Wheelerof4te wrote:Clearly, it's being centralised, controlled to filter out any "extreme" though, "naratives that don't coincide with the right way of thinking".
Just one example of this is the regulation of pornographic material in the UK. In the late 2000s the government passed a law against "extreme pornography" where anyone who possessed pornography which related to non-consent, BDSM etc could be arrested. Since then there have been multiple arrests because of possession of "extreme" porn [child porn was already illegal, this was supplementary].
This year, the UK is now seeking to make all pornographic websites age-verifiable. Users will have to hand over credit card details to gain access. This was originally going to be enforced next month but now it's been pushed back to the end of the year. Gradually there is a knock-on effect as forms of media are processually considered unsuitable and furthermore restricted or illegalised. It is slow erosion of fringe interests that do not fall in line with mainsteam thinking.
Quoth Groucho Marx:
If any form of pleasure is exhibited
Report to me and it will be prohibited
I'll put my foot down, so shall it be
This is the land of the free
Wheelerof4te wrote:True, there are alternative media outlets, but vast majority of general public doesn't know or care enough about them.
I take it you're referring to the newspapers and online 'media' but the same can be said of alternative subcultures and their outlets. In London there is hardly any subcultural representation anymore. One no longer sees punks, goths, ravers, metalheads etc on the streets here - and for such a diverse city, that is surprising. Everyone looks the same. It can be no coincidence that the younger generations spend so much time on social media, which has a profound effect on how we see ourselves and others.
n_hologram wrote:However, with absurd teen-suicide rates, I'm interested to learn what role dopamine plays, particularly for a developing brain. I don't think the rule would apply in quite the same way to adults. The teenager, though, is pretty unique, because their entire world -- and self-esetem -- IS social networking.... So, the kid who is bullied online is going to feel those effects offline, and because all their other friends -- and, therefore, their self-esteem -- are online, it becomes a vicious circuit. Long story short, it's not as simple as "just unplug," because if every teenager's friends use a platform, there's little incentive to "just stop," regardless how the data is being [mis]handled.
I would not be surprised - in fact I fully expect - the governments/tech firms to have conducted tests to see how much the effects of social media can replicate [or even give] similar pleasures as those derived from soft drug use. The same could be said for smartphone gaming, e.g. gem games. These games are graphically attractive and brightly-coloured, giving constant rewards to the user. They're almost psychedelic. People do not read books as much as they used to on public transport either: literature is provided for them in newspapers such as
Metro or
Evening Standard which are free and funded by advertisers. This is, in all senses of the word, the Orwellian 'prolefeed' that was written about in the '40s. The irony is that any mention of such in social circles will be deemed as 'tin foil hat' since people are in denial as to the true state of society and like to think of themselves as individuals who are free-minded and unmanipulatable when in truth, manipulation - by its very nature - must be covert and undetectable.
You're correct in that it's not as simple as "just unplug": one can switch off one's phone and walk away from social media temporarily but words can still linger in our subconscious, exerting all-too-real effects in the physical world. A recent example is the tragic death of a young porn star, August Ames, who killed herself following a backlash on Twitter.
This is what happens when everyone gets a voice. Up till the 21st century, only the words of the influential, powerful and knowledgeable were heard
en masse. Those who had - for better or worse - worked to get to their positions of national or international renown. Now absolutely anyone can be heard by anyone, but the issue is that the large majority of people have little useful to say and will resort to emotional, cheap methods of attention-seeking or the fostering of political microissues to get noticed. Social media helps all of this material proliferate, to mostly negative - or even disastrous - effect. If you quiz the average FB user you'll find that they know its use has negative ramifications but they feel they can't stop using it, which is the text-book definition of addiction.
