24 March

In a social media culture, somebody has to be to blame for everything, because that fires up the imitative rivalry. The fake debates, the outrage. Like right now, with fuel. The most common explanations you hear are that fuel companies are price gouging, that individuals are hoarding fuel, and that the government is somehow to blame. The actual reason is simple, and we all know it. What’s happening in Iran. And oil-based fuel has been getting more expensive all the time anyway, because the remaining reserves are rare and being fought over and priced accordingly. An adult culture, like Norway for example, looks at this and says ‘ok we should stop using this fuel.’ And then gets to work, doing that. Isn’t anybody else tired of living in kidult/social media culture? The continuous fights over the most simple things, with simple solutions. Turning problems into platforms for individual self-expression, to generate status? The exhausting social conformity caused by these fake debates, because changing anything would mean letting down your social team, ‘losing’ in the team sports. Don’t people recognise this as Year 9 culture, in a school, where peer pressure is the dominant force? Don’t we see social media with its battling teams of likes and followers has turned our adult life into permanent Year 9? Not by analogy, it’s the same culture.