McMinn and CheeseThoughts on an algorithmic social media ban
I don’t know what I think, really, which is why I’m writing this, now, and reserving the right to have my mind changed. Banning social media for under 16s is the answer to a problem that has been vexing us all for quite a while now, especially since the Nazi took over the Twitter—but it’s not just a problem for teenagers.
Part of me wants to say that the ban should be for everyone, not just the under 16s. The harm that has been done to society by social media since its early 2000s beginnings has been immeasurable. The riots in Belfast are just the mose recent manifestation. We all live now with the harsh realities of Brexit, and we’re all paying the price for the grifters in charge of the US government and the intractable problems the UK government has to deal with.
Which is before you get to the daily friction of dealing with people who have been misinformed to the point of madness. Whether its vaccines, net zero, the 15-minute city, the manosphere, trans rights or immigration, we’re all just wading through shit all the time. It’s like a permanent wet Glastonbury.
And we’re here because of lies and liars who were given an opportunity to spread those lies in unprecedented ways. Or, not just an opportunity. Encouragement. Support. Carte blanche, go ahead, knock yourselves out. And behind all this, the tech overlords whose greed and wholesale swallowing of Ayne Rand nonsense sees them determined to burn society to the ground. It’s not just that young people (all people) are being fed a poisonous diet of misogyny and racism, anorexia and suicide tips. It’s that the people in charge of these platforms don’t fucking care. One of Space Karen’s first acts on Twitter was to fire most of the moderators. Fucking Zuckerberg, who is one of the wierdest fucking creatures ever to evolve on this planet, decided to “stop apologising”. And the goons in charge of YouTube just want people to keep watching those ads.
A while ago, I wrote about the boiled frogs of Instagram. After leaving Twitter, I cast around for an alternative, and (very) briefly considered Insta. But confronted with the reels and reels of pouting lips, distorted faces and thrust out arses, I backed quickly away.
What prompted me to write this was seeing this comment (on the so-far algorithm-free) Bluesky:
Completely banning kids from social media rather than hold platforms accountable for content and safety is like telling women how to dress to avoid harassment and assault.
And I thought about it. Part of me agrees. Sure. These tech fuckers need to be held to account and taxed within an inch of their lives. But my further thought is that this is a question of framing. And, yes, if you frame this “ban” as a “punishment” for teenagers—depriving them of something they want just because we can’t control the tech bros—then it does seem like a case of victim blaming. But if you see algorithmic social media as a clear threat and harm—if you see it more like smoking tobacco or binge drinking alcohol, then it is something that young people (all people) need to be protected from.
And that’s the way I see it. I think so-called influencers are a blight. Not just because they have people injecting themselves with toxins and making their faces look like horrors from the deep, but because they make the whole world into advertising. I fucking hate advertising, always have. Hate it on TV, on podcasts, descending the escalator on the tube, on buses, bus stops, posters. On web sites. I have spent my life avoiding advertising, and then suddenly everybody wants to be an influencers. Everything has to be first person. Here is my honest review and other shit.
The liquid excrement we are all swimming in, the depths to which we have sunk. Not just Brexit, not just 💨💨, Space Karen Nazi, Zuckerberg and his Lego minifig hair, algorithmic AI slop, riots, Farage, Yaxley fucking fuckface whatever his name is, but all of it. And the sight of young people at The Football filming themselves as they celebrate a goal so they can post it on the socials. It was bad enough, being a parent at a primary school concert, twenty-odd years ago, the cameras. But now it’s an epidemic. Ugh, ugh, ugh. I have no words. We are all frogs boiling in Glastonbury shit.
#life #mentalHealth #politics #SocialMedia
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