Preface: I do not want to diminish the incredible value online spaces and communities have for people isolated due to disability, sexuality, race, gender, politics and all the other oppressions we face under capitalism.
A few years ago I spent two days in the hospital recovering from a bad flu and fell down the youtube rabbit-hole for the first time. And after getting out, I never really left either. While I had always spent too much time on the internet (at the expense of friendships and hobbies), this was when I began doom-scrolling till 2 or 3 in the morning wishing I could stop and feeling powerless to do so—an experience I'm sure many of you can relate to.
I hated it and I couldn't find a way out. Apps that limited how long my web browser could stay open would be disabled after a few days. Other times I would have a successful break and then rationalize why it was a deserved treat to spend a few minutes on youtube/reddit/wherever. Pretty soon it was more doomscrolling until two in the morning and waking up with bloodshot eyes.
During most waking moments, even if I wasn't actively looking at my screen I was listening to music and podcasts and ultimately avoiding the world. It might sound corny, but my big 'come-to-jesus' moment came when I read chapter 4 of 'Capitalist Realism' by Mark Fisher where he describes 'depressive hedonia': "an inability to do anything else except pursue pleasure. [accompanied by] a sense that 'something is missing' - but no appreciation that this mysterious, missing enjoyment can only be accessed beyond the pleasure principle". He went on to describe a student of his who continually wore headphones and I saw myself. The passage that made me go 'oh my god, this is what is happening to me' goes:
The consequence of being hooked into the entertainment matrix is twitchy, agitated interpassivity, an inability to concentrate or focus. Students' incapacity to connect current lack of focus with future failure, their inability to synthesize time into any coherent narrative, is symptomatic of more than mere demotivation.
Understanding what was happening was a partial step toward liberation. During the headrush-honeymoon period that followed I even replaced my smart phone and was sort-of present in my life AFK! However, that twitchy distracted feeling remained and ultimately I just switched to spending more and more time at my desk. Ultimately little better than when I started. (and of course trying to live without a smart phone is impossible for many people in this day and age)
Was Fisher wrong? Did I not really understand the problem?
Not exactly. While Fisher describes the problem well, he failed to point to the path beyond depressive hedonia. While I understood what was wrong, I didn't know how to fix it; I had no idea what that 'mysterious, missing enjoyment' was.
Eventually, that friction and my politics led me to get involved with an org in my area and become a participant in the class struggle in action as well as in post. In struggling together toward a better future and feeling that hole fill as we did it, I realized that what was missing was empowerment, agency, and community. While I stopped reading as much theory as I did during the peak of my internet/hyperstimulation period (it wasn't totally wasted!), what I did read I was/am able to apply to our work and discuss it with my comrades. What a fucking rush!
Gradually, I stopped spending as much time on the internet as the compulsion withered because that lack was starting to fill. Fisher was correct to point out that our urge to hyperstimulation is how capitalism conditions us to respond to alienation, disempowerment, and purposelessness. You can't solve a problem by treating its symptoms as I was trying to do when I got rid of my smart phone, you have to go to the source. For any anticapitalists and revolutionaries of good faith, the best thing we can do for our mental health is to engage in the struggle however we are able and develop our sense of community and belonging.
For some, the terrain for that may even be online. For me, it wasn't and I believe that since the internet was designed by capitalists to addict and erode community it is hard to do so, but it is possible. "Dare to struggle dare to win" not just for our class, the oppressed, our loved ones and the planet, but also for own sanity and well-being.
I hope that this has served as a call to critical reflection on our online habits, and galvanizes a few people to take the plunge and start organizing! I appreciate any suggestions or critiques you may give, I am not a very skilled writer.
Afternote: Working on the Habit-Side while Working on the Root Of course things are not perfect. My solution now to internet usage, like with quitting dairy, was with a categorical ban. One that is much easier to follow given I am working on the underlying problem, but it is still necessary to work on the level of habit. Interestingly, I have found myself still sometimes wasting time and checking out looking at the relatively harmless internet things I have left: signal, e-mail, a few other messaging apps for other life activities. I am trying to figure out if this is just a healthy amount of smooth-brain time since my energy is finite, or whether I need to be more aware. A few times I have been tempted to come back here and this is the result of the first time I have really buckled. A general trend seems to be that I spend more time in front of a screen during downturns in the struggle or when I start to despair again. That said, those moments are less crushing and don't last as long when I have real work to ground me and comrades to share in it. in the end, thankfully the doomscrolling days are over!