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David McElroy

making sense of a dysfunctional culture

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Can we find peace online when social media have become toxic?

By David McElroy · January 23, 2018

The only reason I signed up for Facebook 10 years ago was to please a girlfriend. I didn’t see much point in it, but I signed up anyway since she asked me to. At this point, I wonder if that was my first social media mistake.

I was online far earlier than most people. In the early ’90s, I was active on CompuServe message boards. I quickly became a discussion leader and then “SysOp” — which originally meant “system operator” but eventually just came to represent the managers of a forum.

I liked some of the people I met online and I loathed others. At times, I got involved in horrible flame wars that embarrass me now. Years after that, I was quite involved for awhile on a message board for independent filmmakers. Again, it was a mixed bag. A lot of the people were insufferable, but I’m also still friends with some of those people and I ended up meeting some of them in real life.

As social media services have become more and more important in modern life, I find that it’s become a more and more toxic environment. I’m seriously questioning whether I still want to be part of social media.

For several years now, I’ve had a horrible feeling about what the online world has become, so I’ve already slashed my use of social media quite a bit.

• I’ve gone from 5,000 Facebook “friends” to slightly fewer than 750.

• I’ve reduced my level of posting greatly over the last few years. I no longer get involved in online arguments. I frequently don’t even read comments about controversial subjects and I respond to such comments even more rarely.

• My involvement in social media other than Facebook is pretty much token at best. People constantly tell me that I need social media for success in the 21st century, so I’ve maintained a presence, but I fail to see much that’s positive, especially when it comes to Twitter.

By any sane standard, I’ve cut out the worst of social media by trimming my contacts and avoiding arguments when possible. Although I still post a few things which are politically and philosophically charged, I don’t argue with people who disagree. I don’t even post to change anyone’s mind. It’s merely to express frustrations about things which seem obvious to me.

But what’s the point?

Isn’t most of the time I spend on social media wasted time? Doesn’t it suck up my time and offer very little in return?

There are definitely some positives to social media. I’ve met some good people I’d never have met otherwise. If I cut myself off further from Facebook, for instance, there are some people I’d miss. I’d no longer share jokes and comics with certain other people who appreciate the same odd humor that I do. I’d no longer have a way to share my photos — of cats and Lucy and sunsets, for instance — with some people who appreciate those pictures.

But overall, why am I sticking around?

I joined Facebook for a woman and I stayed active for the last few years mostly for another woman. There was someone who I’d lost active contact with and I hoped we could resume a relationship one day. But after I found it necessary to painfully end contact with her, that killed most of my reason for remaining. Facebook seemed pretty empty after that.

Even after reducing my use of Facebook and other social media, I’m still left with the empty feeling that they’re still sucking up too much of my time and giving me little in return. And I can’t decide what to do.

How do we maintain contact with the shrinking number of people online who we truly like when the modern way to do that is to do it on Facebook? How do we use social media to promote our careers when we’re wading through toxic sludge and wondering when the positive promotion starts?

If I give up on social media entirely, will I find “real life” social activity to take its place? It’s odd to think of it that way, but more and more of our social contact really is the digital kind. Is it possible that pushing the digital world out of the way would lead me back to a more of the old-fashioned analog connections that I need?

I feel as though this is a disorganized stream of consciousness, because I have so much to say about this subject, both for good and bad.

I realize that it might seen odd to be using a form of social media to call social media toxic, but I’m not really sure that my writing here qualifies as social media. This is more akin to a modern-day version of someone who writes books or pamphlets and publishes them for the world to read. I still have things to say, but I’m interested in publishing and producing — not in the toxic shouting matches which characterize most of social media.

There’s a short film I’ve been wanting to make for the last year or so, but I haven’t had the time or budget to make it. The short is based on the notion that the social media world is a cacophony of voices which are all screaming to be heard — sometimes with nonsense, sometimes with anger and hate, sometimes with random ideas.

What if nobody is listening? What if we’re all screaming from our rooftops to be heard? What if all of us are shouting or whispering into a void — hoping that someone hears us and understands us and accepts us? What if we’re all so busy hoping to be heard that nobody is heard?

Social media has lost most of its remaining purpose for me — ever since she isn’t there anymore — so I’m struggling with what the point is. When she was still there, I’m not sure I realized the degree to which I was talking to her all the time, even though I was ostensibly talking to everybody.

