They act out this status-dance of pretending to loathe every second of life in the toxic digital hellscape that, in the talk tracks and visibility it gives them is actually very beneficial for their careers.
They couldn’t actually admit it’s been good for them though, as that would mean admitting profiting from the algorithmic, privacy problem-invested landscape that they barely understand but have made their careers criticizing.
But of course, everyone’s at it! So the only way to get ahead is more paranoia, more angst, more toxicity. Once you’re bought in, you can’t go back to tacking to the middle. So we get an arms race of performative angst and hyperbolic statements.
Before you know it, you’re claiming that Slack notifications give you PTSD symptoms: https://twitter.com/pfpicardi/status/1220738739514814467?s=2...
The problem is that that is antithetical to the real work of journalism - which should be about seeking truth without fear or favour.