Back in 2019, I spoke at a conference at Illinois State University in Normal. Illinois is my home state, but Normal is not really a place Chicagoans flock to unless it is related to the university. The town is only two hours away from Chicago, but it bears no resemblance to Chicago. It is a typical small Midwestern town, complete with a cute little Main Street and not much else. Which is why when I found myself at the hotel bar one of the nights I was there, I was definitely on guard as I made small talk. This was at the height of the Trump years, and while Illinois as a state is more or less a Democratic stronghold, there are plenty of conservative white folks in the towns that fill out the majority of the state’s landscape.
Despite my guard being up, I ended up chatting with a group at the bar. They were friendly and chatty and there is nothing like the shared bad habit of smoking to bring people together. Initially wary of chatting with strange white folks in a small town as a Black woman traveling alone, I ended up having one of those bar conversations that stays with you years later. While we initially exchanged vague and mild pleasantries, it turned out the group was also in town for a work-related event and, as the drinks flowed, several of the women and I discovered we were Gen X grandmothers. But, of course, in America all conversations eventually turn to what people do for a living. I assumed that once I explained my work, the conversation would come to an abrupt ending, but it didn’t.
Instead, a lively conversation ensued and it was safe to say that some, if not all, of the group supported Trump—or at the very least didn’t think he was a total idiot. We chatted for a good hour or more, eventually parting ways but not before they let me take a picture for my daily Instagram pics and, before parting, they asked me to not see people like them as flyover people.
It was a moment that has stayed with me all these years, especially in this moment when it seems that the ability to talk across differences is a lost art.
I have been thinking a lot about that trip as I continue to ponder whether or not social media is doing us more harm than good.
Over 20 years ago, when social media initially entered our lives, it held so much promise. It created accessibility, it allowed the voiceless to have a voice. It launched careers. It created new connections. Iit was the planning ground for change. Unfortunately, it is no longer any of those things.
In recent years, social media has crushed traditional media, making it damn near impossible for the average person to access timely and accurate news without spending a small monthly fortune. Local media is dead and national media—while not dead—is a shadow of what it once was, as underemployed journalists now jockey alongside bloggers like yours truly to eke out a living in a Substack, Patreon, tip-jar kind of world.
Furthermore, the same sites where news and commentary were once abundant have decided that accurate news, reporting, and commentary are bringing down the vibe and, well, they simply throttle or shadowban such things so you are essentially spoon-fed what they want you to see. The sites that don’t actively throttle news are filled with conspiracy theories, hate, fear mongering, and the worst of humanity.
All of this at the same time as many have started to question the status quo and whether or not our leaders across the globe are truly working in our best interests. Throw in the long-term impact of the early pandemic years, the nonstop hijinks of Trump, the ever-normalized reality of climate change, the increasing unaffordability of daily life and, well, people are not well.
As many say, we are living in late-stage capitalism. Many are also just waiting for it all to crumble and thanks to social media, you can partake in a steady diet of sorrow that either deepens apathy or radicalizes people—for good or bad. At the same time, we are asked to pretend that all is well.
This current moment we are living in has also increased tensions and hostility toward one another, so despite all this connectivity, we are losing our ability to actually communicate. The world has become a stark place of black and white with little in the way of nuance, where when people don’t see our perspective, they are immediately deemed bad. But humans are created for connection, so even in the midst of this morass, we still seek it out. But in this moment, it means it probably will be connection with no nuance and connection that demands complete allegiance with no questions asked.
I found myself thinking about this today for two reasons. It seems my recent piece on Israel and Gaza has sparked a mini exodus of patrons. One former patron left this comment on their exit survey: “Ignorance about what’s happening in Israel and the Middle East.”
Sigh. The truth is that since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, talking about the situation is bound to piss someone off. Typically what I have experienced is that some feel that I don’t care about the Jewish people who have been impacted and, while that is their right, at the same time I have received pushback that I am not speaking up enough on behalf of the Palestinians.
Personally, I know I can’t please everyone but what I have appreciated are the people who will attempt a conversation so that we can actually hear each other. But that rarely happens. It’s bad enough that I recently realized a long-time online friend that I have known over a decade—a Jewish woman—not only canceled her patronage but unfriended me on social media. Again, I wish a conversation could have been had but that’s not the world we seem to live in.
Social media makes it easy to block and move on without care. It feeds the dehumanization machine where life and feelings are easily disregarded. Where activists with large platforms regularly make sport of coming for those who aren’t doing enough and mocking those who dare to say that they can’t. Because it’s not as if people aren’t dealing with life in the midst of the global carnage, and still trying to get food on the table.
Social media is often a dehumanization machine that is stripping what is left of us that late-stage capitalism and stress haven’t already taken. It creates communities of performance where we can influence or be influenced but it creates little in the way of communities of care. Instead, our compassion and care are often weaponized toward others or ourselves. Social media feeds us without regard for our capacity to hold and that can have grave consequences.
Maxwell Azzarello, a 37-year-old man from Florida, set himself on fire outside the Trump trial on Friday, April 19. Azzarello was not a Trump supporter. Rather, he felt that Trump and Biden are leading us towards a fascist coup. Shortly after I wrote this piece, Azzarello, who left behind a manifesto on Substack, died of his injuries. I took a few minutes to skim through his thoughts and many things stood out, including this statement: “We are victims of a totalitarian con, and our own government (along with many of their allies) is about to hit us with an apocalyptic fascist world coup.”
Honestly, much of what he wrote is nothing that I haven’t heard before. I know people in my work-adjacent spaces who hold similar thoughts, and I most certainly see similar thoughts echoed on a daily basis online. The problem is that when people are stretched and living in their echo chambers of choice, it is easy to lose hope and to feel that the only way out is to take extreme measures. This year alone, several people have been pushed to the brink of despair and set themselves on fire and, most of the time, the media barely gives it a news nod.
Setting oneself ablaze is an extreme act. To reach such a place of despair is extreme, and yet it is becoming normalized. At the same time, if things are crumbling fast, why are we not building sustainable connections and communities of care that can create change, even if only in our individual corners?
I refuse to believe we are helpless against the bigger forces, I believe that we all can play a role in pushing back and reclaiming our humanity and society from the forces of big money that entrap us. But if we are eating a daily diet of anger, despair, and hopelessness, how do we even muster the courage to do anything? When our anger in these venues won’t even allow us to hear others unless they subscribe to exactly what we do?
That isn’t sustainable. What is, though, is looking to build communities where we can—ideally local communities—recognizing that ultimately most of us do want the same things. It’s just that the powers-that-be profit from our inability to see any semblance of shared humanity. What good is yelling about white supremacy, capitalism, imperialism, and colonialism if we can’t actually break it down in ways that allow people to feel they can do something to dismantle these systems? The only way that starts is with human connections and shared goals, and ultimately we have to decide how we want to build our connections and communities in a way that nurtures, nourishes, and sustains us for the long game. Personally, a little less time online—if only to allow us to reconnect with our own humanity and regain a sense of hopefulness rather than wallowing in hopelessness—might be a good start.
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