| Covid meant staying in. Staying in meant greater consumption of media, more specifically, increased screen time and television.
Media is designed to be extreme, fear-based, and polarizing (it holds out attention better this way), and time spent on a platform is the number one metric for advertisers.
Social media then becomes echo chambered and television is partisan.
This, in turn, reinforces our views without challenging them.
This, then makes us distrust neighbors who disagree with us, (“how can they see the world that way?!”) which perpetuates more anger and isolation, and thus, more tv watching and scrolling. |
