How far does personal responsibility go? what if there are 100 psychologists working to undermine your self control? do you stand a chance?
I've had, at different points in my life, YouTube, Snapchat, Instagram, Reddit, and Facebook installed on my phone. At no point did I ever feel like I was somehow compelled to use any those apps.
Android has operating-system-level controls on notifications. If you don't want to get Facebook notifications, and you turn them off, it is impossible for the application to notify you.
I have more of a problem checking Hacker News than I ever had with any of the above platforms, and there's no HN app, no notifications, no psychologists trying to control me. This clearly shows that Facebook-checking is purely a discipline problem.
Now, this obviously wouldn't be the case if, for instance, some big corporation was injecting some kind of addictive chemical into your food, and there was no way to limit your exposure to this chemical because, well, you have to eat. In that case, it's pretty clear that that company is doing something illegal and unethical and regulatory action should absolutely be taken.
But this isn't that. You can't survive without food. Facebook is entirely optional. You don't want to be addicted? Don't use Facebook. All of your relatives are on Facebook? Don't use Facebook; give them a call or text, invite them over, video call, share a meal, play a video game together.
Facebook. Is. Optional. If you get "addicted" to it, it's solely because you chose to repeatedly expose yourself to it without taking the proper precautions.
Ah, but what is full control? If I miss out on events and face passive ostracization... do I really have full control? We do not live in vacuums and self-control isn't solely concerned with the self, there are myriads of external factors that can have significant impacts.
I have the control to not give my 13 year old a cell phone, but I do not have control over the social consequences that creates for them. Therefore... could I claim to have full control over that situation? no, just a narrow aspect.
> This clearly shows that Facebook-checking is purely a discipline problem.
Maybe... but we know that Facebook attempts to undermine self-discipline. The average user spends an hour a day on Facebook. Are they all conscious of how much time they're wasting? are they conscious of the ways that Facebook attempts to get them to waste more time? are they aware of what it's doing to them psychologically? can one be expected to exercise control when the stakes have been intentionally obscured?
> But this isn't that. You can't survive without food. Facebook is entirely optional. You don't want to be addicted? Don't use Facebook.
Is this not true of drugs as well? I don't need caffeine to survive, but if I stop tomorrow I'm going to have some serious headaches.
I don't need Facebook to survive, but not having it may harm me socially, and I might even feel a psychological absence. Do I have full control at that point?
Sorry if this is too abstract or philosophical... but I don't think it's a binary situation at all. Reality is much more complicated. It's hard to say that anyone living in society has full control over anything, especially when they're deceived.
I'm sure many obese people would prefer not to die young, yet they do. Should I only blame them for the lack of self-control? Is it not fair game to scrutinize the powerful societal mechanisms that undermine their self-control?
I'm willing to bet it's not immediately obvious how scrolling through social media makes a person feel, unless they have experience with it (something psychologists teach to help their patients deal with situations.)
So, if it's something that can be taught, does it affect how responsible someone is with their social media usage?
Is their environment equipt to impart such information? Are they equipt to learn? Do they just enjoy it anyway?
Right, and the scary thing from my perspective is that a company like Facebook has actually experimented with manipulating emotion on real users. People don't understand to what extent they're being manipulated, but the manipulators often harvest this data for their own purposes.
People with little to no self-control stand no chance, but there are many people I’m sure that would survive psychologists, especially knowing that they work in a field where almost nothing is reproducible :)
Plus, if it's "only" 20% of people we lose to these addictions, that's still a major tragedy.
The dig at psychologists was funny, but this is a super serious topic, unfortunately.