That part is precisely the problem. "Just get help for your addiction" is not how anything works.
It's incredibly hard for an addict to stop using the brain rot stuff. A lot of very smart people make a lot of money making it as hard as possible.
That's why you need help.
But you don't need to eliminate all forms of fermentation or combustion from your life to get over an alcohol or cigarette addiction. You don't need to eliminate all screens from your life to get over your tiktok addiction.
You put some spatial restrictions (no tv screen visibly standing permanently in the house). Some people put time restrictions because that works for their case. It does not mean that they do not want to use these "wondrous technologies", they just want to spend some amount of their time doing something else. Saying "this works for me, everybody should do that" is absurd, something that works for you could work for some, but there is no reason to think it may work for everybody. And you just overlook how certain stuff are built to be addictive/attention grabbing, through A/B testing and research and tons of high-end specialised human capital in order to increase profit from advertising.
It's weird to rail against one but implement the other.
> There is A LOT of this sort of pressure and sentiment.
There’s absolutely no pressure that can’t be ignored. Just because you feel the pressure there’s no need to call everyone else’s way of dealing with overuse nonsensical.
> It's not screens that are bad, it's what you do with them and how you use them.
“Medium is the message” is a highly recommended reading.
Well, I don’t get why I can’t discover his writings if I have still Saturday :) but it is his website not mine… so if he wants me to visit it on Monday to Saturday his time, I will. Or will not…
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-36256-4
The mere presence of one's own smartphone impairs cognitive capacity
My point was it's how you decide to use them. Do you have a TV/screen as a constant visible physical presence in your life spewing content design to attract and hold attention, or do you have a screen as a damn-useful tool that you choose and decide to use to your own benefit?
People who choose not to use screens one day a week are “deciding” not to use them for one day a week, for many reasons including some you mentioned yourself. But then you say “do you avoid electricity?”
You avoid putting a tv in your kids’ room tuned permanently to the news. Why? It would be damn-useful for them to learn what’s going on in the world. You literally let your kids use the screen way less than this guy allows himself to. You’re in agreement with him…
They don't even "let" their kids or themselves use a TV at all!
As you said, the whole thing is completely incoherent. They seem to have zero self-awareness.
You are bewildered that someone wants to try to limit technology in some way, while literally not having a television - which you call "a damn-useful tool".
Can you not see how utterly un self aware you are here?
2. There aren't billion-dollar corporations, staffed with teams of PhDs in psychology, whose sole purpose 24/7 is to get me to use a hammer more. That's a false analogy.
Personally my biggest complaint is not necessarily screen time in itself, it’s that the tech giants are dedicated to maximising your (and your children’s) watch time by showing a stream of addictive slop.
It’s a shame, there’s good content for kids on YouTube but the algorithm always biased towards addictive crap. And they’re cornering the market to the extent that other operators producing good kid-friendly content (like the BBC in the UK) get sidelined.
It's not the screens, it what you do with the screens.
We do not need to reduce our lives to that of Luddites - we do not need to throw the baby out with the bathwater and avoid all screen use - just because people are addicted to social media or short-form video content.
They're not addicted to the screens, they're addicted to YouTube/tiktok/twitter/whatever.
> My kids love watching TV...we don't have a physical TV in the house
What do they watch "TV" on? Or do you mean they watch their shows on your laptop? Their tablets? What are the black rectangles that show them the shows? Without this it's hard to understand why you are patting yourself on the back so much about the lack of a TV. If the solution is to give the kids tablets 24/7, then the looming black rectangle with parental control might be preferable. If you're showing them the shows on your laptop and taking it away later; congratulations, you are just "taking technology away".
> there is no looming huge black rectangle in the corner reminding them all their waking time (we adults just watch netflix/whatever on a laptop after bedtime for the kids)...I think this is part of the problem.
What is part of the problem? That there is no looming black rectangle? There is no obvious phrase that corresponds to "part of the problem".
> Get help for your addiction...I do not understand this rejection of hugely beneficial tools and technology that has made our lives so much easier.
You are acknowledging that there is addiction, but then saying you don't understand why people would choose to "get help" for it by avoiding said technology 1/7th of their week (incidentally on a rest day when they get to decide what they do)?
Using obscure French words while talking about English comprehension...you really might be overestimating your own fluency and clarity of communication in English.
Just because it's your native language doesn't mean that you're automatically fluent.
Don't tell me you're one of those "If English was good enough for Jesus, then it's good enough for the rest of American!" people...
Your performative insistence that you're incapable of comprehending his point is a tired and ineffective way to make your own.
Edit:
Yes! That's exactly the fil conducteur: "It's how you use them" and "I control how they're used in my own house" reinforce each other. The latter is a concrete example of the former, not a contradiction.
I strongly agree with mattlondon, and made essentially the same point here:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49583842#49584461
Screens are general-purpose tools. Exercise judgment over how you use them instead of blaming the medium or prescribing abstinence to everyone else.
It's a fool's errand trying to see patterns in clouds where there aren't any. Or pareidolia, if you want a fancy word.
Have a more open mind.
Only until I started smoking cigarettes and later stopped I realised what addiction really means, and how hard it is to kick it.
Congrats on being a good parent, but there's a lot of people out there who put much less conscious effort into it than you apparently do.
Read some of the news URLs about "AI slop children's videos" for example, and try to imagine what happens when people give a 3 to 6 year old a tablet and unrestricted use of youtube to keep clicking on recommendations.
https://www.google.com/search?&q=ai+slop+children%27s+videos...
I'm not saying that having a day without screens or going completely no-screen is the best and absolute solution, but that it's a very real category of problem to grapple with and decide for yourself what's most appropriate.
Alcohol addiction is bad. But no one is saying we should have "bottle free days" or "try not to use a glass until you've been outside" or whatever - no one is saying "bottles and cups cause addiction! We should not allow children to use liquid containers until they are 16!" just because they could conceivably contain alcohol. That is obviously absurd. You are not addicted to the glass or bottle, you are addicted to the alcohol.
Yet we as a society are basically doing that for screens. Screens/bottles are not in themselves bad, but it's what you as an individual actively chose to put in it that leads to the problem. Don't use tiktok or whatever, but do use the screen.
The original author isn't trying to ban all screens from public life (e.g. screens that show bus information) or religiously avoiding them, it is obvious that by "screens" they specifically mean the "addictive entertainment that is usually delivered via screens". This does not mean they will run screaming from a screen at the doctor's that's displaying their vitals.
Actually, there's an analogy right there in your argument! We often say "he's been hitting the bottle" as a metaphor, that doesn't literally mean someone is hitting a bottle, it means that they are addicted to the alcohol in it.
It's the slime, not the glass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPFIkty4Zvk
I am gross and perverted, I'm obsessed and deranged
I have existed for years but very little has changed
I'm the tool of the government and industry too
For I am destined to rule and regulate you
I may be vile and pernicious but you can't look away
I make you think I'm delicious with the stuff that I say
I'm the best you can get, have you guessed me, yet?
I'm the slime oozin' out from your TV set