"I realized I have a very finite amount of time on this planet, and there is so much I want to experience and accomplish. I was wasting so much time distracting myself with TikTok." - Elizabeth Tate, 25, described reason for going 'cold turkey' with TikTok, WSJ, March 9, p. A12
"As I detailed at length in my 2022 book The Hidden History of Big Brother: How the Death of Privacy and the Rise of Surveillance Threaten Us and Our Democracy, that’s the “secret algorithm” that determines what content and which “influencers” and even regular users get promoted or ignored, and to whom that content is pushed.
That algorithm has been proven to be, in many cases for each of the various social media sites, highly toxic, pushing people into conspiracy theories, Nazism and white supremacy, and destroying the self-esteem of young people and children. It has often caused death, both from radicalization (El Paso and Buffalo shooters), actual genocide, and suicide." - Thom Hartmann, The Hartmann Report
"Are you
better off today than you were four years ago? Honestly, I didn’t think
Republicans were going to try replaying Ronald Reagan’s famous line, since so
much of the G.O.P.’s 2024 strategy depends on a sort of collective amnesia about the last year of Donald
Trump’s presidency. Is it really a good idea to remind voters what the spring
of 2020 was like?
For it
was a terrible time: It was a time of fear, with Covid deaths skyrocketing. It was a time of
isolation, with normal social interactions disrupted. It was a time of surging violent crime, perhaps brought on by that
social disruption. It was a time of huge job losses, with the unemployment rate
hitting 14.8 percent that April. And do you remember the
great toilet paper shortage?" - Paul Krugman, NY Times today
The WSJ piece (March 9) 'Why Twenty Somethings Are Saying No To Tik Tok' was an eye opener for sure. Though I'd realized for a while this thing had surreal addictive and distractive capacity, e.g.
I never truly appreciated the extent to which it had hijacked the brains of so many young adults and converted them into mush. Now, we learn many Twenty Somethings are consciously detaching from the coke-like app to reclaim their lives, their thoughts and their wills - and one now hopes - their political sense. As the WSJ columnist (Julie Jargon) writes;
" Many 20-somethings are now trying to break the all-consuming TikTok habit they started during the pandemic. The young adults I spoke to have been on social media for a decade or more and didn’t question the impact it was having on them until recently. They started noticing that TikTok, in particular, got in the way of sleep, work, household chores and relationships. Some even say it has kept them from chasing their own creative dreams. They are now deleting the app in pursuit of more in-person experiences and tidier homes."
Wow! And what led to such a remarkable decision? Well, we see a wide array of examples in the piece. Take, for example, Keilah Bruce - a 27 year old accountant in New York. She stopped using the app after Tik Tok's algorithm began showing her things that matched her private thoughts. As she put it to the WSJ: "It's one thing to know about you, and another to know you."
Twenty somethings who believe they've found the 'pot of gold at the end of the rainbow' with Tik Tok need to take note. While it's true - thanks to the app's hypersensitive algorithm - users could discover content and personalities that aligned with their interests just by scrolling the app's main feed, they were unaware the same algorithm could plumb their own thoughts via their responses. In such a way also, rage and hysteria could be reinforced and pumped reaching a political chain reaction. Such has been the case with the angry campus protests in response to the unfolding Gaza horror, which has distracted too many 20-30 somethings from the coming U.S election and the need to vote Joe Biden. Not impressed? Then clearly you didn't see the latest news about Trump warning of a 'blood bath' if he isn't elected, e.g.
by Robert Reich | March 17, 2024 - 7:19am | permalink
— from Robert Reich's Substack
At a rally today outside the Dayton International Airport in Vandalia, Ohio, Trump warned that “if I don’t get elected, it’s going to be a blood bath … for the country.”
While Gaza for sure is a spectacle of needless horrific suffering (thanks to Bibi Netanyahu) it affords NO rational or justifiable excuse to either not vote, or to vote for a certified monster and lunatic like Donald Trump. With the entire nation's (and I'd argue world's) future on the line. This is given that an electoral win for this whack job - who would have the nuclear codes - surpasses any outrage over Gaza. Hence, an informed vote must alas take precedence over political division over Gaza, or indeed any other issue (inflation, school loan debt, perceived inaction on one's "pet" Biden to do's etc.)
Back to the WSJ piece, we also learn about the tribulations of Samantha Rodriguez, 29, an estate planner. She reported how the app frequently put her in danger, i.e.
