I love the internet.
I have loved the internet since 1994. I have sold it, defended it, talked non-stop about the possibilities for nearly 30 years.
Now, thanks to American corporations, their special brand of puritanism making everything they touch turn to shit… I think I hate the internet. Which makes me unemployable, because it’s the only real skill I have.
With Facebook announcing their new name, Meta, well all I can say is a hearty “whatever” and hope everyone disappears into it, never to be seen again.
Everyone and everything is being… dumb. Every single day, I feel like I’m in a 24/7 Idiocracy nightmare that I cannot seem to wake up from. My own personal version of purgatory where I have to guess what I did wrong to deserve being there.
I loved the internet.
Whilst I naively thought I could persuade people that our blind spots are being used and nudged by greedy and bad people, and that by being committed to what is correct and true, and to keep my integrity… I am not convinced. I will tell you, the asymmetric propaganda machine I am up against is powerful. The culture wars content factory is a massive scam.
The Dunning Kruger effect is very, very real, except rather than being funny, now it is actually incredibly dangerous. Because it is not just about a little knowledge giving too much confidence to a bunch of ordinary harmless people, but a system that incentivises deliberate and wilful ignorance, expertise being punished and told to be more stupid in order to “reach an audience”.
Sorry, but some things are complicated and take more than 30 seconds to explain, arsehole.
This race to the bottom is affecting people’s grip on reality, history, evidence… and now also affecting everyone’s mental and physical health.
Americans in particular are so unbelievably, wilfully obnoxious. The United States’ unique brand of weaponised stupid used to be quaint, but being bombarded with their ill-informed, aggressive nonsense is now like being waterboarded with liquid shit.
I find it completely unbearable to be on the internet with them and their death cult Coke vs Sprite nonsense.
I find it completely unbearable watching liars and conmen and people with no interest in politics outside of “content” for clicks, making them effectively televangelists with updated firmware.
I find it completely unbearable watching people with no training, education or even meaningful insight other than pandering to angry men and teenage girls elevated as “thinkers”, whilst people who actually invest the time and effort are frozen out – only to then be told it is a meritocracy. Bullshit. Your content is crap and your audience is dumb. Anyone can do that. You’re a symptom of a broken system, not an expert, bro.
America, and those who listen to America more than they should: “Cancel Culture” and “Wokism” and “Trumpism” are not a mystery. Pick up a book, maybe even two books and learn about your own history and government and how the death cult known as the United Corporations of America is the unrelenting, loud-chewing elephant in the room.
The world isn’t “meta”. It isn’t something that you can simply dream into existence and hack into existence. You have to do the structural and foundational work. People aren’t a construct, or a tool, or a simulation. This isn’t a multiverse. This isn’t about “possibilities”.
Why on earth would any sane person want to disappear any further into this hell hole of stupidity, greed, narcissism and neoliberal propaganda?
This is a psychological weapon with very real consequences. Seemingly, there is an inverse relationship between expertise and audience: the more wrong you are, the more people listen to you. This is not only a terrible outcome, but a deliberate one.
I think I hate the internet.
What started out as a world of thoughts and ideas and facts and hope and change, quickly turned into scams, slogans, gotchas and demands for hours and hours of “debate” from radicalised fools who think your lack of engagement with them is further proof of them being correct – and not them being a time wasting idiot.
This is why I just can’t do digital anymore. It sucks because I love it. But the worst, most unethical people are rewarded, and people like me are punished.
I hate the internet.
Now this is meta.
Have a great day.