Digital connection VS. Personal connection

-- By DanielaWeerasinghe - 08 Dec 2021

The unnoticed dichotomy between self-connection and digital connection.

For the first time in probably ten years, I switched off my iPhone for ten hours and entirely disconnected myself from the Internet (including on my MacBook). This real-time in Cognito; experience was surprisingly gratifying for it reinvigorated a "connection to myself" i.e., in the sense that I was in my own thinking bubble, capable of thinking through my thoughts until the ending, without constant interruptions or temptations to disrupt myself by checking WhatsApp? , Instagram, Gmail and co. By disconnecting from smart devices, I realized how much power (and indeed free time) I have regained over myself and thus how much I misconceived the benefits of carrying around my iPhone everywhere I go. This in turn made me recognize that I have voluntarily (!) let those gadgets, and by extension Apple and Meta in particular, assume power over me, throughout the past decade. The magnitude of the damage caused is unquantifiable but not yet irreversible.

Why nobody notices the resulting dearth of individualism and authenticity.

Ayad Akhtar tied Kahneman’s seminal work on the effectiveness of unconscious priming to today's screens, by conceptualizing them as the "delivery system for unconscious priming", engineered for maximum engagement by so-called "attention merchants". In addition, she argues that smart devices have a "confirmation bias as the default setting". This is to reassure, soothe, and reinforce the views that you have been primed to believe – to of course, keep you engaged, which symbolizes a "profound technological support for primary narcissism". (The Singularity is Here, the Atlantic, November 5, 2021). I agree with this analysis.

I realized that it is not targeted advertising that is my immediate “visible” concern of smart devices, but their ability to subconsciously exercise a monopoly on my attention and thought process. This, in turn, interferes with my autonomy and my personal development, in the uncanniest manner plausible. For example, when I was in primary school, I got a Nokia phone (my first phone), purely in case I had to make an emergency call to my family. That is, I would only use the device when really needed. Today, I use my iPhone almost every second, for no objectively important purpose or reason. I would automatically default to mindlessly scrolling on it or sending messages to friends. In other words, I do not use the iPhone but it uses me and constantly wins in getting my attention due to its deliberately addictive design. Yet, there is an inertia towards remedying this self-harming and default tendency to resort to smart devices.

And beyond the immediate harm on the thought process, there is this looming shadow of collected data being used against me without knowing about it:

"Google, Facebook, and Amazon have amassed combined valuations in the trillions of dollars by building empires of omniscience. These firms know our deepest fears, our best friends, and our favorite toilet paper" (Derek Thomspon, Why Surveillance Is the Climate Change of the Internet, The Atlantic, May 9, 2019).

A quote from Jeffrey Rosen captures this paradox eloquently: "This is about as rational as allowing a camera into your bedroom in exchange for a free toaster" (The Eroded Self, New York Times, April 30, 2000).

Why the concept of "convenience" needs to be reinvented.

As I understood, Eben Moglen's theory characterizes convenience (i.e., the surrender of anxiety to the machine) as the key driver for our usage of smart devices. Once inside the Apple, Google, Facebook cult, we are locked into a vicious circle of endless, free social media consumption in exchange for endless, targeted advertising and behavior modification. My thought was this: what if we used the same weapon of "convenience", employed by so-called digital feudalists, and repurposed it to lock our usage of smart devices into a positive, harmonious circle that "serves us, not them". This approach would be threefold:

(i) SELF-GOVERNANCE: breaking the habit of mindlessly succumbing to our smart devices, by realizing that self-connection and real-life, social connections trump digital connection, not vice-versa;

(ii) USING THE INTERNET ON OUR OWN TERMS: setting anonymous and private browsing as the default, convenient option (via proxy browsing or switching from Safari/Google Chrome to Firefox with the TrackMeNot? extension, which would inter alia permit using the Google Search engine in an encrypted manner); and

(iii) REGULATION: prohibiting both the collection and usage of data for advertisement or innovation purposes.

Step I would safeguard your freedom of thought "internally", while step II will do so "externally", i.e., making sure nobody harvests your data or targets you with advertisements that subconsciously modify your perceptions and behavior. Consequently, digital feudalism would be deprived of their key means to exist: their capacity to monopolize your attention and thought process and to obtain your data. Step III would be to enforce rules that render the monetization of human data illegal, which, in the grand scheme of things, could be seen as akin to prohibiting human mind trafficking. As a result, both the chief incentive (=money/power) and ability to surveille you would be removed. The omniscience of the tech empires would gradually erode, while our independent minds and human experience would be restored.

Reclaim the painting brush.

As pointed out by Eben Moglen and others, we are the last generation to have experienced both a world with and without smart devices and are thus uniquely positioned to understand and harness the pros and cons of living in each of those worlds. I am not advising to become a digital vegan or vegetarian, i.e., quitting entirely or partly the digital world. What I am suggesting is to adopt a thought-through approach towards your usage of smart devices and social media platforms. Think of this as creating your customized nutrition plan: you could start with a strict diet (e.g., digital detox) and/or switch to a non-smart phone (e.g., Punkt) to resist the constant temptation of resorting to it and allow mental space to flourish in the real world.

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