Culture has stability. “The way things are around here.”
When we are pushed too far from our norms, life gets stressful.
Some of the people in the systems that used to keep things stable have discovered that they can make a profit or gain an edge by embracing extremism instead.
You might not have thought you’d be spending seven hours a day reading the internet, or most of your free time posting and responding, but that’s what the social media companies have pushed us to do.
And you might not embrace some of the extreme views that we’re exposed to every single day, but the pressure can feel relentless. It feels like we come out just a bit ahead if we go along with the latest angry meme.
It’s worth checking in with ourselves and the people we care about. What are we signing on to and supporting? How are we choosing to spend our precious time? Is it riskier than we’re comfortable with? And mostly, what sort of new world are we endorsing?
It might make sense to choose stability when we can.