Our columnist is in a crisis of meaning: Why does he keep returning to the social media racket? The world is bad enough without having to read, even yourself.
By Micky Beisenherz
“Good morning, you son of a bitch.” There is also bad company.
Nine times out of ten, if you answer the question “What’s the point?” cannot explain exhaustively, a routine may have no right to exist. If this actually makes your own life worse, it becomes even more dubious. And if it is also life another messed up, it becomes completely absurd why one should take part in something like this.
When I posted a photo of myself on Insta this morning (“Good morning”) toasting my cell phone camera with a coffee, it would have been difficult to answer the question about the deeper meaning of such a post. Maintaining relationships with the audience? Duty of chronicler? It’s not as if the fact that I drink coffee in the morning is a newsworthy occurrence. There are probably several Germans now drinking coffee in the morning.
Strangers wish you death on the internet
My own hand casually swipes across the user interface like in a catalog of attractive lifestyles, and I can see that others are drinking their coffee in Florence and not, like me, in, let’s say, Cologne. Others are drinking their coffee in Bali, and the coffee is actually a cocktail, and I feel sad. Quick look at the comment bar. Three people write something like “Mmhm. Coffee” or “I prefer drinking tea,” and the fourth person greets back with a hearty “I hope the caffeine gives you a heart attack and dies.” Well, going online was worth it again! And there you sit on a sunny Tuesday afternoon and ask yourself why there is this slight mood. Until you remember that some stranger on the internet wished you dead this morning, or worse, wrote to you that you had grown old.
Why do we pay such a high price? If social media were a department store, you would go in regularly, find a pair of nice socks, but then get beaten up on six floors and come out stripped down to your underwear. We still go in again and again. Worse still, how many – mostly young women – think they can break this chain of incessant degradation by making this one particular post? This one statement that convinces all “critics” to let go of her now. The opposite is the case. It’s like quicksand. The harder you kick, the deeper you sink. Arguing with people who start with an insult is like playing volleyball with a hornet’s nest: you might score a point or two. But the damage outweighs the damage.
Who among us has the nerve to put up with all the insults that await us every day in this digital problem area? And what is actually waiting for us there if we assume that we can define ourselves as a person by how a bunch of complete strangers rate us on X, Threads or Instagram. I’m not going to go to Braunschweig, stand on the town hall market and ask people: “And you? How do you actually find me?” You are constantly and constantly being scrutinized and criticized that would be too harsh even for Andi Scheuer – when all you want to do is post a photo of yourself in a bikini.
There are enough sociopaths in our society
Almost touching, all the posts and videos that are intended to encourage people to stand by their bodies in 2024 (“body positivity”). Or posting screenshots of hate messages, to be precise What to prove? As if we needed a reminder that sociopaths are the only reliably renewable raw material in our society. Such posts usually positively influence around 28 people to rethink their view of society – and encourage 23,977 accounts to really piss off the old woman in her underwear.
In the event of a shitstorm, the average rabble finally switches to beast mode: all the dams break in the service of the “good cause”. Even in all the noise, it’s no longer clear to you who you actually are. In this situation, would someone tell you that your ID card says under Surname: “dumbest asshole in the nation” – you would believe it. The wounded self is completely shaken up. Like a surfer who is swallowed by a huge wave and at some point no longer knows which way is up and which is down. Of course, each individual in this swarm of rage considers their individual verbal insult (“go die, you Kek”) to be justified criticism. In canon, they gradually push the object of contempt closer towards the cliff – only to get the next opportunity Hate on the internet accuse and sharepics for Mental Health to share.
It almost doesn’t matter whether the digital torch mob is sent out by some crazy left-wing social warlords, because a mild gender gag is of course the gateway to fascism. Or whether Julian Reichelt’s digital boxing booth from the far right is shaking because Ricarda Lang promised herself to Illner. There is only peace when you find the victims of the social media Way of the Cross trembling under a river bridge. And the others, in turn, find salvation, freed from the pronoun requirement, in listening to the political-philosophical rants of the vulgar masculine hosts in Finfluencer podcasts, because they can still speak freely.
Twitter was once a meadow for small, subtle gags
While Twitter was once a meadow where style blossoms grew and small, subtle gags turned young people into indie stars, today the storm of projections dominates. Since the takeover of the kryptonite Nero Elon Musk, “X” has only been an orgy of insinuation.
The simple rule remains: If a name is already trending on the Internet, think carefully about whether you still need to do something about it.
The fact that Meta and Co. want to present political content at a disadvantage in the future probably has less to do with the social responsibility of Zuckerberg and Co., but simply with the fact that what is considered political content applies, no longer encourages interaction, but simply: incredibly stressful. It’s bad for business. People stay away. Who wants to be yelled at non-stop? The world is bad enough without having to read, even yourself.
So you can: enjoy your coffee and just not post anything. Stay away.
Oh, if only I were less vain to be able to stick to it myself.