I can’t stop thinking about Bentham’s panopticon and how it really does explain social media and how everyone is at the center of their own pages with everyone staring at them all the time. I know, at least for me and I’m sure some of you, have those few people who watch our facebooks and instagrams like a hawk waiting for us to fail, or say something ridiculous and have those cages open and flood us with comments of negativity, almost like a revolution. Social media really has become a prison that has trapped a lot of us. They even had to combat it on Instagram and restrict seeing the amount of likes on someones picture because people obsessed over it. It’s sad, people have become so dependant on others people’s opinions of their own selves rather than doing what they want to do.
The internet is such an ugly but beautiful place and I don’t think I would go as far as saying it’s making us stupid like Carr suggests. However I don’t think it’s necessarily making us smart either. “Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski.”(Carr) This quote hit me so profoundly because it’s true. Even at a young age already for me, I just don’t read real books anymore. I have totes of books, of my favorite books that I used to read multiple times a year just because I love the story and I could immerse myself in the pages. I have not read a real book in years, like the author, I think the last book I read was when the 3rd Ms. Peregrine’s book came out. And heres the funny part, I don’t remember when that was but Google just told me it was 2015. Google also told me theres been a release in January of the 4th book, and I didn’t have an overwhelming urge to go buy it immediately like the last time I found a new one. I feel like the internet has dissipated my drive, because I could just look up what happened without reading it in its entirety. I promise I didn’t, but the point is I could. So after reflection, maybe google has made me stupid. However, on the flip side of things, Noë thinks this is just how humans adapt, it’s a “cognitive strategy.” And in a way, it is. It’s the convenience factor. The convenience of not having to remember has become more important than just wanting to know something for the sake of knowing it. It’s so hard for our brains to wrap around the concept of the internet. Let me tell y’all, that video we watched in class last week about the creation of the internet absolutely did not make sense in my head, I even rewatched it to try to get a grasp and nope, nothing. It’s such a vast place that leads to everywhere and absolutely nowhere at the exact same time. Nobody reads paper books, nobody remembers phone numbers, nobody remembers even directions anymore because we don’t have to.
But if we can’t learn, grow, and want to intake more information, then what’s the point of being human? If we don’t have to learn anymore, then what are we doing?
Weekly News: We’re all college kids and half of us are addicted to nicotine.
SOCIAL MEDIA & SOCIETY 
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