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I sure found that article difficult to read. Considering it was done by someone with a PhD in Literature, I guess it's just me. Welcome to the NHK was a great
by navs 10y ago
I sure found that article difficult to read. Considering it was done by someone with a PhD in Literature, I guess it's just me.
Welcome to the NHK was a great watch. Someone would call it terribly depressing but surely not to the degree of Elfen Lied or Neon Genesis Evangelion.
The author mentions:
> An identikit of an average Hikikomori: likely a school dropout, may or may not have specific skills, most likely unemployed unless he has an online gig of sort, lives in his room in his parents' house, never steps out of the house, spends the day daydreaming, reading, roaming the internet, flipping TV channels, floating in his room.
It's comfortable being at home, especially your family home. I could spend all day reading online, offline, watching adultswim's marathon streams or just taking naps. When I walk outside the safety of my home I meet people that are different from me.
These people don't speak by reciting lines from early Simpsons episodes. These people don't think my jokes are funny.
These people don't talk about the things I like to talk about.
The Internet solves this. Reddit gives me subs. IRC gives me channels. Twitter gives me the ability to follow only those that interest me. I'm able to be someone else online, the best extension of me or the me that I want seen.
Now if my parents continue to pay and let me stay at home, I'll do just that. Eventually, that routine will be too difficult to break.
In my darkest moments, I thought exactly that. It was simply easier and more comfortable being at home and socializing online. When I read articles like these I relate and think back to those dire moments when my room had a leaning tower of pizza boxes and I hadn't showered in over a month.
- sillysaurus3 10y agoSo what happened?
- navs 10y agoYou can only deal with the smell of stale pizza and unwashed armpits for so long. Before I completely let that lifestyle consume me, I decided to seek help and reached out to my local District Health Board. Now I am still a bit of a recluse but I make it a point to physically leave the house and exercise at the gym. Going to and running local Meetups via Meetup.com helps with socializing. The local library allows me to pick and read books outside of home and be surrounded by people, quiet but nonetheless present. Medication also helps and continues to give me a wee boost. It is surprising, though, how easy it is to slip back into that comfortable sleeve. A few weeks back UberEATS launched in New Zealand. It was also raining terribly with thunderstorms and the like. That was all I needed to spend two days tucked in bed with empty UberEATS bags and the sound of Space Ghost playing continuously off my laptop. If it hadn't been for my physical trainer messaging me on the Monday to remind me of training, I'd have stayed in that bed a good while longer.
- rootsudo 10y agoI agree 100%! Welcome to the NHK is a great series, thanks to it, I was able to change my life around alot during my college years. It's sad nowadays the biggest trap we have is that our place of residence is too comfortable. Outside we have to cave into social pressure, wear clothes, behave in a certain way. Inside, you're free. You find ways to communicate, find online communities and procrastinate time 24/7 and your mind changes. Plasticity changes how you think and absorb information. Compared to traditional learning or talking, online information is instant. It's a hard cycle to break. :(
- da02 10y agoWhen you skip showering, is it because of lack of energy or you just "don't feel like it"? What did you use for money? Savings?
- navs 10y agoFor me it was a lack of energy. I wanted to be clean I just couldn't deal with expending energy on the task. As for money I had savings and my father.