I’m finding myself typing out a comment, either long-winded or succinct, in my long fight against people being wrong on the internet, then thinking to myself “What the hell am I doing?”
So then I highlight my comment, delete everything, and close the tab.
I was last on nextdoor.com commenting on some user’s needless update about a grocery store layout change and how they posted it in the “Safety” category, which spams my email box. The use of categorizing every non-issue on “Safety” happens a lot, and I was about to deliver a tongue lashing to my village idiot.
But then I realized that, after about 5-6 years of arguing with people who have caverns for brains, I’m just so tired of dealing with this shit.
I’ve gone as far as deleting all of my social media apps on my phone. All they do is make me feel empty. I fill up on dopamine and when it comes time to do the shit I really want to do, my brain pokes me and says “c’mon Zan. Let’s go back to YouTube or check Instagram again. I bet there’s something new on Twitter! Hey, maybe someone is wrong on Facebook and you can type out a 4 paragraph comment, pointing out just how wrong they are! I mean, they won’t change their minds and you won’t feel better, but you showed them how wrong they are!”
Ugh.
I’ve decided to invest more of my time with shit that matters. I’m going to code a lot of shit. I’m going to take pictures. I’m going to play with my dogs. And at the end of the day, I don’t care who knows. When I go out, I won’t be taking a picture for the “likes”. I won’t think about who might comment on what. Because it doesn’t matter. These fellow dopamine drones don’t give a flying fuck about me – and that’s fine. I don’t care about a lot of them either. We’re all in a basket, clamoring for a little bit of attention (give me some of that fucking dopamine, yo), all while we’re slaves to the master algorithm.
I suppose that because my profile has a bunch of false information, the algorithm doesn’t know exactly what to serve me.
“Maybe some chicks from Nebraska? Uh, Bernie Sanders stuff? How about some custom hoodies? CLICK ME! INTERACT WITH THIS STAR WARS PAGE, YOU FUCK!” – Facebook, probably.