I Want My Social Media Experience to be Boring
Last summer I announced that I was leaving twitter for good. It didn’t last. I thought I could control my time on the platform, but within a few weeks I had succumbed to the same dangerous urges of incessant scrolling and tweeting banal and inconsequential nonsense.
About three weeks ago I made the decision to deactivate my account again for many of the same reasons, but where before I was thinking about it constantly, this time I haven’t given twitter much thought at all. This morning I woke up to news that Musk is going to phase out the legacy verified blue check marks and I barely batted a wink.
My account was verified. Applying for the blue stamp of approval was probably one of the worst mistakes I made during my time on the platform. It not only turned me into a target, but encouraged an unhealthy belief that, somehow, I was an authority, who had an obligation to speak out and challenge those that I viewed as misguided.
It was nothing more than a waste of time and energy.
The constant stream of information was always too much to process and 99% of it has little, if any, value. It left me feeling helpless and never more alone. It reinforced misleading impressions of friends and colleagues, which in turn gradually ate away at my own self esteem and sense of self.
Do we really need to know what each of us is doing day in and day out? I am tired of giving people I’ve never met or even care to meet a rent free space in my head.
In contrast with my earlier attempt at quitting twitter, this time I have had no urges to reactivate my account. I am not reflexively hitting the share icons on news articles that I read. I am no longer wondering what I might be missing or how my friends and colleagues are responding to the latest outrage.
I’ve come to the conclusion that I want my social media experience to be as boring as possible. I don’t mean uninteresting or even unentertaining. What I want is less sensationalism and posturing in the hope that people will take notice of you.
I believe it is possible to make meaningful connections with others online, but it has to be nurtured over time in spaces that allow and encourage honest conversation. It’s one of the things that I am committed to encouraging in this particular space.
Our time on social media should be intentional. It’s horrifying to consider how much time we spend on platforms like twitter without any understanding or awareness of why or whether it can, in any way, be justified.
While others are lamenting the fact that Elon Musk is running twitter into the ground, I remain committed to not allowing it to run me into the ground.
Do yourself a favor and deactivate your twitter account now.
I never got going on Twitter, so deactivating (2 separate accounts) wasn't a problem for me. It does take a little more time, but I prefer to do my own news curation with various apps specific to general news outlets—AP, NPR, I even have a BBC app for national news. When something major happens, like the Nashville shooting, I find a local news source if I can. Still on FB, but only to keep up with people I know that I'm not connected to any other way. I've been subscribing to Heather Cox Richardson's blog for years for the national scene. If she mentions something I need to know more about, I follow her links and dig in deeper. In fact, I'm pretty sure that she (and Substack) is how I found you.
Yes, the bird app can be a real time suck. I don't spend as much time on it this year as I have in times past. As an elected official, though, I must admit it comes in handy to get scoop on our mayor's shenanigans, covered with much more scrutiny by hyper-local writers than those who report for the Washington Post. Also, I need to know how those who don't think like me -- or just plain don't like ppl who look like me -- are thinking (or posting). That stated, I don't miss you on Twitter because you're here! Yay! Thanks for setting up the Steady account. I follow you and 3 others here and it's a nice experience.