[vitaflo]

>Now it's invading your real life, your real-world friendships, your workplace, even your family.

I fully expect in the future for there to be a segment of the population that chooses to "drop out" of the always-connected digital social life for these reasons. And I don't just mean giving up Facebook, but going back to analog social circles only, as well as ignoring those who are still connected (and hooked) digitally.

I like to compare it to smoking. Imagine everyone got addicted to smoking, but you eventually wanted to quit because you realize how bad and addicting it is. Even if you quit though you'd still be hanging out with other smokers mostly, and breathing in that 2nd hand smoke. The only true way out would be to both quit and only hang out with non-smokers.

This won't be everyone of course. Like smoking, toxicity and polarization are too addictive, but I can see there becoming a counterculture that simply rejects all of it altogether.

[WingTipTheSpick]

I have already started doing this. I use my phone for calling people, listening to music, reading books, and directions when I'm lost. I have given up Facebook. Twitter. Gmail. Google. And a bunch more besides. I hadn't realized how much the Google/Gmail ecosystem was affecting me, how it fed me news based on links and news based on what I'd clicked, and how that affected me. Since I have given these things, particularly the Google filter bubble, up, I am calmer and happier. That's not to say that I am perfect, or perfectly calm, or anything like that. But I am significantly better than I was a year ago.

[ryandrake]

Don't wait for the future. You can have this life today. Whenever I read about how this Twitter stream is toxic, and that group is using Facebook to harass some person, about Gamergate and 4chan and The_Donald--how glad I am that I don't participate in any of these sites, and therefore have opted out of all of this drama!

This stuff is almost 100% online. It's not invading your real life unless you invite it in. Switch the computer off and disengage, and suddenly you're immune. Someone right now might be badmouthing me on Facebook or Twitter, and I don't care. It doesn't matter because I'm not on these sites.

[anigbrowl]

Counterpoint: people who shoot up churches and the like.

[jessaustin]

Those people are vanishingly rare. You're vastly more likely to die in a traffic collision than to be shot because somebody doesn't like your church.

[anigbrowl]

They're a lot less rare than they used to be. Likewise, few people die in wars until they're suddenly declared.

[jessaustin]

We haven't "declared" wars in my parents' lifetimes, yet somehow millions have died at our hands. "Apocalyptic" violence in USA is partly an echo of our crimes overseas, but mostly an obvious result of the constant fear-mongering and dehumanization our media performs in order to justify those crimes.