Article
Comment
Digital
Film & TV
Masculinity
4 min read

How our social media turns us against ourselves

We treat others differently when our eyes and hearts are forced inwards.
An unhappy father sits next to a scared son in a police interview room.
Stephen Graham and Owen Cooper star in Adolescence.
Netflix.

My wife turned to me this week whilst watching the compelling Netflix drama Adolescence and asked if it was based on a true story. That proves the quality of the acting, script, and storyline. But it also demonstrates the drama’s prophetic nature. Conceived two and a half years ago by Stephen Graham and Jack Thorne, the perversion of Jamie’s underdeveloped brain and developing masculinity by social media forces has come to reflect real-life extreme violence by young men. With the sentencings of murderers Axel Radakubana and Nicholas Prosper in recent weeks, Jamie’s actions resonate deeply. Adolescence isn’t based on a specific true story, but that doesn’t prevent it from being true. 

What about the role of social media in these narratives? Radakubana and Prosper were radicalised by violent content they had accessed online. With social media, extreme content does well, particularly on sites with no filters on pornography and violence like Reddit and X. We are beginning to discover that content algorithms are not neutral, instead siloing us into echo chambers that are deliberately forming us into better consumers of content, advertising, and objects. Social media harvests our data and sells it on- meaning it cultivates us as the product. 

Yet these manipulations cover over the deepest issue. Social media depersonalises us, preventing us from making genuine human connection and perverting our view of anybody but us. The German philosopher Martin Buber differentiated between two different ways for humans to exist in the world. One was I-It; in a person treats everyone and everything they come into contact with as an ‘It’- something to be used or taken advantage of. 

The other was I-Thou, in which humans approach every other person as a unique being, with resources to offer the I which ensures that a mutual, open, present connection ensues. For Buber, the ultimate ‘Thou’ was God, with whom humans can have the deepest and most transformative connection. 

Social media ensures we see life in ‘I/It’ mode by removing genuine contact with others and providing curated, fake, existences that can never be open to genuine connection with others. Love and affection become commodified; likes, follows, reactions. Our presentation of ourselves becomes more extreme, more perfect, more beautified, to keep mining the commodities. Our eyes and our hearts are forced inwards, and we lose any sense of encountering a ‘Thou’ on the way. We just keep encountering the I: our own thoughts, needs, desires, self-radicalised by our own insular minds. 

This can be our contribution to the conversation on the culture our young people, and particularly young men, are growing up in. To live I/Thou lives.

The great St Augustine back in the fourth century developed the idea of ‘original sin.’ All humans are prone to destruction: it’s in our DNA. The evidence for such an idea is found in every human experience, as the destructor and the one destructed. Left unchecked without genuine connections with others to challenge and expand our hearts, an I/It life digs deeper and deeper into these destructive impulses until our humanity is twisted into violent obsessions. 

The I/It life focuses completely on self-glorification through any means, something amplified by social media. What if we don’t get enough likes, follows, reactions? What if we cannot achieve self-glory through the more banal mediums of attraction, attention, popularity?  

Both Radakubana and Prosper said they wanted to be notorious, attempting to find the most extreme channel for their violence as possible to ensure they are never forgotten. They will not be the last. Jamie continues to deny his crime but in episode three of Adolescence he states that he could do whatever he wanted to Katie, the young girl he murdered. The same impulses come through; others as objects to take advantage of in achieving self-satisfaction. 

The good intentions for human connection that some of those early social media sites were set up for has been largely lost. But the good intention can remain in our own resolution to live an I/Thou life. Putting down social media and picking up connections with humans in the real world by seeing the other with curiosity and openness will ensure that we are constantly turning our heart outwards, embracing genuine relationships, and finding space in our heart to think of the other before ourselves. These are the relationships that will make us more human. 

Ultimately, Buber was right that the ultimate ‘Thou’ connection we can make is with God. The Christian story is full of God’s desire to seek out relationship with humanity, to allow us to find a connection with God that surpasses our own human experience and transforms us to be people that slowly grow away from our destructive instincts.  

What might Christian faith have to contribute to the conversation on the culture young men are growing up in? To live I/Thou lives that are curious, open, and seeking truest divine and human connection. Such a life might even touch those who have been ravaged by social media and ignored by other I/It lives. It might even inspire them to compassion and curiosity that look beyond the content that turns them inwards, to turn outwards and find a healthier future. 

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Article
Comment
Economics
Politics
Trust
5 min read

Tariffs destroy trust so where do we go next?

Blunt weapons cause a mess in markets and lives.

Paul Valler is an executive coach and mentor. He is a former chair of the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity.

A gold coin with the DOGE dog on it, lies over the face on a $50 bill.
So doge-y.
Kanchanara on Unsplash

‘When America sneezes the rest of the world catches a cold’ quipped economists almost a century ago after the Wall Street crash.  A comment that might equally apply to the more than 10 per cent drop in stock markets caused by President Trump’s sudden raised tariffs on imports to the USA.  The impact of the American economy on the world is inescapable.  It represents almost a quarter of global GDP and the dollar is the leading reserve currency, accounting for around 60 per cent of international foreign exchange reserves.  Size is what enables America to bully the rest of the world. 

