I honestly can’t say I know who social media is even for at this point. There is so much content promoting unhealthy ways of thinking just haphazardly strewn about everywhere. I don’t know how anyone can avoid it all. I don’t know if the benefits can outweigh the costs. Even the most harmless content is forgettable and eats up valuable time that could be used for something more meaningful.

Sometimes I think about how we never see any posts from the happiest people alive. They don’t need social media validation, their positivity wouldn’t generate clicks, and the negativity of social media platforms probably scared them off long ago. As a result of their absence, negativity and unhealthy thought patterns have proliferated unchallenged.

I think you’ve found the larger part of the Internet you don’t relate to anymore with this. Not necessarily the Internet as a whole, but the subset of social media, and the subset within that of the many expressing how bummed they are with things (to put it lightly).

When you shift or fine-tune your focus to use the Internet as it was originally built for (sharing info, collaborative research/creative work), you’ll find it more useful and maybe more pleasant. This is more or less what I’ve tried to do more and more after fumbling about with social media stuff for awhile and experiencing my own growing disinterest in the bummer parts of it.

Speaking of books btw, if you’re into public domain work and ebooks, give Standard Ebooks a look! Similar to Project Gutenberg (also great) with more attention to nicer formatting.