When I think of the typical social media user, I tend to draw heavily from my own dysphoric self-portrait: I see myself, invariably alone, looking at a screen in an otherwise empty room, usually in search of a viable excuse to extend my procrastination — some article to read, some Twitter thread to expand and unspool, some relaxing rhythm of images to scroll through. It doesn’t matter what the content is; I just want “distraction” in itself. I see myself in an elevator, searching the screen for a plausible reason to avoid greeting anyone who steps in. Or I might imagine myself at the bottom of a well, like some displaced Haruki Murakami character, and I’m shouting things up to the surface, cries for help disguised as haphazard observations, yet passersby simply drop crumbs of attention on my head every now and then, possibly by accident.
Techniques of Self-Isolation
Techniques of Self-Isolation
Techniques of Self-Isolation
When I think of the typical social media user, I tend to draw heavily from my own dysphoric self-portrait: I see myself, invariably alone, looking at a screen in an otherwise empty room, usually in search of a viable excuse to extend my procrastination — some article to read, some Twitter thread to expand and unspool, some relaxing rhythm of images to scroll through. It doesn’t matter what the content is; I just want “distraction” in itself. I see myself in an elevator, searching the screen for a plausible reason to avoid greeting anyone who steps in. Or I might imagine myself at the bottom of a well, like some displaced Haruki Murakami character, and I’m shouting things up to the surface, cries for help disguised as haphazard observations, yet passersby simply drop crumbs of attention on my head every now and then, possibly by accident.