For decades the American trade deficit has been an elephant in the room and Trump is to be applauded for recognising it and addressing the problem. Unfortunately, the way he has gone about it has caused another, bigger problem. Changing the direction of the global economy is like turning a tanker, it cannot be done easily or quickly, but Trump’s style is to attack, like hammering at a nail.  Every issue in geopolitics looks like another nail, waiting for him to hammer out a negotiated deal.  Full marks for courage, but not for wisdom. The blunt weapon of trade tariffs is designed to bring wealth and power back towards the USA, but blunt weapons often cause a mess, and sure enough a global mess is what we now have.  A US/China trade war with higher prices that could end up stoking inflation and a government own goal.   

Panic selling of government bonds signalling a loss of confidence following Trump’s dramatic tariff boost is reminiscent of the impact of Liz Truss’ sudden and radical UK tax cuts, which were also driven by an ideology, but ended up as a wrecking ball.  Even some of Trump’s backers have warned of an economic nuclear winter.  In the long run, Trump has done the world a favour by highlighting a structural issue that needed correction, but his economically violent methods of addressing it look increasingly unwise.  If a global depression does happen on the back of all this, then coupled with the rise of autocratic and belligerent leadership, we would face a worrying parallel to what happened in the 1930s when the world eventually slid into war.   

Tariffs are like walls, barriers to cooperation and the epitome of economic selfishness.  Make America Great Again is selfishness writ large - a society pursuing wealth and power without the cohesive framework of values that are so essential to cooperation and community wellbeing.  A psychology of self-centredness that damages relationships at the national level.  This is what I find most concerning about Trump’s approach; not just the economics but the long-term legacy of relational damage that could last well beyond his Presidential term. 

Our fears reveal just how much we trust in wealth above everything else, and how much the fear of scarcity affects our mental health.

Michael Schluter in his book The Relational Lens defines five principles, or measures, of relational health.  They are directness, parity, common purpose, continuity and breadth.  Applying those five measures helps us see why Trump’s tariffs are the polar opposite of relational.  He introduced these escalating penalties remotely and not in face-to-face negotiations.  Exploiting the power of America instead of showing respect for the status and needs of other nations.  Tariffs have no common purpose with other countries, only a selfish agenda.  There is no continuity with previous trading protocols.  And it is all purely financial, with no reference to the broader holistic impact.  All in all, a relational disaster.   

Despite living in the ‘first world’ we remain gripped with fear of loss.  Our fears reveal just how much we trust in wealth above everything else, and how much the fear of scarcity affects our mental health. Markets are not entirely rational; they are driven by algorithms that stem from this psychology of greed and fear.  Emotions and trading swing wildly with a herd instinct that often drives behaviour.  As Rabbi Jonathan Sachs said:  

‘Markets have no moral compass; we have outsourced morality to legislation by the State.’   

But the worry now is that the current US administration shows signs of ignoring morality and even riding roughshod over the courts.  No wonder people feel afraid. 

Where can we find hope in all this turmoil?  Is there a better response than gritted teeth and the mantra: ‘this too shall pass’?  I think so.  There is life beyond the market.  Jesus said: ‘life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.’  We can choose to step back and look at all this with the true perspective that money isn’t everything.  We can cultivate gratitude for what we do have.  We can learn contentment.  Yet I feel for those who have experienced financial loss, and don’t want to minimise the reality of hardship.  In fact, something important and practical all of us who are privileged can and should do is to be vigilant in watching out for those who are poor and disadvantaged.  To look after those with a real need for the basics of life and help them through this tough time when economic disruption could make life even harder.  For those with a faith this is part of working out how our faith makes a positive difference where we are. 

Perhaps the supreme irony of this crisis is President Trump’s insistence that Americans must trust him.  Ironic, because the one thing that his tariff actions seem to have undermined more than anything else is trust.  The trust that is essential to the functioning of both markets and civilisation as a whole.  Face to face discussions must be the way forward now, to rebuild trust and find more nuanced, mutual approaches to solving America’s trade deficit.   

There is one person we can always trust though, and his name is written clearly on the American One Dollar bill. In God we trust. Let’s pray that Trump and his America returns to that imperative and turns back to a more Christ centred philosophy of loving our neighbour as ourselves, reflected in a more bilateral approach to diplomacy and agreement.

Celebrate our 2nd birthday!

Since March 2023, our readers have enjoyed over 1,000 articles. All for free. This is made possible through the generosity of our amazing community of supporters.
If you enjoy Seen & Unseen, would you consider making a gift towards our work?
Do so by joining Behind The Seen. Alongside other benefits, you’ll receive an extra fortnightly email from me sharing my reading and reflections on the ideas that are shaping our times.
Graham Tomlin
Editor-in-Chief