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I'm not sure what's really new here, and if it's such a problem. When I was a kid, there were similar discussions. Kids watch too much TV, play too many video g

I'm not sure what's really new here, and if it's such a problem. When I was a kid, there were similar discussions. Kids watch too much TV, play too many video games, watch porn VHS when parents are away. In the end, it wasn't such a big deal.

micromacrofoot 3y ago
I don’t think tv ever radicalized white supremacists and terrorists like youtube has, the personal recommendation systems amplify everything
- paulryanrogers 3y ago
  People have been radicalized by all kinds of things: religion, crowds, friends, books, and likely broadcast television too. The amplification capability is just more widely available and there's more fringe content. Never thought I'd have so many friends and acquaintances who doubt the world is ball shaped, the moon landing, or suspected 9/11 was an inside job. Yet I do and some of them actually came to these beliefs because of school research papers and debate classes.
blix 3y ago
Computers aren't really new. Addition and writing have been around for a long time. There's nothing that a computer can do that can't theoretically be accomplished by a team of people with abaci and carrier pigeons. The entire value proposition of modern computation is about scale and cost. It's the same things, but with much higher quantity and intensity. Something that can be tolerably safe at 1 unit/day may be very dangerous at 1000 units/day. I would be surprised if pre-teen porn consumption has only risen by 1000x in the past 30 years.
JoeAltmaier 3y ago
It's all 100x faster and 1MX more. Yet humans are the same biological systems. At what point does it go from entertainment to obsession to something like heroin? There's a point where it does, and we could probably figure out a metric. It's disingenuous to pretend 'oh there's nothing new here'
FoomFries 3y ago
I don’t remember being able to do this at school while in a classroom. So I guess that part is new. And likely a problem if that’s the only venue for required learning.
- yodsanklai 3y ago
  I don't know about the US, but in my country, smartphones are forbidden inside schools. If they're not, it's not a social network issue.
thatguy0900 3y ago
Were you playing too many video games and watching too much porn while at school, or at home? Were those video games engineered with the help of psychologists to addict you as much as possible?
JKCalhoun 3y ago
I may be older than you so ... TV (we only had broadcast) sucked during the day since it apparently targeted housewives. That, as it turns out, sent us outside to play, ride our bikes. Video games had not arrived — when they did they cost a quarter to play. That kind of limited the time spent there, ha ha. Personal computers were expensive so even when they arrived, we of course did not have one. Porn was finding a magazine in the trash can behind an office building. The thing that saddens me the most about all of this stuff (the internet especially, perhaps) is that kids aren't out trying to fly a kite any more.
zo1 3y ago
You say it wasn't such a big deal, yet here we are in a thread discussing a mental health crisis that most of us agree is occurring. Maybe they were right and if we listened we wouldn't be here now.

micromacrofoot 3y ago

I don’t think tv ever radicalized white supremacists and terrorists like youtube has, the personal recommendation systems amplify everything

paulryanrogers 3y ago
People have been radicalized by all kinds of things: religion, crowds, friends, books, and likely broadcast television too. The amplification capability is just more widely available and there's more fringe content. Never thought I'd have so many friends and acquaintances who doubt the world is ball shaped, the moon landing, or suspected 9/11 was an inside job. Yet I do and some of them actually came to these beliefs because of school research papers and debate classes.

blix 3y ago

Computers aren't really new. Addition and writing have been around for a long time. There's nothing that a computer can do that can't theoretically be accomplished by a team of people with abaci and carrier pigeons. The entire value proposition of modern computation is about scale and cost. It's the same things, but with much higher quantity and intensity. Something that can be tolerably safe at 1 unit/day may be very dangerous at 1000 units/day. I would be surprised if pre-teen porn consumption has only risen by 1000x in the past 30 years.

JoeAltmaier 3y ago

It's all 100x faster and 1MX more. Yet humans are the same biological systems. At what point does it go from entertainment to obsession to something like heroin? There's a point where it does, and we could probably figure out a metric. It's disingenuous to pretend 'oh there's nothing new here'

FoomFries 3y ago

I don’t remember being able to do this at school while in a classroom. So I guess that part is new. And likely a problem if that’s the only venue for required learning.

yodsanklai 3y ago
I don't know about the US, but in my country, smartphones are forbidden inside schools. If they're not, it's not a social network issue.

thatguy0900 3y ago

Were you playing too many video games and watching too much porn while at school, or at home? Were those video games engineered with the help of psychologists to addict you as much as possible?

JKCalhoun 3y ago

I may be older than you so ... TV (we only had broadcast) sucked during the day since it apparently targeted housewives. That, as it turns out, sent us outside to play, ride our bikes. Video games had not arrived — when they did they cost a quarter to play. That kind of limited the time spent there, ha ha. Personal computers were expensive so even when they arrived, we of course did not have one. Porn was finding a magazine in the trash can behind an office building. The thing that saddens me the most about all of this stuff (the internet especially, perhaps) is that kids aren't out trying to fly a kite any more.

zo1 3y ago

You say it wasn't such a big deal, yet here we are in a thread discussing a mental health crisis that most of us agree is occurring. Maybe they were right and if we listened we wouldn't be here now.