"People will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think"

There's often something apocalyptic about scrolling through Twitter or watching TikTok videos. It's as though I'm watching the end days of culture and intellectual thought unfold before my eyes. I didn't think Idiocracy (2006) would be such an accurate portent of things to come...

Scrolling through Twitter is often like scrolling through a sea of inane, half-formed, poorly worded thoughts, punctuated by lol, y'all and like. Such thought-vomit tweets sometimes get hundreds of thousands of likes. Am I missing something? Am I the one who should change and just go along with all of this? All the great people in history, who changed the world for the better, is this what they would've done?

Tweet 1

Too much time spent on social media makes people less intelligent than they would otherwise be. Social media commentators and "activists" are quick to opine on things that they haven't researched or deeply considered, and they often express themselves in a judgmental and simplistic fashion. Please see tweet 1 for an example of this. It's rare to find truly intelligent, free-thinking people on social media, though the impression I get is that a lot of social media morons believe they are intelligent and free-thinking. It seems, mathematically speaking, that our intelligence isn't commensurate with the quantity of likes we get.

On social media, I've noticed people communicate themselves in a way which they wouldn't do in real life. I've noticed people are very opinionated on platforms like Twitter and TikTok, and can talk rudely and arrogantly. If they acted like this in person, they would probably be very unlikeable. A lot of commentators don't seem concerned with resolving the issues they talk about or having a healthy dialogue about them. Do they think they're educating people in a positive and constructive way?

Social media appears to render people more vapid, as well as less intelligent. It seems that when we reflexively express any little thought we have with little reflection, and still get a decent response from others online, then there's a tendency to become very superficial and lazy in our thinking. Conversely, when we inwardly reflect on things and consider them over time, our thoughts tend to become more nuanced and meaningful.

Being on social media sometimes reminds me of being in school. You have the popular kids, those with most followers and likes, and everyone else. A lot of people try to emulate the popular kids. They will adopt the language, abbreviations and style that popular kids use, and in the process lose their individuality and creativity. One of the latest trends on Twitter is starting a tweet with "did it hurt?". By emulating others to such a degree, people lose their originality.

Another style of posting is very common. There's a kind of post where there are no comas or full stops (just Joyce's stream of consciousness) coupled with a judgmental and opinionated attitude. This is the kind of tweet that gives off a "whatever I don't give a shit" vibe. Such tweets just make me think of a lazy, uninspiring teenager. Not to say that I expect people to conform to strict grammar rules on social media, but I often feel people are consciously trying to put out a "yeah whatever" vibe, and end up emitting ignorant, uninteresting babble.

The funny thing is, I think social media can be a good thing. I think if one is selective about who one follows, and if time on spent on social media is rationed properly, then there's nothing wrong with it. It's about maintaining awareness of what one is doing, and not getting sucked into a rabbit hole of opinionated teenagers spewing thought-vomit into a smartphone. 

It seems many people get into a position where they open up their social media and are immediately sent into a state of numbness (think of soma from Brave New World). They are then caught in a cycle of dumb posts rehashed over and over again.

There is often a lack of self-awareness on social media. But to be fair on the users, this lack of self-awareness and overuse of social media is actively encouraged by the tech companies who own these platforms. It's what is called the "attention economy", where each platform is competing with others for who can maintain our attention the longest. In this regard, I'd recommend the work of Tristan Harris, creator of the documentary The Social Dilemma. With the billions of users of social media, and the tremendous impact it's having on people, I think people need to be far more aware of what is going on.

A passage from Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death is incredibly relevant here. Tristan Harris himself uses Postman to illustrate his points. Postman compares Huxley's Brave New World to Orwell's 1984, remarking:

"Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley's vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared that the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance"

We Need to Overcome Ideological Thinking

I have learnt that there is a common tendency for people to distort their experiences to fit into their preconceived ideological thoughts. To me, such people are not free-thinking. Such people do not think independently and have little individuality and creativity. Such people do not perceive reality in an accurate, healthy way. They do not try to understand something for what it is, but reflexively apply their established, ideological concepts onto everything in a robotic fashion. In this way, such people are not open-minded or receptive, quite the opposite. I have also learnt that this phenomena occurs on all sides of the political spectrum, though in varying degrees depending on where you look.

Unfortunately, most of the people who need to internalise these ideas will be those who are most resistant to them, and the person who points out uncomfortable truths is often seen as an enemy. I am reminded here of Carl Jung's view that the biggest threat to humanity is what he calls a "psychic epidemic", whereby people lose the capacity to think in a healthy, coherent way, thus losing connection to reality. Truly confronting reality, after all, is not an easy task. It is like facing up to an almighty dragon. To use Carl Jung again "the most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely".

It is my view that "the truth will set you free". I strongly feel that if more people had a more evidence-based, accurate view of what is going on, human societies would be far healthier and happier. This entails overcoming ideological thought and moving beyond political boundaries. But many people, from what I have observed, are not willing to do this. 

We live in an extremely opinionated and defensive age. This has been exacerbated by social media. It seems that on social media many people react in an extreme, unintelligent and vapid way. I do not see enough thoughtfulness, self-reflection or nuance on social media. Maybe people deem these qualities to be boring or unfashionable?

Even if ideological, defensive people have good intentions, their thoughts and actions only contribute to a cycle of polarisation, division and avoidable conflict. "The road to hell is paved with good intentions". 

As far as I am concerned, it is only when people start truly thinking for themselves that human societies will get better. It is only when people start overcoming their egotistical, knee-jerk reactions that we will start really learning about the world. It is only when enough people become well-rounded and integrated that we will start developing healthily as a species.