How does it work?
Social media platforms don’t care what you watch.
They only want to keep you engaged so they can show you more advertising so they can make more money. It’s all about the money.
The more negative stuff you watch (violence, fights, war) the more the algorithm shows you.
The more positive stuff you watch (fitness, education, fishing) the more the algorithm shows you.
You make the choice between positive and negative content.
If you go down the dark side and constantly watch violent, horrible content:
- You become stupider. It nukes your brain.
- Increases anxiety and depression.
- Seeing real-world violence can cause symptoms like Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). This is what war veterans and police officers suffer from…why do this to yourself willingly?
- Makes you feel the world is more dangerous than it is.
- Shapes your behaviour, it can radicalize you in a short period of time.
- Violence becomes normal, fist fights become normal.
Violence is not a normal part of life.
It is to be avoided at all costs. Nothing good comes from violence.
Addiction
These platforms employ the smartest engineers in the world to design the app to be as addictive as possible. The same people who design Poker machines design social media algorithms.
They want you to be an addict.
Try and put your phone out of reach for an hour. Do you feel anxious? You are addicted.
Retrain your algorithm
It’s time to take the path of positivity and leave the darkness behind.
- Actively reject violent posts. Click ‘not interested’ or ‘hide post’.
- Scroll past quickly. The algorithm wants you to stay engaged. Quickly scroll past the darkness.
- Search for positive posts. Fitness or fishing or how to survive in the bush.
- Follow accounts with positive content.
- Clear your watch history. Start fresh.
- Use the filter settings in the app to filter out violent content.
Once you have done these steps, take a break. Don’t use it for 24-48hrs. When you come back your feed is more positive.
Continue to train it until there is zero violence in your feed. Your brain and mental health will thank you.