This, and your other thread on Twitter, are really interesting! Do you think this is leading to something? Is this "immunization" behavior heading towards a more resilient "culture"? Or do the social rules become stricter and stricter at a more and more rapid pace?
(For the record, I found myself editing for tone multiple times before posting to try to not be one of those soyface memes)
thank you so much for reading and I'm glad you liked it. I think it creates a culture that's really prone to orthodoxy and group enforcement (and I think is weaponized and stoked for this reason), while also alienating people from each other and themselves. working on part 3 now :)
Great post, I'm totally in agreement with you, and we seem to have come upon very similar ideas. With respect to the nerds being the bullies, the best rendition of that I've seen is 21 Jump Street: Channing Tatum goes back to high school and everything is backwards, the cool kids sing reduce reuse recycle.
When I think about this phenomenon I think a lot on comment sections. Most of the Internet is hypercometitive environments for commentary to evolve, and 99+% of users just consume it. I think what happens to someone who consumes this enough, and especially who grows up consuming it, is their superego takes the form of a comment section. The Freudian superego being the best explanation pointing to the part of your brain that figures out what "society says" about things. A comment section super ego, like you describe, is characterized by a ton of extremely specific validations, for example constraining yourself to not give the demeanor of the dog walker guy.
This is fascinating. I think you’re laying out the architecture of modern memetics. What i see happening is the hyper reality folding in on itself. We can’t create new archetypes so our mimicry bounces back and forth between the same mirror becoming subtly more exaggerated over time. It seems every boundary will be blurred and odd merging’s will happen.
What happens when the devils and the angels switch places without knowing it?
Is there a part 3 coming? Excellent work! Keep going!
hey, apologies I just realized I never responded - thanks so much for reading
I think I know what you mean about the hyper reality folding in on itself... separately have had the thought that we've gotten much better at knocking stories down than building them, and that we've gotten hyper relativized to a very narrow and myopic way of looking at others and ourselves and our broader social world / culture
and yes it can be hard to keep track of what's real, what's genuinely good and what's genuinely bad vs what's just social contagion and confused heuristics
Excellent essay. I think about this often; we didn't evolve to be rubbing up against each others' brains every day like this. To call it over-stimulating is an understatement.
This, and your other thread on Twitter, are really interesting! Do you think this is leading to something? Is this "immunization" behavior heading towards a more resilient "culture"? Or do the social rules become stricter and stricter at a more and more rapid pace?
(For the record, I found myself editing for tone multiple times before posting to try to not be one of those soyface memes)
hey, I'm sorry I just realized I didn't respond
thank you so much for reading and I'm glad you liked it. I think it creates a culture that's really prone to orthodoxy and group enforcement (and I think is weaponized and stoked for this reason), while also alienating people from each other and themselves. working on part 3 now :)
Great post, I'm totally in agreement with you, and we seem to have come upon very similar ideas. With respect to the nerds being the bullies, the best rendition of that I've seen is 21 Jump Street: Channing Tatum goes back to high school and everything is backwards, the cool kids sing reduce reuse recycle.
When I think about this phenomenon I think a lot on comment sections. Most of the Internet is hypercometitive environments for commentary to evolve, and 99+% of users just consume it. I think what happens to someone who consumes this enough, and especially who grows up consuming it, is their superego takes the form of a comment section. The Freudian superego being the best explanation pointing to the part of your brain that figures out what "society says" about things. A comment section super ego, like you describe, is characterized by a ton of extremely specific validations, for example constraining yourself to not give the demeanor of the dog walker guy.
I outlined my thoughts on this topic here: https://pendertif.com/who-am-i-a-sketch/
This is fascinating. I think you’re laying out the architecture of modern memetics. What i see happening is the hyper reality folding in on itself. We can’t create new archetypes so our mimicry bounces back and forth between the same mirror becoming subtly more exaggerated over time. It seems every boundary will be blurred and odd merging’s will happen.
What happens when the devils and the angels switch places without knowing it?
Is there a part 3 coming? Excellent work! Keep going!
hey, apologies I just realized I never responded - thanks so much for reading
I think I know what you mean about the hyper reality folding in on itself... separately have had the thought that we've gotten much better at knocking stories down than building them, and that we've gotten hyper relativized to a very narrow and myopic way of looking at others and ourselves and our broader social world / culture
and yes it can be hard to keep track of what's real, what's genuinely good and what's genuinely bad vs what's just social contagion and confused heuristics
working on part 3 now :) thanks again
Very compelling
Excellent essay. I think about this often; we didn't evolve to be rubbing up against each others' brains every day like this. To call it over-stimulating is an understatement.
keep writing—but, please, watch out for weaponized dopamine; twitter or substack may harm your mind or inner peace.
very appropriate advice at the moment
thanks for reading
banger
keep writing
"I know I’m not that guy."
That guy can't know he's that guy. If he did, he wouldn't be that guy.