The Perils of Our Virtual Reality

Defined physical communities are a bulwark against nationalization. Social media sees them as impediments.

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Dear Reader (though not necessarily amateur rocket scientists),

When Margaret Thatcher (praise be upon her) passed away, the hashtag #Nowthatcherisdead took off on Twitter. And almost immediately, scores of people started freaking out about Cher’s passing.

I’m reminded of this story, which I thought was hilarious, because in the wake of Neil Young’s ultimatum to Spotify—“They can have Rogan or Young. Not both!”—“Who is Neil Young?” started trending on Twitter. Of course, a lot of the people saying “Who is Neil Young?” actually know who Neil Young is, they just wanted to dunk on Young or suck up to Rogan.

The brouhaha between Rogan and Young  leaves me passionately ambivalent. On one hand, I feel like the world would be a better place if they settled this with broken pool cues with the Joker declaring, “We’re gonna have tryouts.” Of course, I don’t condone violence. Also, the tryout wouldn’t last very long. It would end in about 90 seconds with Rogan showing Young his still beating heart. “Doesn’t look like a heart of gold to me, old man!”

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  1. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    They’re censoring Tyler Durden in China now? Not surprising.

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  2. Kurt Von Fuchs

    Well I totally agree with your argument I was baffled by 3/4 of your references since I spent almost no time online, well that's not entirely true I actually spent a lot of time online doing things like watching movies listening to music but I don't have a Facebook account I'm not on Twitter and I can't stand looking at other peoples staged pictures on Snapchat.

    I still can't fathom all the brouhaha about Spotify. Neil Young made a great point and left and took roughly one and a half million followers with him. Spotify will still be around and it will still be crappy or than iTunes. I thought your final analogy was weird; I think a better metric would be the "Beatles test". In 50 years people will still be listening to Neil Young I'm not sure anyone will even remember who that Rogan guy was.

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  3. Avatar photo
    C C Writer

    Caption/cutline: "A whatchamacallit displaying all the social media thingies that C C Writer wants nothing (with one or two exceptions) to do with."

    No, I haven't seen commercials for Facebook. (At least not that I recognized while fast-forwarding through what TV shows I can get from my future former cable company for only $74 a month.) I do see Facebook's full-page ads in my daily local big-city newspaper. I think they're stupid. I mean, it's Facebook, trying to justify itself. But at least the money spent on the ad space is helping keep the paper alive.

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  4. Avatar photo
    Take a Deep Breath

    Joe Rogan has every right to express his views and Neil Young has every right not to listen to it. All Neil accomplished was getting himself taken off Spotify. Brilliant move!

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  5. Jim

    I would encourage you to listen to Joe Rogan’s podcast with Dr. Peter McCullough before characterizing him as an anti-vaxer. I did so just to learn what all the fuss was about and concluded that the discussion was highly informative. Dr. McCullough is no quack. He is a highly qualified physician who happens to Be voicing some views that should be seriously considered. Some statements he made have proven to be incorrect with the Omicron variant. No doubt others will prove incorrect as we learn more. On the other hand, what expert has spoken on the topic of Covid and gotten everything right.

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  6. Avatar photo
    Bill B

    I'm not sure that some of this makes sense - or at least not to me. The digital/social media space has never appeared to me as anything but a force for fragmentation and balkanization. Jonah may be on to something here although there seem to me to be paradoxes and contradictions involved. For instance the trend I see is that digital communities or metaverses end up as cultural and political burb-claves. These are basically "defined" digital communities that somewhat mirror "defined physical communities". After all isn't that what the digital universe has become - a set of tribal/cultural groups all vying for the survival of an identity of interests. I'm not sure how that's nationalistic or even contributes to it. Certainly they want to impose thier will on everyone else but they are just as concerned that no one impose thier will on them. No one wants to live by anyone else's rules. It seems at odds with the idea of a process of nationalization.

    The "Progressivism as the root of all evil' shtick on this point seems to be overstated - it wasn't just New Dealers or Progressives who didn't care much for Federalism. Hamilton didn't either. It's been an old and on-going argument.

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  7. Mary Stine

    First of all, Jonah, THANK YOU for stating the perils of social media so well. I have steadfastly refused to participate in Facebook or Twitter, originally for security reasons and now to avoid the hatemongers. I'm also a fairly private person. I'll listen all day long to someone's passionate argument for "x" if they are civil about it. But I refuse to be barked at on Twitter or Facebook.
    I was done with being barked at back in the '80's when all my conservative friends wanted to
    dictate my faith, my hairstyle, and my reading choices. So far none of my Dem friends and family are trying to tell me how to live my life, but if they do, I'll become an independent voter.
    I'll stand with you any day Jonah, as a Democrat and a liberal and shout it from the rooftops:
    Freedom isn't real if the government can dictate the parameters of your intellect.

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  8. Avatar photo
    Soniak21

    Something I think about a lot is that the internet has broken down the buffers that separate... well, people who largely WANTED to be separated. In olden times, you didn't constantly see what people thousands of miles away were up to. You'd hear a bit about it on the national news, but usually only if it was a pretty major story.

    And even if you did hear about them, they didn't have much to do with you. If you were living in a nice, wholesome town in Iowa and you heard about some weird new schooling fad in California—well, that's just the sort of thing those hippie freaks out there do. Good thing you don't live THERE!

    But the internet (especially social media, especially video) creates the illusion that stuff we hate is right next door. If there's some weird new schooling fad in California, your social media feed will be full of people railing for and against it. You forget these people are 2,000 miles away because, virtually speaking, they're *right in your face.* The madness appears to be at your doorstep. It could be coming for your town next!

    And worse, there's political incentive in fueling this anxiety. "Yes!" says your governor or congressman. "The madness of those freaks across the country IS coming for you next!! ...unless of course you reelect me, for I will stop it."

    I think humans, in our natural state, were meant to have a little distance from those we've decided are "not our kind of people." The internet imposes closeness that we weren't equipped to handle.

    Not that I'd ever try to change it. Obviously, fantastic things have also come of the internet—and I'm as big a Twitter junkie as the next person. But that doesn't mean it hasn't also screwed us up good.

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  9. Avatar photo
    Jason Gibson

    This was a great great gfile

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  10. Avatar photo
    Jason Gibson

    “Aroos” is now a descriptor used in my household nearly daily

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