It goes without saying that simply going outside your house won't fix all the world's problems. What it will do is greatly damage many of these global projects, and on personal level will build communities and social skills that the internet killed. Doom scrolling replaced with pleasant conversation. I was considered a shut in by the standards of the 90s. More interested in playing Mario Kart and Goldeneye than football and bike riding, but I was a social butterfly compared to younger generations (and even what my own generation has become).
I don't feel like splitting hairs either, and I do agree with Nietzsche that you shouldn't coddle the "weak". Problem is that most people forget that the world of yesterday and its problems never really go away; they simply change, or "rhyme". You are right that social media has really taken its toll on some people, but don't forget that back in the day, such people would be narcissistic snakes and ladder climbing sociopaths or still shambling social rejects (and I mean like, really terrible people, not high school clique shit) actively also doing stuff outside; they still exist, as evidence of this thread enough, but the addition of those who could be would prove that there are just more of them in the world than the "smarter" ones. If it wasn't video games, it would be other shit, like politics or "mainstream media" like modeling and acting or whatever, and in a more pronounced way.
Then there's the fact that open oppression and misery doesn't equally breed more people willing to do better; it only breeds more misery and misdirected rebellion before anything gets done about it. Everyone thinks George Floyd was bad, his shit only lasted a week. The LA Riots lasted for
months. And then there's the Great Recession. Honestly, if it wasn't for the internet, I think there would be more radicalization and active crime. We may have distilled mental diarrhea posted online, but would you be willing to deal with that or active criminals who can't be reasoned with fuming with irrational rage?
I do agree that basic social skills are important to worry about losing out on. But blaming this simply on the tiktoks and social media to me feels about as overblown as simply blaming the telephone and MTV: both of the latter definitely had vapid shit related to it, but if they didn't exist, those kinds of kids would still find other ways and bad influences. Today is "live streaming e-celeb fame" and the want to be a "professional youtuber"; yesterday was the entire Los Angeles metropolitan area booming off of coming of age coeds who aspired to be actors, musicians, models, or shysters, with just as many people running off of the same dunning-kruger highs of aspiration. That's just one of the ingrained sins of the Information age, it seems, the allure of constant attention and the want of the world being known of your existence.
I don't have the answers for everything, I can't fix this problem that we call Sweet Baby and DEI and shit with a simple one sweep solution. All I know is that while the present sucks, it could be worse.
