I feel like this is very obvious to most people, but is really... Not something we are "allowed" to admit to, at least officially.
It's a very strange time, in this sort of... "Mental health" space. On the one hand we have literally thousands of Tiktok, Instagram, Snapchat and Tumblr posts by edgy teens claiming to have mental issues, whether they actually do or not, and capitalising on that "brand", while on the other hand... The way we actually treat this shit is fundamentally not working...
Look, I appreciate that brain chemistry plays a role in most mental health issues. So does trauma. So does genetics. But the fact that "we", as a society, choose to pretend like depression and anxiety are purely caused by internal problems, and can be treated almost solely as such? That's frankly fucking insane...
The fact that men, in particular, are treated like it is their... Fault, that they are suffering, even if they are poor, even if they have a shit job, or are lonely, or have no friends that they can rely on, or are dealing with... Personal issues from having seen, or experienced, really bad shit... The fact that we say "just go to therapy" or "just take the pill, bro", or "just smoke some weed, bro. It'll help" - frankly it's fucked.
The sheer lack of support in society, to actually... Help people, and do more than just talk. To actually offer practical solutions, and get people truly connected to their society (men's sheds are great and all, but they fundamentally fail to replace what church, and the local sports team, say, once provided), and defeat that... Isolation, that has become the heart of "modern society". That's where the fundamental problems lie, I think. Let alone, say, if you get laid off, or sacked, or lose your position somehow - there is NO support, for most people, when that happens. None at all.
No wonder people fall through the cracks. No wonder we hear about people like Paul Green (rugby league coach - sacked), Jacinda Barclay and Harley Balic (AFL, womens and men's respectively - left out of their team squads during Covid) killing themselves, let alone "ordinary" people who generally have even less support, and certainly considerably less money to play with...
The whole thing is just... Pretty fucked up, frankly. Leftists constantly whine about Catholicism teaching "the flock" to "externalise blame", but now we have a secular society that teaches everyone to, in essence, BOTH externalise and internalise blame, both at the same time, which is... Probably not any healthier, frankly.
I just wish "we", in Current Era, dealt with these things better than we do.
I assure you, though, I don't really bother "posting", in these places, anymore. As you say, there are better ways to get dopamine hits.
I just use them, as I say, as communication "tools", if shitty ones, because idiots insist that is the way they want to keep in touch. And also because my University mandates that we use both Twitter and Facebook for assignments, unfortunately. But I do try to push people towards more... One on one things, where possible.
And yes, Redditors are retards. Managed to get myself banned from the local subreddit for daring to go against an obviously astroturfed circlejerk (around local development issues, as above), so yeah, I realised that, pretty quick, lol...
lol, what? I'd sue them for privacy violations.
There are various local idiocies like that, but also a global idiocy that disallows you from setting up any community that does respect free speech.
Ha. They know that we can't afford to sue them, and best of luck getting a class action out of a bunch of terminally online Zoomers, unfortunately...
Twitter is for, no joke, "course engagement" (which the Uni uses to increase its own public profile, naturally), and Facebook, for the most part, is for group assignments...
Welcome to university in the new decade (it's been like this since at least 2015), unfortunately...