I want to walk away, but I’m afraid I might be missing something. I’m afraid there might be some way to make it safe that I’m overlooking.

All I know is that I’m closer and closer to walking away, maybe for awhile and maybe for good. Something has to change.

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For “throwback Thursday, let me introduce you to For “throwback Thursday, let me introduce you to Sam. In 2009, I took in a young feral cat who I named for the early American revolutionary Samuel Adams. He was one of the most confident — downright arrogant, in fact — cats I’ve ever been around. He had an amazing personality and I immediately loved him. He was no more than 8 or 9 months old when he suddenly died for reasons that my vet couldn’t explain. Even though I had him only a short time, he was one of my all-time favorites. #tbt #cats #tabby #feral #birmingham #alabama
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On a live awards show Sunday night, one man made a joke about a female celebrity. The husband of the celebrity was offended and hit the man who made the joke. Or maybe it was staged for entertainment. Who knows? Who cares? Social media is full of discussion — and even arguments — about this idiocy today. This baffles me. Let’s assume for a moment that the event happened as reported. People have been having such idiotic fights ever since there have been humans. Half the bars in the world see such brief dustups regularly. It simply doesn’t matter. The fact that so many people believe they need to talk about this — or even need to have opinions about it — is more evidence of the bizarre media brainwashing that convinces many to care passionately about brain-dead trivia. Your life will be happier and saner if you focus on yourself, your family and your friends, not on whatever scripted (or spontaneous) bilge that the media wants to pipe into your home.

I’m in the middle of migrating this website to new servers this week. This means you might encounter some unexpected behavior until I get all the bugs worked out. Clicking on my links (including this one) might cause your browser to give you the message that it’s a site without a current security certificate. It’s not actually unsafe, but there’s something which isn’t yet set up for the security certificate. I apologize for any such errors you might encounter while the process is going on. If you notice any problems with content which didn’t migrate properly, I would appreciate you letting me know the details at davidmcelroy@mac.com. Thanks for your patience.

I often wonder what animals think when they look at us and consider the society we’ve created. Yes, I know this is fanciful and unrealistic, but what if they could? Would they be astounded at how we treat each other? Would they be disgusted by the ugliness and pettiness which fill so many of our daily interactions? The truth is that I’m feeling pretty disgusted with humanity tonight. I made the mistake of reading some online interactions that I should have avoided — and it sickened me. The people involved appeared to be vile and stupid and arrogant. I wish I could pretend they’re a tiny minority, but I know better. It’s times such as this when I most need to escape much of “civilization” and disconnect from their world. If humans are going to be worthy of “ruling this planet,” we have a lot of growth to do. And I fear that growth is nowhere in sight. So my buddy Thomas, above, and all of his friends would be right to judge us harshly — and to think, “Why do you folks get to be in charge?”

I should have expected this, but I honestly didn’t. The article I wrote last week about disagreements over treatment for autistic children brought me angry emails. You could almost call it “hate mail.” Of the five emails about it so far, two have been to tell me that I’m wrong to even listen to critics of the most popular therapy for autistic children — and the other three tell me I’m wrong for not condemning the treatment as the “obvious” abuse it is. If you read the article, you know I didn’t take a position on the issue, because I simply don’t know enough to have an opinion. But by talking about the issue, I stepped into a heated controversy. The emails from the two sides convinced me of nothing. But they did give me even more empathy for the unfortunate parents who have to figure out for themselves where the truth lies for their children.

Have you ever had what you thought was a new idea — and then discovered that “old you” had the same idea years ago? I had that experience tonight. And it’s been wonderful. I came up with an idea tonight for a very short satirical film that would be a promotion for a fictitious college. The point is to make the college promote — as good things — everything which is actually terrible about most modern colleges. Then I remembered a fake college that I invented back when I was in college. I had created student recruitment brochures and various newsletters back then, so I decided to call my “new” college by the same name I’d invented years ago: Ochita College. As I searched my computer for any old material I might still have about Ochita from the past, I discovered an email I sent to someone in 2009 — outlining essentially the same idea which I came up with tonight. Since I didn’t remember writing that, it felt like magic. So my next film project just might be this one instead. If all goes well, you might soon see “Ochita College: Your Future Starts Here.” This should be fun.

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