Jaron’s Ten Arguments To Delete Social Media
Jaron Lanier was born to a Nazi concentration camp survivor (as a blonde, his mother survived by pretending she was Aryan, and walking out). His father’s family escaped from Ukraine to avoid violent riots. Jaron himself used to work in Silicon Valley.
Then for his mental health, he gave up social media. He now spends his time offline as much as possible, which includes playing some of his collection of 100 ancient musical instruments!
Like most of us, he is concerned that our world now seems to be controlled by not just social media, but a few powerful people who use it: Trump, Musk, Kanye etc. Named one of the world’s 50 greatest thinkers, his take is very interesting:
He says that Trump may still have won the Presidency without his own Truth social media, but likely would not have won without Facebook support. Lanier believes that Trump is a narcissist and bully, who is so insecure he has a social media addiction, as it’s important to him to know that ‘people like him’.
And that’s why he keeps posting lots of nonsense (in CAPITAL LETTERS!) whenever he has practically any thought.
And the only way to deal with this, is what you do with any narcissist (who is never going to change). You simply walk away:
Trump supporters seem nuts to me, and they say liberals seem nuts to them. But it’s wrong to say we’ve grown apart, and can’t understand each other. What’s really going on, is that we see less than ever before of what others are seeing. So we have less opportunity to understand each other. Jaron Lanier
His ten arguments to delete social media are:
- You are losing your free will.
- You are not resisting world insanity
- Social media is making you into an arsehole
- It’s undermining Truth!
- It’s making what you say meaningless.
- It’s destroying your capacity for empathy.
- It’s making you unhappy.
- It doesn’t want you to have economic dignity.
- It’s making politics impossible.
- It hates your soul.
More of Jaron’s Societal Wisdom
Funding a civilisation through advertising, is like trying to get nutrition, by connecting a tube from one’s anus to one’s mouth.
If money is flowing to advertising instead of musicians, journalists, and artists, then a society is more concerned with manipulation than truth or beauty. If content is worthless, then people will start to become empty-headed and contentless.
We cannot have a society, in which, if two people wish to communicate the only way that can happen is if it’s financed by a third person who wishes to manipulate them.
