Welcome to the Birth of Clarity newsletter on Substack.
When you log into X or whatever social media site you use, does it feel like you have to wade through a sea of shit before you get to anything you like or are interested in seeing/reading? There’s just so much unnecessary noise nowadays! And the problem with noise is that when the volume gets turned up, you end up making more noise to be heard. This is where the world appears to be at the moment - whoever shouts the loudest is the one most likely to be heard.
And while the decibels increase, the quality of what we have to listen to decreases. More noise apparently equals more nonsense. Everything is so irrelevant and irritating. Fight vids, choreographed skits, ultimate fail vids, people pointing & making faces at other people’s videos; it’s all bullshit. It drives me crazy.
Plus, EVERYBODY seems to be filming themselves doing EVERYTHING!
The problem is that when all this noise gets ramped up, your mind pays the price. It gets cluttered with the content and creates chaos. Your mind shouldn’t be exposed to all these things. I hate to think about the amount of unnecessary, useless things we subject our brains to on a daily basis.
This isn’t necessarily a rant about social media either, because the fact is, there are so many other things your brain has to process that are doing it no good. In my opinion, once your brain begins to function at a lower level, it turns to these more basic solutions for stimulation. It’s used to being fed this nonsense, so it craves it!
The damage all this technology has done is baffling. I do not doubt that mental health issues have worsened because of the unyielding barrage of BS our brains are forced to endure regularly. I know I’ve suffered because of it.
Take porn, for instance. I’ve written numerous articles about the damage it does to the brain. And yet it’s still so prevalent in many people’s lives.
A study by Kühn & Gallinat (2014) found that men who watched more pornography had less grey matter in the brain’s reward centre—the striatum—indicating a reduction in natural pleasure response. This means less sensitivity to pleasure and more difficulty finding satisfaction in everyday life and relationships.
Addiction to social media, porn, TV, video games, gaming apps, and gambling all stems from needing to fill a void. These distractions from daily life are killing us. They are taking away the true essence of who we are. They are dumbing us down and trapping us into a never-ending cycle of shit!
I’m ashamed to admit it, but the BS conquered me the other day, and it cost me. Instead of being at a certain place at a certain time, I was late because I got stuck in a never-ending loop of YT Shorts. It was totally embarrassing and really unlike me because I like to be early to things, especially if I’ve given my word that I’d be somewhere at a set time.
It showed me that I’m not operating at a high level at the moment. Instead of seeking out things to inspire, I was seduced by surface-level nonsense. It made me worry for my son and future generations because these digital distractions are only going to get more powerful. They are only going to get more alluring, too. As I said at the beginning of this post, people will not only be watching all this shit, but they will also decide that they can do it too, and will be filming themselves constantly.
Mobile games will get more and more addictive with dopamine rewards, video games, with the advancement of VR, will get more and more addictive as they get more and more realistic, porn will soon be at a stage where every fantasy will literally be at your touch and social media will be a cesspool of self-righteous and self-serving idiots who spend their lives glued to their screens, making more and more incessant noise.
I am sick of it. I can’t stand it.
I recently posted that I was closing in on 7 and a half years of sobriety, which genuinely makes me happy—but it even annoys me that I wrote that! I’m just adding to the noise. Granted, it’s positive noise, but still! Even posting a link to the other newsletters I write has urked me today, but here you go anyway!
PLEASE CHECK OUT AFFATHERS, ROSCOE’S ROUTES, AND RÁPIDO READS — ALL PART OF BIRTH OF CLARITY!
I’m not a fan of the way things are heading, and I have to admit, it worries me. I don’t want my son to get caught up in this BS. I think we’ve done a good job of protecting him and navigating this type of thing, but as he gets older, of course, it worries me.
The last thing we dealt with, and we did a great job of overcoming it, even if I say so myself, was the recent craze of “Italian Brain Rot” videos that swept the school. Our children, and we as parents, shouldn’t have to be dealing with this shit, but unfortunately, it’s going to continue—all so YouTube “creators” can make money trying to rot our kids’ brains. Fucking ridiculous!
I know I’ve been all over the place with this rant, but it’s hard for me to put into words the feelings I get when I see the state of the world right now. Beyond the surface, it feels dark and sinister, yet all conveyed as innocent fun—if that makes sense?
Do you feel the same? Maybe you’re better at putting these feelings into words…if so, I’d love to hear from you.
This is a subject I will continue with at a later date. Below, I’ve linked to other articles touching on this theme. Please check them out :)
Thank you for reading: “Brains Battered by BS.”
Before you go, here are some useful articles related to today’s post:
Please check out the last post: “Don't Make My Mistakes: The Power of Passions, Skills and Knowledge.”
And 💜 and Restack this post on the Substack app.
Take care,
Roscoe | Birth of Clarity
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