"I would scroll Tik Tok while walking my dogs and there were times I'd walk right into a tree or mailbox,"
She also admits to have gotten into the habit of scrolling late at night to try and catch the latest cute dance or song, but this affected her job performance. It also affected her marriage and irritated her husband who often resorted to snatching her phone out of her hand while in bed. It had become a toxic element. Finally, she ''cut the cord" 6 months ago realizing that recovering her sanity and sense was more important than late night self-entertainment with empty dross. She says it was worth it, and "now wakes up feeling refreshed and more productive."
These cases are not exceptional as Ms. Jargon further notes:
"The 20-somethings I interviewed aren't outliers. They say many of their friends have also deleted the app or scaled back their use in recent months - like Alissa Chapman - who realized after watching hours of creative videos on Tik Tok one night she was never doing any of them herself. "
Her creative 'juices' were being sucked out by distraction and addiction in much the same way 20-somethings' political attention to this existential election is being sucked out the same way. (How else account for the mere 10-point edge Biden now has among the 18 to 34 age set compared to a 25-point edge in 2020?) Thus getting the 20-somethings off this brain -sucking, mind warping app may be the most critical step to a Biden reelection.
As I wrote in my January 17, 2023 post, the term “TikTok brain” has gained currency and validity, especially in the psychotherapy realm, and appears to refer to a genuine affliction of our time. Especially of younger brains way too inclined to be mesmerized by dancing monkeys, or dancing peers moving to the rhythms of catchy tunes. Often the defining feature is the way the energy-activity mesmerized young brain gets hooked on short videos in the 1- 2 minute range. Thereby it becomes so attuned to activity-dancing shorts that watching anything longer becomes intolerable.
Not to mention actually exercising brain cells - whether reading 'The Odyssey'- or even watching a lengthy historical movie like 'Exodus'. (Which has the added benefit of conveying the background to the Palestine-Israel issue.) Or reading an actual newspaper article on the multiple accomplishments of Joe Biden compared to Donald Trump.
The term itself was aptly coined to describe what this insidious app does to brains in their prime. Indeed, the very nature of the short videos endlessly trotted out – impairs memory, attention span and overall mental functioning over time. Kids are left staring at their tiny screens for most of a 24-hour day getting hooked on the memes portrayed by dancing peers while their neurons (and microglial cells) rot.
The NY Times had a weekend piece with the provocative header:
What Do You Do If You Hate Both Biden and Trump?
Which answer truly is a no -brainer for the non-Tik Tok mind. If your brain is firing on all cylinders and you're not trapped in a fake hysteria or 'sadness' miasma pumped by Tik Tok piffle, then you can get beyond it, e.g.
New Rule: Cheer Up! | Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO) (youtube.com)
And if and when you get beyond it, all the hand wringing distractions, you must vote for Joe Biden. You cannot allow emotions to run amuck and put a consummate criminal, rapist and traitor - not to mention wannabe dictator - into the most powerful position on the planet. As Bill Maher puts it in his most recent New Rule:
"Wages are rising. Unemployment is negligible. The stock market is soaring. yes some inflation is still around but you know an actual good, life -size TV now costs just sixty bucks. Who gets credit for that? We've got next day shipping, legal weed, stuffed crust pizza, GPS, and porn hub on the phone.
Cheer the fuck up! Stop acting like life in America in 2024 is unbearable.
Biden's ratings are in the toilet not because he's doing a bad job but because too many Americans like to live with their head in the toilet."
Maher goes on to note that almost a third of Americans report they suffer from depression. But as he also points out, earlier generations understood you're not supposed to feel good all the time. So why do so many of today's lot feel that way?
My suspicion is it can be traced to addictive algorithms in apps like Tik Tok and the ensuing social media addiction. Just the act then of seeing dozens of photos of what other people seem to be doing can drive one's own despair...if one lets it. As for the realm of "influencers" it is appalling to me so many young uns' hanker to enter this dubious "profession" given so many are unsuccessful (never mind the media hype). No, what we need now is not more TikTok influencers but rather more genuine patriotic voters canvassing for Joe Biden. And more than ready to take down Donald Trump for the second - and hopefully last- time!
