The backlash is on!
Ex-blogger extraordinaire Andrew Sullivan fired the bazooka in this week’s
New York magazine, to wit:
There might be a few of you who bookmark this essay – or more radically –
set aside time RIGHT NOW! to read it. Do otherwise and yes, as they said in The
Sixties, consider yourself part of the problem – not the solution.
Readers of this blog have seen these thoughts here before. In fact, I’ve
been running without headphones – more interested in achieving a meditative
high than an adrenaline high – for forty years next year. On July 17, 2012, I wrote:
_______________
“Item: Nokia slashes price of Lumia 900 Windows phone to $49.99
with a two-year contract.
Item: Young man in
Prospect Park flogging cut-rate mobile-phone service near-interrupts me,
thrusting a promotional postcard, while I’m on a fast-paced run.
It’ll get you,
Internet addiction. Consider the following:
Item: The brains
of Internet addicts look like brains of drug and alcohol addicts.
Item: A researcher
on aging and memory selected 12 experienced Web users and 12 inexperienced ones
and passed them all through a brain scanner. The difference was striking, with
the Webbies showing fundamentally altered prefrontal cortexes. The novices went
away for a week and were asked to spend a TOTAL of five hours online. The
brains of the novices had rewired and were similar to the Webbies.
Item: The average
teen processes 3,700 texts a month (123 texts daily).
Item: Teens fit
some seven hours of screen time into the average school day; 11, if you count
the time spent multitasking on several devices.
How hypocritical
of me. People turning to this blog – either on a mobile device, a PC, a Mac,
etc. – are adding to their screen time. And too often every day I find myself
checking to see how many visits my blog posts have attracted. I’m typing into a
computer screen right now, my rewired brain piqued by the rush that I’m
attracting readers, maybe even followers.
In the event of
followers, listen to this: Log off. Go out for a run. Pet the dog. Pick up a
pen and journal and write. Call a friend and make a plan to play tennis, or
golf. You can be assured that Facebook and Twitter – and yes, Running for Your
Life – will be there when you get back.”
_____________
So consider this shout-y protest as a grab for your screen. I am
not so arrogant as to think that my way is better. (I use a flip phone that
gets less smart by the day). Rather, I’m happy to have more company in the
forefront of the backlash against the screen that mirrors your brain.
Next: Running for Your Life:
Deep State S--t
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