden’s personal army dooming the nation to one thousand years of lib ideology. and even in the center there are thinkers such as haidt who blame the state of the kids today on social media.
the truth is more banal. as i see it, having been a kid when social media became popular, it is probably bad! it is addictive(ish), bad for self image(ish), and provides an unfortunate frictionless outlet for social behaviors which kids today™ would rather use than do all the behaviors that have been in freefall since 2010. all this is true(ish) and yet i cannot bring myself to care that much.
the contention that the internet is good for friend-making is true (you are much more likely to find someone with a similar personality as you if you are weird) as someone who has met many more strangers over the internet than is recommended in internet safety classes (did everyone have those?) but this isn’t a good contention because most people do not use the internet like this and we cannot force them to. rather, the internet is neutral.
rather, people get used to the status quo. the average person will be their baseline happiness at any given moment. you get used to your environment, and if you’re used to life on the world wide web, you’ll likely get adjusted. if you get bombarded by news about climate change and everything wrong in the world that’ll likely nuke the minds of those not used to this in childhood (hiiii millennials, specifically liberals) but gen z? idk we’re probably going to be fine after a time. if you’re a miserable person you’d probably be miserable without the internet too and just place your misery into other outlets. sorry that was going to happen anyway (what are the reasons for this? uh maybe genetic or early childhood). striking the change of a major life change, your baseline happiness is already set. gen z will be alright because fifty percent of their happiness has been dialed in due to genetics and the rest already built in the new world of the internet. like always, millennials (who haven’t been kids for some time) get the short end of the stick.
this argument when read aloud seems to endorse a form of wireheading which i am firmly against. the epicureans sought pleasure through the absence of fear and an insulated box with the dopamine drip of social media seems to fulfill this. maybe! epicurus seemed to like friendship a lot and friendship via screen may fulfill this? not sure. the others? I think a life filled with dopamine drip isn’t virtuous. you’re certainly doing something in excess. one should probably go outside to achieve eudamonia. the real harms of social media are the harms of excess and these are not unique. get off the phones. exercise some self control. etc.
talking out of my own posterior, i don’t think that the dopamine drip continues forever. i’ve certainly felt the gravitational pull of the Apps lessen over time; they just do not scratch the sweet spot that they once did. the hedonic treadmill wins in the long run and people will naturally put down their phones.