Calling a top on gawking

We don't use TikTok and Instagram for a reason, let's keep the circus sequestered there

Scene from the movie Idiocracy, incredible flick and definitely worth a re-watch here

There’s something unsettling about the state of culture today, a creeping feeling that our collective IQ is slipping. And, I don’t think it’s the fault of ‘dumb people.’ It’s the fault of all of us, especially those who consider themselves smart, the self-appointed curators of what is ‘intelligent’ or ‘worthy.’ It’s the educated elite that’s both silently suffering from and directly complicit in the dumbing down of culture.

A big part of the problem is gawking. Gawking is one of those human instincts that feels innocent on the surface but is weaponized online. You see something dumb — a viral video of a public meltdown, a celebrity saying something patently absurd, someone posting a silly ‘day in life of video’ and (some of) your first instincts is to share it with your network. You feel a surge of superiority, a kind of comfort in knowing, hey, at least I’m not that guy. But in doing so, you’re not merely observing the stupidity. You’re perpetuating it. I just don’t think enough folk have sufficient self-awareness on this one, even otherwise smart people. They think they’re being funny, and some of them are, but most just can’t pull it off. Anyway, a good percentage of us are online specifically because we don’t like reality TV vibes. Slowly but surely, that’s leaked into everything. Nice internet we once had.

There’s this misguided belief that by gawking at parts of the spectacle, you are somehow above the subject of your derision. But in reality, by amplifying the absurdity, even laughing at it, you become part of the circus. You are complicit. Every click, every share, every moment of attention feeds the algorithmic beast that thrives on the lowest common denominator. What gets rewarded? Not the thoughtful or nuanced, but the shocking, the outrageous, the dumb. This becomes just another thing keeping us trapped in a creative dark age. I also think being part of this is low status behavior, and mentally when I see people sharing certain things, I notice my opinion of them falls.

There’s a quote by David Foster Wallace that comes to mind:

"Postmodern irony and cynicism's become an end in itself, a measure of hip sophistication and literary savvy. Few artists dare to try to talk about ways of working toward redeeming what's wrong, because they'll look sentimental and naive to all the weary ironists. Irony's gone from liberating to enslaving. There's some great essay somewhere that has a line about irony being the song of the prisoner who's come to love his cage.

I share this quote as I believe (consciously) sharing dumb things for clicks is a cynical act, and by doing so many are trapped in the type of prison described here.

The early internet was somewhat immunized against this behavior, as there was a slight barrier to entry. You had to have some level of technical competence to even be there, and that created an online ecosystem that in many ways self-selected for a base level of intelligence and aesthetic. It wasn’t perfect, but at least most people online had something different or at least creative to say. The audience was limited, and the content reflected that. In many ways, it was a nerdy utopia.

Now, everyone is online. The barriers are gone. And with the advent of algorithms, the content that gets the most engagement is often the least thoughtful. The easiest way to get attention while feeling superior, to scratch that itch of self-satisfaction, is to gawk at the stupidity of others. "Wow, look at this thing, how could anyone believe that?" And so, we give it our attention. And attention is power. Attention gives life.

It’s easy to say something like: yeah, just follow smarter people and curate your feed, ignore the nonsense. And, yes, this is technically possible and I’d encourage you to do it. You can opt out, you can block and mute, you can create a digital space that mostly reflects a higher level of discourse. But the reality is that algorithms are not designed for that. They’re designed to push things that get the most clicks, the most outrage, the most attention. And often, that content is precisely the posts we roll our eyes at.

Traditional media has caught onto this as well (I wrote on the subprime attention bubble previously). What used to be an industry focused on informing the public has now become an endless race to the bottom, optimizing for the broadest, most easily consumable stories. They are serving us a media diet full of sugar and industrial ingredients devoid of nutrition. They’ve learned that the easiest way to generate engagement is not through rigorous reporting or thoughtful debate, but by highlighting the absurdities that capture attention. This feeds back into social streams, and the cycle continues.

So, what’s the answer? It’s not easy, but one step is to simply stop gawking. To resist the urge to share TikTok and Instagram videos and feel superior in your derision. I’m sure I’m guilty here too, although share these types of things very sparingly, and as social commentary or about a trend (because sometimes the absurd is part of my job, but it isn’t for most). Still, it’s the minority of what I post. For many it’s the majority. Likely because they have nothing original to say, or have been conditioned by algos to be rewarded for gawking. I’m just fairly bored with everything that happens in this vein. Humanity at its dumbest. More people need to stop and ask what we’re doing here.