As for the 20 (and 30-) somethings I am reasonably secure in my conviction the drop off in support of Joe Biden is from lack of motivation, of interest, of the erroneous perception he hasn't done enough for them. I am nearly 100 percent certain they cannot now be switching to back Trump. To destroy their own futures when he enables even higher interest rates on student loans? When he extirpates all remaining reproductive freedoms? Oh no! I cannot fathom young, ostensibly bright minds making common cause with MAGA brigands with a penchant for epic dishonesty, moral cowardice, baleful pessimism and revanchist animosity to obliterate American institutions and our Republic - heeding a traitor tyrant's calls. No, I refuse to believe it.
But the "proof will be in the pudding" as they say, and what transpires this November. Let us all - for their sakes and ours - hope the young do come to terms with our political reality and act on behalf of sanity, not insanity.
See Also:
by Amanda Marcotte | March 20, 2024 - 7:01am | permalink
When Donald Trump declared "If I don't get elected, it's going to be a bloodbath" during his rally speech in Ohio Saturday, two things were immediately and obviously true: That is a threat, and it's a literal one. No honest person could dispute that just hearing the snippet of the quote, in which Trump articulates, "It’s going to be a bloodbath for the country." Presented in the larger context, there can be zero honest doubt that this is a call for real-world violence.
In the same speech, Trump celebrated the January 6 insurrection at length, calling the people who ransacked the Capitol "unbelievable patriots" for attempting to steal the 2020 election for him. He also underscored the fascist ideology he was espousing by declaring that immigrants are "not people," and sneering, "But I’m not allowed to say that because the radical left says that’s a terrible thing to say." One doesn't need a doctorate in history to recognize this blunt dehumanization is typically used to justify genocide and hate crimes. Frankly, most people who stoke racist violence tend to be more subtle than Trump with the dehumanizing rhetoric.
And:
by Thom Hartmann | March 19, 2024 - 6:05am | permalink
While I agree with the bipartisan House and White House consensus that having TikTok owned by a company that, by law, must share its information with the Chinese Communist Party is a national security threat, there’s a larger part of the issue — which includes a danger to Americans also presented by both Facebook and Xitter — that nobody is seriously discussing.
As I detailed at length in my 2022 book The Hidden History of Big Brother: How the Death of Privacy and the Rise of Surveillance Threaten Us and Our Democracy, that’s the “secret algorithm” that determines what content and which “influencers” and even regular users get promoted or ignored, and to whom that content is pushed.
That algorithm has been proven to be, in many cases for each of the various social media sites, highly toxic, pushing people into conspiracy theories, Nazism and white supremacy, and destroying the self-esteem of young people and children. It has often caused death, both from radicalization (El Paso and Buffalo shooters), actual genocide, and suicide.
And:
by Thom Hartmann | March 20, 2024 - 6:02am | permalink
It sure looks like Republicans want women to die. Particularly if they’re teenagers and have the temerity to be sexually active.
This is highlighted by what has to qualify as the most shocking scientific study of the year, published last week in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) Network and titled Teen Pregnancy and Risk of Premature Mortality.
And:
by Robert Reich | March 19, 2024 - 7:23am | permalink
— from Robert Reich's Substack
Friends,
Yesterday, Trump tried to walk back his Saturday warning of a “blood bath” if he is not reelected, saying he was just warning of a “blood bath” in store for the auto industry if his proposed 100 percent tariff on Chinese cars isn’t enacted.
Rubbish.
In his Saturday speech in Dayton, he not only repeated his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen but praised the people serving prison sentences for attacking the Capitol on January 6 — calling them “hostages” and “unbelievable patriots,” commending their spirit, and promising to help them if elected in November.
Trump loyalists know exactly what he meant when he declared that the country would face a blood bath if he lost in November, because they’ve heard him issue similar warnings before — and sometimes acted them.
And:
And:
And:
by Robert Reich | March 18, 2024 - 6:23am | permalink
— from Robert Reich's Substack
Excerpt:
One of my goals in this daily letter to you is to give you the facts and analysis you need to make informed decisions, especially political ones — and equip you to spread the word to others. So here goes on social security.
During a typically rambling and incoherent interview last week, Trump admitted he would cut Social Security and Medicare if reelected. “There is a lot you can do in terms of entitlements, in terms of cutting and in terms of also the theft and the bad management of entitlements.”
Trump has tried to walk back the remarks, saying that when he used the word “cutting” he didn’t actually mean “cutting,” and that Social Security has a lot of waste. (In fact, Social Security is well managed, and theft or fraud is rare.)
But there’s no question Trump and his Republican allies want to cut Social Security and Medicare.
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