Red Dead Honor Bar

In Red Dead Redemption, there’s an honor bar. One side is good, the other is evil. Save someone and the icon moves right. Kill or rob someone and it moves left. The actions are very black and white, but your character lives somewhere in between.

Life isn’t so clean cut. Good and evil usually aren’t obvious. We, like Arthur Morgan, all live on the gradient. But I’m convinced that most social media algorithms, especially X, are designed to slowly push you toward the darker end of that spectrum. And therefore X is evil.

Now, the smart reader might say: aren’t the algorithms just a reflection of you? And yes, partially.

Ten years ago, the algorithm created the generic Barstool bro hive mind. Haha beer. Saturday are for the boys! The same recycled jokes. Annoying, but harmless. But now I have a ton of friends whose takes are basically, “I’m one doom scroll away from becoming a radicalized [],” or “Dude my X timeline is just the most insane shit ever.”

People are self aware. But if you’re not consciously choosing what you consume, it gets away from you fast. What starts as sending a few memes back and forth quickly escalates into a constant tsunami of outrage, resentment, and hate.

And look, everyone has the right to post, consume and believe whatever they want. But personally, I want to form my own opinions and prejudices. I don’t want them silently molded by the slop of an unrelenting algorithm. I don’t want to be bombarded with content that desensitizes me from seeing other people as people.

Because what’s the most common realization people have after some mind melting psychedelic experience? That love is the most important thing.

No, I don’t love everyone. Yes, I have spicy personal takes. But I want to at least strive toward the ideal of love. I don’t want an algorithm slowly poisoning my heart.

That’s why I deleted X a few months ago. It was genuinely corrupting my soul.

I’m a little less informed now and miss a few funny jokes, but honestly I think the tradeoff was worth it :)