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Imagine a fortunate normal person, their base needs are all met, they have food, water, a shelter, friends & family that are similar to them, and just enough income through a full-time job to provide and perpetuate this condition at about 40 a week. They have some energy reserves left, a little time, a little money to save and hope for a brighter future in a nicer house with a nicer car...
Now, give this person two choices for what they may do with their remaining resources: entertainment or self-cultivation. For lower-class people, this choice is still 50/50 in my opinion, with a higher likelihood of total soul-death.
Entertainment is infinite in its variety & titilation, it's easily accessible and often free in our Era, and is what much of culture is based around in colonialized cultures. It does not stimulate much growth and is focused around pleasure, engagement, and escape from boredom or reality. I would even throw most faith-basee religions into this category, for reasons that could make up its own thread, as well as most news.
Self-cultivation in comparison takes more energy, self-discipline, isn't fun in the sense that entertainment is, and in many cultures isn't very common or trendy, usually the serious stuff demands Isolation, sometimes to the point of being entirely counter-culture (there isn't a feeling worse than looking around and seeing everyone you know, love, and depend on acting like lunatics). Past therapy or ego-pleasing surface-level fads like Westernized Yoga or crossfit, there is no real mainstream signs that a path outside entertainment even exists. Many stay in the mainstream knowing nothing else.
The point of this thread is to examine the real, subtle, and malicious effects of "doomscrolling" and low-quality content producing platforms.
With the mainstream being all you know and are used to, it could be difficult to ever want to move a muscle and get out of it. Being on this forum, you have likely already hopped out of the stream and can understand the true soul-crushing implications for people now having iPads in their hands from infancy (not an exaggeration) and having less need to entertain themselves or "waste" their freetime in contemplation.
To make this an easier metaphor, every person is an acorn. Those who are entertained their whole lives and never cultivate themselves are likely not to grow into trees. The soul-forest of our species is shrinking as fewer and fewer people are given reasons to think. This is very upsetting to me (partly because I remember vividly what that death-like state of being felt like) and I can't understand why more people here aren't as panicked.
The dream is becoming thicker and more difficult to wake up from.
What do you all see for the future? What do you all feel about this? Do you have any ideas on how to help people who Doomscroll so much they don't have the attention-span or desire to research anything, or even pursue hobbies? Does this have any correlation with the growing racist / anti-immigrant sentiments being fostered in the Americas, the UK, and parts of Europe?
Call me a schizophrenic, but I feel the mainstream heating up to a boil that will lead to something unpleasant.
Now, give this person two choices for what they may do with their remaining resources: entertainment or self-cultivation. For lower-class people, this choice is still 50/50 in my opinion, with a higher likelihood of total soul-death.
Entertainment is infinite in its variety & titilation, it's easily accessible and often free in our Era, and is what much of culture is based around in colonialized cultures. It does not stimulate much growth and is focused around pleasure, engagement, and escape from boredom or reality. I would even throw most faith-basee religions into this category, for reasons that could make up its own thread, as well as most news.
Self-cultivation in comparison takes more energy, self-discipline, isn't fun in the sense that entertainment is, and in many cultures isn't very common or trendy, usually the serious stuff demands Isolation, sometimes to the point of being entirely counter-culture (there isn't a feeling worse than looking around and seeing everyone you know, love, and depend on acting like lunatics). Past therapy or ego-pleasing surface-level fads like Westernized Yoga or crossfit, there is no real mainstream signs that a path outside entertainment even exists. Many stay in the mainstream knowing nothing else.
The point of this thread is to examine the real, subtle, and malicious effects of "doomscrolling" and low-quality content producing platforms.
With the mainstream being all you know and are used to, it could be difficult to ever want to move a muscle and get out of it. Being on this forum, you have likely already hopped out of the stream and can understand the true soul-crushing implications for people now having iPads in their hands from infancy (not an exaggeration) and having less need to entertain themselves or "waste" their freetime in contemplation.
To make this an easier metaphor, every person is an acorn. Those who are entertained their whole lives and never cultivate themselves are likely not to grow into trees. The soul-forest of our species is shrinking as fewer and fewer people are given reasons to think. This is very upsetting to me (partly because I remember vividly what that death-like state of being felt like) and I can't understand why more people here aren't as panicked.
The dream is becoming thicker and more difficult to wake up from.
What do you all see for the future? What do you all feel about this? Do you have any ideas on how to help people who Doomscroll so much they don't have the attention-span or desire to research anything, or even pursue hobbies? Does this have any correlation with the growing racist / anti-immigrant sentiments being fostered in the Americas, the UK, and parts of Europe?
Call me a schizophrenic, but I feel the mainstream heating up to a boil that will lead to something unpleasant.
