I think your last paragraph hit the nail on the head. As with any drug, moderation is key. Social media is a dopamine drug 100%, and just like some drugs, people cut it with shit that’s bad. It’s an odd analogy, but I think folks (myself included from time to time), spend way too much time here, and if gets in your head. But winter is cold and windy and wet and inside just seems to keep leading back here.

I often argue that Reddit and Lemmy are not the same type of social media that Facebook and the like are, but they’re just as susceptible to influence. Individuals need to think more about themselves and their micro existence, before diving into global issues so much. At least, that’s how I try to avoid the crippling depression that comes from post after post written by chicken little.

This is a serious get off the Internet moment. This place and the predecessor are absolute doom and gloom 24/7, but I took my kids to the park earlier and we threw rocks in the stream and hung out under a bridge, and it was a nice day, and we had fun. I join in my community cleanups, I plant trees, I take part in things, and I love my town. Yeah, on a global scale, it ain’t pretty, but I do what I can to make my little bubble a pleasant place to be.

Must include that if you’re here on Lemmy you were probably on Reddit before, and the latter has been a campaign for doom and gloom for close to a decade at this point. When you surround yourself in folks suggesting the sky is falling, you start to believe the sky is falling.

Aliens?

Well sorry to hear that dude, I was also probably fifteen when I got my letter from Verizon, maybe 16 or 17. Don’t let the passion for sticking out to the man fade, but not doing it on Mom and Dad’s Internet is commendable.

I’m a night seeded. My VPN has, rarely, dropped me off zoom calls, and it has a deleterious effect on my work. So nighttime it is.

Out of curiosity, were you using a private tracker? VPN? Just interested in the circumstances. Obviously something anyone who downloads has in the back of their minds. I remember getting a letter 20+ years ago, addressed to my dad from Verizon, to cut it out. I got smarter after that, or so I think.