Sampling error: By definition, you never hear from the ones who did give up social media because… they gave up social media.
Facebook and Instagram don’t sound like especially resource-heavy activities at all, compared to many others people routinely engage in; not sure what you’re trying to tell us.
“Lower our standard of living” is a loaded term. Imprecise. Reduce our consumption of resources, yes, that sometimes does and sometimes doesn’t impact our standard of living.
E.g. Using a cast iron frying pan that becomes an heirloom passed down generations is far more sustainable than PFAS laden aluminum non-stick pans that get replaced every few years. Both can cook perfectly well.
The person living in a passivehouse premium net consumes less energy then they produce but has a comfortable, efficient home.
A city with great public transit can easily get where they need to without wasting resources on cars while reducing demand for land.
We can have a high quality of life and still live sustainably.
giving up facebook and instagram is, contrary to your assertion, actually a higher standard of living than being on them.
Think of all the brain cells you don’t kill! The arguments you don’t have! The data you don’t give the Zuck for free! It’s its own reward, really.
During, I don’t know, maybe the 18th month of Covid, I simply deleted my Facebook and Instagram account. I never had a TikTok account. Within days, I felt a weight lift off me that I simply cannot describe, and every day since then, when people encounter me and talk about this or that link or this or that thing they saw or had to deal with on Facebook or Instagram or TikTok, I never really feel like I’m missing out. All I can do is describe the sigh of relief I have every single time that I am so happy I’m not involved in all of that fucking goddamn crazy melodramatic meaningless bullshit.
And every time I hear someone say, “how are you not on Facebook? How are you not on Instagram?“ I just reply, “you see how angry you are when you ask me that?“ And that ends the conversation right there.
It’s just like when I quit heroin. But at least drug addicts know they are addicted to drugs that are bad for them. even among the worst of drug addicts, it’s pretty rare to meet some psychopath who believes that drugs are actually good for them. Or anyone. People who are addicted to social media? Rarely will you find such clarity. And even when you do, rarely, will you find the will among the addicts to break free and remain free.
I can convince myself all I like that coming here and being on a “social news aggregation site“ is different, but it’s not really. It still feeds the dragon. it still scratches that itch.
Who says that and what does it have to do with Facebook and Instagram?
Every time they use the Google bot they vote yes on the next data center. Ditto on every ChatGPT sub payment. Every use of anything owned by Meta. They voted for that which they claim to oppose.
Reddit too at this point. It’s not just bot posters any more, Reddit is moving to bot moderators.
How else is that brainrot going to spread? Gotta keep the masses blaming each other somehow.
Unfortunately using Messenger and Facebook is nigh mandatory in Philippine schools.
That is dumb degrowther mythology. Growth is not the issue, there a lots of examples that growth and a high living standard can be sustainable.
Decoupling would be the keyword
Weird to invoke mythology while giving one of your own. Neoliberal economists have been touting decoupling as long as infinite growth on a finite planet.
Mythology? Please demonstrate these examples? They would be news to me…
The truth is modern society and convenience is ALL built off of fossil fuels and it’s products. There is a correlation to how much fossil fuels are used and humans’ standard of living. There is a whole understanding of this called macroeconomics. Please tell me how we “decouple” and live sustainably?
Also, saying “you need to give up what you have” is not exactly a good selling point. Especially sunce that is not the case. We can have all the datacenters in the world and run them sustainably.
Giving up Meta products wouldn’t be terrible. But it wouldn’t solve anything. The greatest environmental footprint is left by streaming, I think.
We should all get off the internet, yet here we are. Hypocrisy is the prequel to Idiocracy.
Greatest out of what? Internet services? Believable. But compared to flying, eating meat, and making new e-waste continuously it’s nothing.
Yes. The context was internet services.
The context was living sustainably. I’d argue that getting off Facebook helps that, but not because of the energy savings. My sibling talking about how I should stop playing on the computer and go snowmobiling for fun is also a less sustainable choice, both for cost in dollars and energy consumed per hour of entertainment.
The only people who said that is oil company and millionaire and above CEOs
I recall the then leader of the Green Party in my country saying we needed to stop flying and eat significantly less meat, so I think you’re wrong.
Eating less meat would most likely improve health for most people, so that’s not really lowering standards of living
There’s more to living well than health, and there’s a huge range of how much meat people eat.
There more to living well than health, but nothing that can only be gained through eating more meat.
What people say that?
Probably those on Instagram and Facebook
