The Brave New World Wide Web

I used to dream of a life where my success was based entirely on the internet.

Where virtual likes and clicks and views would become my currency, and more people would know me by my username than my birth name. What drove this was my undeniable desire to be liked, in a digital environment that was still forming and growing around me with each passing moment. Whereas my every day was mundane and lonely, the internet offered a fantastical escape, and I wanted to be a pioneer in this brave new world.

Of course I didn't know then that the landscape would become so dystopian. That social feeds would devolve into inescapable bickering pushed to the forefront by algorithms designed to keep us trapped in a cycle of anger and vitriol. That putting your best foot forward and never showing your true face was an unspoken rule among the influencer elite of this new digital age, resulting in a deluge of comparison among the common folk and the deeply troubling trend of suppressing any emotion save for joy or contentment. Yet, true, genuine excitement rarely exists anymore - nothing is new for longer than a few moments before being cycled out for the next big thing. Do you remember when viral moments led to widespread notoriety and references we made to one another for months on end? When a video with a million views would send you to the Ellen show, as friends from all different communities enjoyed this one special inside joke together?

The internet used to bring us together. But now, it seems, it's doing its very best to drive us all apart.

+ + + + + + + + + + +

At a young age when I didn't know how to make friends face to face, I made them on online forums instead. As I grew older, the internet became a place to recieve praise for my creativity and humor - praise I wasn't often getting in the real world - and making content for others to enjoy became all I wanted to do. Later as an adult, when I moved away from friends and family, streaming to a small and friendly group of strangers - who quickly became acquaintances - filled the social gap.

Being present in online communities, posting and interacting regularly, used to bring me insurmountable joy. These days it comes with a blanket of dread, and the unshakeable feeling at the back of my mind that I'm contributing to something that's not quite right.

Of course, there is a pattern in my online habits. Ever since I learned how to connect to dial-up on the family computer, I've been using the World Wide Web to provide me with things I wasn't getting in my day to day life. I think that was always its intended purpose - to enrich our lives and make living itself a little easier. While not always the healthiest relationship, it served me well as a solution through years upon years of various troubles.

These days I find myself distracted by just how good life is. I've built a thriving career as CEO of my own company. I rent my own little place in a city full of opportunities, every day falling more and more head over heels for the kind of loving partner I thought was reserved for fairytales. And where I used to want so desperately to build up my brand as an online content creator, I no longer feel that insatiable gnawing to make something of myself. I spend my days partaking in hobbies and enjoying the littlest things - relaxing and loving and treating myself and my partner (and my cat) with intentional kindness and nurturing. In the simplest terms, I am content.

I no longer need the "Internet Band-Aid" like I used to... but I fear that if I did, it simply doesn't exist anymore.

_______________________________________________________________

The internet used to be a tool for communication - chat rooms, forums, subreddits, and more. Now all I see are people talking over, or through, one another, shouting simply to be heard while simultaneously refusing to listen. Scrolling through social feeds brings nothing but anxiety and negative emotions. It's reached a point where I've almost entirely abandoned social media in favor of my own mental health.

When did we all collectively give up on community? When did we decide that conflict should be the norm, and that we deserve to be seen but to not see each other?

I truly believe that by trying to become more interconnected, we've managed to isolate ourselves like never before. By vying for each other's attention 24/7, we've stripped away the kind of humanity the internet once ran on. Think of the amount of tiktoks or reels or shorts that you scroll through on a daily basis - the hundreds of different desperate people trying within 5 seconds to win your approval - and how many you refuse to watch all the way through before scrolling onto the next, without any thought for the amount of time or effort that went into creating that video that you couldn't give more than a few seconds of your time because you simply didn't care. And of the ones you chose to stay and watch, how many of them hooked you by triggering a nasty or disturbing emotion? No wonder negativity prospers in an online space when it's the only thing these days that keeps our attention or we feel is worth our time.

As the internet has become more accessible, we've become more jaded by its existence. It's now completely at our fingertips, but its heartbeat is gone. We've effectively destroyed it.

_______________________________________________________________

Do I have a solution? Absolutely not. I'm not sure it's possible for us to ever return to the way things used to be. But for tonight, I'll simply turn off my phone, make a cup of tea, and settle in under a heated blanket to watch Golden Girls with my cat. Ironically, on Hulu. But at least I pay for no ads (don't even get me started on that.)