Struggling with your Algorithm

getting the most out of your personal eldritch abomination

I'm just getting back onto social media after having slowly and painstakingly pushed it out of my life for the last four years. I know this seems like a terrible decision, but you know what they say,

"under peaceful conditions the warlike man attacks himself."

Being a pretty warlike man, I had to endanger all semblance of a healthy relationship with technology so that I could scream into the void on Substack. Unfortunately, for anyone to hear these screams from the void on this godforsaken app, you have to actually treat it like social media.

Since then, I've noticed a slow slip into a feed splayed with things I genuinely do not give a shit about. I follow some things that I like, and then the algorithm thinks it knows me. So, I sit there, scrolling angrily down this list of things I really hate, getting embarrassed and upset about the quality of this hypnotic wall of text and image.

A paragraph-long text post flutters before my eyes. I see some emojis in it so I begin reading, like a fucking stupid bug. I wander along with the author through the little tale that they've spun before myself and 57 other lucky readers. Then I pop out the other side, wondering why I just wasted 30 seconds on that shit.

This happened over and over and over throughout the past few weeks. My feed grew more and more shittified as I let every LinkedIn-core mini story take up another fragment of my time. I understand that any veteran social media addict who is watching this is probably cringing at the absolute state of my repeated rookie mistakes, but if one single soul can be saved from this horrific fate through reading this, then my job here is done.

man vs algorithm

Anywho, this is all a long winded way of saying that the modern age has brought us many wonders including but not limited to "computerized intelligence that will do my homework for me," "computerized intelligence that will make me suspicious about the legitimacy of any creative work made after the year 2024," and "computerized intelligence that will pretend to have phone sex with me". Despite such achievements, one invention stands head and shoulders above the rest as a beacon of humanity amongst the terror of a post-human age: the 'not interested' button.

It demands one singular input from you - simply asking yourself 'do I give a shit about what I just read/watched/saw?' and then clicking the button accordingly. Scrolling back up to a post I genuinely took no value or enjoyment from and saying "oh yeah, I forgot I don't give a shit about this" before clicking "hide note" and then "show fewer notes like this" will never get old.

Even better, Substack has a 'snooze this account for 30 days feature.' This one is great for a pussy like me who is too scared to drown out a voice forever. Muting or blocking someone's profile entirely feels like shooting a dog because it came up to my doorstep one too many times. But hitting the 30-day-snooze feels like giving that dog a Xanax, driving it to a park in a different city, and hoping that it only finds its way back in a dire emergency. Either way, I can rest easy knowing that it's someone else's problem now.

The Added Benefits

What I've noticed while doing this is that the whole exercise is less about training your algorithm, and more of a lesson in attention. There is, in most of modern man, a part of our brain seemingly dedicated to consumption. This part switches on every time we start scrolling, and it seems to have a hard time switching itself off - hence the phenomena of looking at your clock and seeing that 2 hours have passed during your 'quick little Substack scroll treat🤤'.

Fortunately, we can heal this part of ourselves - we need only sharpen an awareness of what we are actually doing. If you have some kind of careful voice in your head questioning, "wait, did I actually give a shit about that?" every time you read, watch, or engage with any kind of stimulation, you bolster yourself ever more against giving over to that dementia-ridden, snot-nosed, mouth-breathing version of yourself whose brain turns off the moment they pick up a source of endless stimulation.

If you find yourself thinking that you cannot trust yourself with the technology in your possession, you have three options:

1) Do nothing and suffer the consequences (don't pick this one).

2) Completely cut off your use of technology (better option than number one, but not really viable for most people).

3) Modify your technology consumption immediately in that moment. Just do something (or earnestly commit to something) significant and lasting.

We are a society of addicts, and our brains are literally being rewired by algorithms daily. American screentime is averaging around 7 hours per day, and it’s only growing. We are so past the point of this being a problem, and if you think you’re the exception to the rule, you are probably just coping.

Attention is man’s primary currency. Money merely follows behind it. There is a reason we say paying attention - not using or applying attention. We spend time and pay attention because these are limited resources. When we engage with something in this way, we literally hand over a little part of ourselves, and in return we receive a minor alteration to the way in which we perceive the world around us, and how we act within it. If we are not intimately aware of this process, other groups or individuals will use it against us, with or without our consent.

average Twitter experience

I know it’s not realistic to advocate dropping technology entirely and living a ‘simple life’. Anyone who preaches this for the masses is simply out of touch. We’ve made our bed and now we must sleep in it. But there are still things we can do, within our little three-foot-worlds, to ensure that our engagement with the internet doesn’t turn us all into hateful, jaded, spiteful, ignorant, neurotic little buffoons. Use the tools at your disposal to at least try to shape the virtual spaces you inhabit into something which better represents the desires, interests, relationships, etc. of the kind of person you genuinely desire to be.

I remember back to a time when I used to laugh with friends about the things that were recommended to us on social media. We would revel in the absurdity - the ‘coincidental’ nature of our recommendations, ignoring a very real elephant in the room - the fact that these things were not truly coincidental - that they gave a glimpse into the things our peers enjoyed at an unconscious level.

Now, I find myself unable to ignore these little glimpses into the private interests of others. There’s a morbid curiosity in what their algorithm reveals about the contents of their inner world. In that same way, when I see what’s recommended to me, I still find in those moments a glimpse into my own shadow. I know that the algorithm is picking up on those times that I hover a little too long over something I know I shouldn’t be paying attention to. So when I see that reflected back on me, it hurts. And it should. Because if it didn’t hurt - if I simply relegated myself to a position of victimhood over the things fed to me by the internet - nothing would change. I would be a slave to those parts of myself that deep down enjoy watching people argue with each other pointlessly - to those parts that enjoy being given the opportunity to abate all semblance of genuine thought or introspection in favor of some incredibly pointless personal anecdote.

Don’t be a victim (or a product) of the endless stream of opinions and ideological drivel that form the majority of online space. You aren’t fulfilling your own personal journey by becoming an instrument in someone else’s. Be your own person.

---