YouTube is getting particularly bad about this to, unfortunately. They need to do more to remove harmful misinformation, but they don't care because it won't make them money.
The unfortunate thing is a lot of people won't remove it from their recommendations and will watch it, and the worse thing is there's actually even worse content than those you listed, it's awful.
For real. Not logged in, on a new PC, just having watched a few gaming videos and got recommended US right wing nonsense. I am not in the US, no VPN, nothing. No ability to tell them to stop showing me that garbage. Hell, just let me disable shorts in general.
It really sucks that YT has such shit "don't show me stuff" controls. Sometimes it feels like asking to not get recommended a certain channel will instead show all the alternatives that feel and look just like it
I have blocked so many right wing channels that my de facto suggestions after watching political shit is Zach gun rants, Arma ops, and Animarchy or one of the other NAFO associates. Its fucken great.
Youtube is good as a video hosting website, but bad as anything social-related. I just treat it like a video website and ignore the rest. Private browsing mode, no login used is my preferred way to access youtube videos
So I was right when I thought social media is propelling us to collapse and that it is analogous to cigarettes on a collective scale.
Small solace though, it already permeated every corner of civilization changing us in mostly bad ways.
I think we really need to choose our social media carefully knowing that every type has their own mental illness flavour risks from body dysmorphia to groupthink. We need to be self aware of our shortcomings and tricks employed by corps for harvesting engagement.
Nowadays you turn off your brain and browse social media to relax but you should rather do the opposite. Focus the brain knowing the site was purposefully made to trick you to spend as much time on it as possible and invest as much emotions as possible. This isn’t some harmless casual leisure activity, you become a cog in a corporation war for information when you open the site. On unfriendly territory, a battlefield of digital war, you ought to wear a helmet at least.
The last time I logged on to Facebook was this past fall because there was a death in our fairly tight knit group of high school classmates. It had been three or four years since I'd been in there.
So I went on and said my words.
While I was there, I didn't really notice what was in my feed.
What I noticed was suddenly I was getting notification after notification that my posts from years and years ago were getting deleted because they didn't fit whatever the current terms and conditions of use were.
This amused me.
So I left my words of dead classmate up for a week then sent my account silent again.
I can't see Facebook or any social media being a place I ever hang out again, which is a little bit of a bummer because without any social media, IRL social activities all but come to an immediate and total halt.
How do you decide which sources are credible? I can't decide. Literally everything can be faked, and the more there is on the line, the more incentive and resources there are to do so.
What important stuff do you think there is that isn't faked? How do you decide that it's not fake?
Damn near everything you've ever accepted as true is stuff you were told or read and just accepted it based on how it was presented.
I believe that some popular news organizations are sufficiently trustworthy. At the very least, you can find sources that rank higher than others on the scale of trustworthiness.
This is why, in a lot of universities, they're trying to teach you how to learn, not necessarily how you should think.
We need to be able to examine the claims for ourselves and learn what red flags look like.
And a lot of the time we mix up "facts" with "opinions". Even when we are looking at facts, most of the time there are lies mixed with truth or conveniently forgotten truths. If we only get our information from a single source, or from biased sources, then we're going to miss some key information.
That's why it's good to make sure that you look at any story (especially politicized ones) from different angles and sources even if you don't agree with them.
Not only that but it can be enlightening to hear about a story from someone who's much more intimately familiar with the subject themselves.
For example, whenever it comes to news stories about the Supreme Court, I like to look for commentary from lawyers such as Steve Lehto or Legal Eagle. You'll find that they typically provide some very important context into why a particular decision was made that cuts through a lot of the outrage material that reporters push for clicks.
Yowza. My dad did the same until he died (shockingly, of COVID), so I just wanted to say I'm sorry. I know what it's like having a crazy parent and it sucks.
Same sentence but replace it with Instagram for me. I can't help but peek into comments for some funny ones but they are all filled with vile stuff. Tiktok is no better but it's definitely better than Instagram. Even worse half of those comments come from my country :(
the vast majority of nutbags with low key mental issues i meet are social media addicts who furiously want to bring their 'curated' image into the real world and force others to worship them.
irrational belief based on fantasy fuels people to action a lot more than rational belief based in reality.
because the former is exciting and meaningful, the latter is boring and mundane.
hence why the crazies tend to believe in cabal conspiracies of evil people whom they must fight against. whereas your average voter is like 'who do i want to have a beer with and make me feel like i'm doing better financially... i'll vote him'
Can confirm giving up popular social media has made my life a lot better. You don't need to know half the shit your friends are up to. It's just going to hurt you. Go outside. Take part in trivia night. Make new friends. Feel the grass beneath your feet.
I left FB back in 2020 among other social media accounts.
The problem with people, just in general.. regardless of who they are, what they believe in, what part of the world they live in... they just read headlines and quickly post it for attention. They don't take the time to read it, ingest it, question it, find other sources to provide more details or to counter the story. People don't care to have a holistic view of an issue and that's sad. At the same time I also blame the chitty producers of said news and the titles they decide to go with and how they love to bury the more important information 4-5-6-7 paragraphs or more down the page.. you have to read all this bs fluff to finally get to the meat and potatoes of the issue.
I'm hoping that some how, some way, an unbiased AI is created just for internet search purposes, where it can gather all the data, analyze it, then present its findings into a summary with all the sources listed.
Platforms like Facebook have an incredible hold on some people. I remember a few years ago when the "Momo" hoax happened, an older coworker arrived at the office and started warning us about the danger of "Momo" they'd seen on Facebook. I'd already heard about the hoax (and was aware of the original creepyasta origins), and brought up a few news articles explaining it, including an official statement from the police. Everyone seemed satisfied by the truth, except for the Facebook addict. They just gave me a blank stare, and a few hours later I heard them telling another group of colleagues to beware of "Momo" getting to their children.
I have family members and longstanding family friends who have succumbed to this. Interestingly almost all of them were decrying the internet as something that couldn't be trusted before the age of social media.
Block Fox and the other right wing news stations, but also a couple liberal news stations like NBC. When they call you for tech support, tell them it's a weird issue happening with cable lately
I want to quit Facebook so badly, but I NEED to use WhatsApp. Family, friends, work even. All informal and semi-formal chats go through WhatsApp where I live.
I hate Facebook. Marketplace is unfortunately the only place a lot of stuff is listed, even though it also sucks. I said I wanted stuff within 85 miles, why are you showing me stuff that's 400 miles away??? Craigslist is genuinely a better experience (via the mobile app) these days, but no one uses it.
I haven't viewed the actual Facebook app/feed in probably 7 or 8 years, but I have a Facebook for messenger. There are just too many people that rely on it as a sole form of communication, I was just getting left out of shit.
I don't really see the problem though, do you not have the self control not to browse?
I disabled my account four years ago when I realized how much plague stupidity and election stupidity on there was harming my mental health.
I doubt I will ever formally delete my account, as it’s the only source for pictures of some now-deceased family members. If hell freezes over and there’s a legit unavoidable need for me to be on there, I’m using desktop+web browser only, and probably in a browser that only gets used for the monthly visit to FB.
Can't you download those pictures locally? It would be good practice anyway to not rely on Facebook of all places to host your beloved photos indefinitely
Be careful, I logged out for too long and forgot my password and they wanted a copy of my driver's license before letting me have access to my account.
