As a harm reduction reminder - I may no longer mod this thread (though I am still a site mod), I feel that I wanted to just offer a suggestion to all who are following political events whether from within the USA or abroad, and who are concerned about what is happening:
1) Part of the power bloc that has emerged is very 21st-century. It exploits the kind of attention that habituation, dependence, and addiction to social media that has existed for a decade or more in increasingly substantial rates.
2) With any addiction, it's important to consider how the addictive agent is impacting you, your health, your capacity to function, your self esteem, your safety, as well as any possible benefits the agent is having (Maybe you need pain meds to function when living with sickle-cell, or cancer, for example).
3) If use of the agent (in this case social media that is targeting emotional regulation in a very intentional way, through curated political activities, content distributed that evoke strong emotional responses (pride, vengence, fear, confusion, all of the above), and your use continues to maintain or escalate inspite of or in response to these triggers: you do have power to make a change
4) Attention is an established commodity by big tech. Your clicks lead to dollars for the tech oligarchs and those in power. The more upset you are, the longer you'll stay engaged, and the greater their valuation will climb along with ad revenue from sponsorships.
5) Remember the serenity prayer:
'Accept what we cannot change
Change what we can
[Grant me] The wisdom to know the difference'
There may be things that are happening that you have no control over - that's okay. What you do have absolute control over is how much of your focus and attention you are giving to social media, news media, and to politics.
Part of the way this stuff is exploited is that it is presented is both incredibly significant while also being business as usual. Something feels both established and normal, and also completely unhinged and on the brink. This is a model that has been utilized by Putin for over 20 years, even before modern social media had fully evolved. There's a reason that Bezos, Ellison, Zuck, Musk, Pinchar et. al, were there on election day and given Musk's near total control of X, there are now explicit channels of proganda that are entirely controlled by government interests and are curated through moderation and promotion to promote messages that are friendly to the white house and its allies, while taking a broad interpretation of dissent, activism, terrorism, and how these things are defined. Definitions are often applied in an unbalanced way depending on whether the message is pro-party (Jan 6) or anti-party (BLM and its alleged connection to ANTIFA). Similar actions will not be treated based on law or precedent, but will be treated based on favor.
All of this is happening and the only control you have is whether you participate, how long you spend participating, how much attention you give, and what you do to separate yourself from these forces.
Recovery is a robust and multigenerational movement that exists and emerged out of people trying to find social support in overcoming addiction. Recovery meetings exist beyond 12-step meetings and related fellowships and all are welcome to attend any OPEN meeting to learn more about what they offer. While this may not feel like a reason to go to an AA meeting, I have noted and interesting way in which recovery meetings have proven to be helpful for some during these times, as the experience of addiction is easy to relate to others in recovery from drugs, alcohol, or other behaviors.
Moderation of intake: Each morning I try to spend at least an hour waking up, getting my day started with some intentions for the day, even if it's just drinking coffee and watching the sun climb in the sky. I watch the neighborhood, check out birds on our porch, and enter the day with a quiet mind. In the fall, post election, I found myself reaching for my phone as I was opening my eyes, and being met with reddit posts and news stories that were alarming. I found my heart rate raising and feelings of dread washed over me before my first sip of coffee.
After a few weeks of living in a sense of agitated panic without any way to deal with what was happening, I realized that I was allowing this to kick in, and when I'd wake up in 'withdrawal' I'd go back to the dope dealer that lived on my bedside table for another hit of bad drugs. I started limiting my use of my phone and social media - reddit is the major site I use, though I've come to use this site mostly as I"ve been moderating but even this becomes too much some days and I will avoid logging in entirely.
It's good to remain informed, and I recommend analysis by publications like The Atlantic if you'd like thoughtful analysis (with a historically progressive vantage point - it was founded in Boston in the mid-1800s and has high standards for publication as well as a history of offering the perspectives of non-progressives as well. Newsmedia has become more clearly curated by the establishment left and right for some time - it is the model for which our tech infrastructure has participated in and is also following through with.
All of these things can lead to social isolation and loss of relationships, so a big protective factor is social connection, in person.
"The opposite of addiction isn't abstinence, it's human connection".
Taking some time to digest how you are impacted by political theatre and curated news about it as well as the social and other media sources that distribute it - how all of these things are impacting you, and deciding if you have changes you may need to make is healthy and empowering. If you connect with people in new ways in non-political contexts, through service work (charity organizations), hobby interests (meetup.com is good for finding things), athletics or fitness groups, or simply contacting old friends to make plans - these are things that can help to offset and overcome the weaponization of your attention for the benefit of others.
I realize that this was a long post, I have taken some time to consider whether to mention this and how to do so. I've become aware of people online expressing increasing levels of paranoia, distress, despair, anger, and a willingness to take increasingly risky actions because of things that have been going on. Much of this is designed to evoke these exact feelings and causes a helpless state that continues to come back for more, hoping that their attention will help change things.
We need to look out for ourselves and work on our connection outside of online spaces as these are the most important protective factors we as humans have.
If you made it this far, thanks for reading - always feel free to DM me if you want to chat about anything or ask questions about recovery, dependence, mental health etc. It's good to get things off your chest and anything people share with me I keep between us.
