Comment by socialist_coder | Hacker News Reader

Comment by socialist_coder | Hacker News Reader

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socialist_coder

I wish people didn't watch so much television. It's too good and too easy to watch an unlimited amount of content. Every hour you spend being entertained in front of your screens is an hour less you could be spending building actual social bonds with people in your community.

There is a correlation to increasing tv watching and decreased social club engagement. By social clubs I mean bowling clubs, skating clubs, 4H clubs, knitting clubs, quilting clubs, book clubs, etc. Whatever other clubs people used to do back in the pre modern television era.

Being a part of these clubs connects you with your local city. It encourages real social relationships. If the club membership is diverse, you are exposed to people of different backgrounds, experiences, and races, which decreases racism and xenophobia.

All of this will increase the amount of trust we have for random humans. And that correlates strongly to how well government is working for us.

This could also be fueling why the US has so much hostility in politics now. What if we were in clubs with people of different political viewpoints? You like these people, and you disagree politically. I think that would change things.

So please, do your part and stop watching so much bullshit on television. Sure, a few good movies and shows every once in a while is understandable. But really do you need to watch all these new TV series and every single made-for-netflix movie??

I have some pretty bad internet addiction too. It was so bad I basically stopped playing guitar in my teen years. I restarted last year and had to basically start from scratch, it was so depressing. I used to be able to sight read sheet music, then I threw a budding life skill all away to look at memes I will never remember or play some dumb quest in a game.

I was addicted really to consumption. I stopped creating. Now I'm trying to make more time for it. The other night I fell asleep on the couch before midnight with my guitar in my hand and my fingers forming a chord, rather than being wired and awake on reddit until I look and notice it's 2am again. Still, the sting of knowing I squandered probably 10 years of youth just consuming junk is a lot to bear.

It's depressing knowing some very smart people are out there striving as hard as they can to get me and others away from looking inwardly and creating, or at least investing focus in one's own life and building yourself up, and instead hooked on the teet of endless content. It's like the end game with this endless consumption is The Matrix, where most of humanity is just plugged into the machine sitting there, thoughtless, sucking on the feeding tube and fueling the robots until they eventually die and are replaced by another warm body.

It sounds like there's hope for you, especially since you are now aware of what you wish to mindfully pursue.

I'd suggest that you not beat yourself up over the past, and always, always keep in mind the Creative Gap:

https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/02/22/ira-glass-on-the-se...

>>"Every hour you spend being entertained in front of your screens is an hour less you could be spending building actual social bonds with people in your community."

I feel it didn't used to be like that; there was a brief period of limited TV choices where it seemed to increase the bonds - it was a shared experience, and unlike most shared experiences which you have with couple of people physically present, it was shared with any number of friends colleagues and strangers. "Did you see the movie last night" or "Did you catch Ed Sullivan" show, do even "Remember the Friends episode where...". It was a common cultural reference point.

Now of course there's so much content we are more divergent and everybody watches their own TV show or Movie or Youtube channel or TikTok etc.

Yeah, agreed.

I'm surprised that your insightful comment (questioning the very elephant-in-the-room assumption that we all must have content to consume) has not been voted higher by this community of hackers, tinkerers, and makers.

Indeed, why is this so central to our lives? Why isn't a different kind of shared activity more sought-after?

Your point about the sheer variety is also relevant -- there's just too many echo chambers of consumption for everyone now.

Overall, the creative force has nary a chance to flourish in such environs.

Doesn't TV shows and movies also contain diverse cast and help us relate to people with different backgrounds, race, sexual orientation, etc.? For example, i think Hollywood movies depicting homosexuality have large impact on people watching them from conservative countries.

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