An odd article, because it puts up a whole smorgasbord of strawmen. It seems to conflate all of it into one big old-man-yells-at-clouds complaint: tiktok and s

An odd article, because it puts up a whole smorgasbord of strawmen. It seems to conflate all of it into one big old-man-yells-at-clouds complaint: tiktok and social media addiction, chatgpt, stimulants, depression, teenagers, helicopter parenting, porn, videogames, sensory overload, being called a snowflake, stuffed animals (?) and on and on it goes. But it never actually brings anything concrete to the table, nor maybe examines how the world teenagers grow up in today might not be the world where the author grew up in 40 years ago. For example, in that very first screenshot, the first two teenagers say they feel more connected to their friends and social online, while the latter two saying they feel more peaceful. How is that for connecting with yourself and others? It's not like the authors seems to have spent a lot of time talking to these kids to maybe form a better informed opinion. Instead, their writing veers off into nytimes op-eds and big words about the fundamental task of our lives (fundamental to who?) and throw-away culture. I don't think we inhabit the same internet. Mine is full of dedicated artists and researchers and hackers and students and youtube creators (hide the kids!) creating amazing videos. Heck, just spend one day on HN and click all the obscure stuff showing up on the frontpage. As an autistic person, online was indeed where things where calm, peaceful, and where I could be social at my own rhythm. It's only later in life that I figured out that that's where I am grounded, that's where I can grow, instead of pretending to connect in the real world. It's one thing to criticize a specific aspect of digital culture, and maybe come up with some facts; it's another to just put everything in a blender and pretend there is wisdom in calling it terrible. (edit: typos)