Digital Apathy
civil war.
I am here to write in a turbulent time — the truth. It’s not my truth. We are living in times, no different from past history, where it’s about who is listening and who wants better for future generations. In your life, which is only given once, you must decide what you will do with it…
As Mary Oliver says, it’s “precious.”
I took this piece I wrote two years ago and re-wrote it:
On my journey, these last five years, I have risen above personal whining about political observations, enticed by a big finger beckoning me inside the eye of the screen storm, swept up, not in righteousness, but in confusing noise, which came across as righteousness. I was in the wrong battle. The people you see screaming, camping out, authorities doing whatever to quell, is all optics. Very small optics in a huge world-wide picture of wars, oppression, starvation and death. It’s serious. We might think we know something., i.e., a political party which is best, or a way of living which is best. “Your truth.”
However, “the truth,” what He says about all that stuff, is worth the deep dive.
So here we are.
Welcome to the Digital Civil War.
The battle is against isolation, which sucks minds down a dark rabbit hole of ideology.
Evil laughs in the face of this. Most fights aren’t ours.
Prayer IS ours.
Kindness IS ours.
L O V E IS OURS.
Digital isolation. An isolated world, thrown to a digital relationship, that rarely speaks back, is unsustainable. It is the undercurrent war… long in the process. A matrix, a mental, often physical deathtrap. I know. I can feel it. Who here has a one-sided relationship with someone via a digital device and nothing else? Perhaps it’s in every avenue of your life. I know. I can feel it. It takes me down and delivers “their apathy, their laziness, rudeness or assumed problems directly into my gut.” I can make a million excuses for someone else’s lack of energy. Then I become the same.
Check Shopify. “Gift delivered” — weeks gone by. Nothing. Silence. Am I supposed to keep this up — even with family?
God on one shoulder: “You should probably move on and just pray sincerely” (hum? good discernment. Jesus walked away from some people)
He withdrew to pray. Remember: Prayer is work. Prayer is Love. It’s counted.
The Devil on the other shoulder: “You’re a bad person if you don’t remember everyone.” “You don’t want to be a bad person do you?” “Guilt.” The community or family you are trying to make is working. You’ll see. It will work someday. They will start to care.
Actually that’s a lie.
And that message is a self-serving one — in disguise. We need (repeat: we need) to feel better about ourselves by trying with people who don’t care. Or serving only takers.
It’s draining by design.
Who is guiding our thinking?
Distraction is by design and evil operates it’s business. Because I believe, inherently, most people want to do the right thing, stay in touch, be there and communicate.
I see you, each and every older person. I see you reaching for the phone to the agonizing recording on the other end. I see you longing to talk to someone. I see you trapped behind “the news.” Afraid. I see you hiding behind your writing, your art, books, your need to tell the world you are here — your four walls of alone and quiet. I see you trying to wheel your trash out to the curb at 83 years old. Nice to meet you Rubin. I’m sorry you have to be invisible because you rented rooms out to three young men that drink and don’t care to hold their end of the bargain. Can I give you our number?
My neighbor Kathleen’s car was found a county away. Abandoned. She had onset dementia. Where is she? How many homeless elders with dementia have ended up this way because of distraction and low priority energy? or they isolated themselves and stayed small as they aged. Dare they bother anyone. No one answers the phone.
I see you good hard working young people trying to feed yourselves and pay rent in a tough economy, unable to afford a comfort animal, let alone kids. I know the domino effect of power and greed that works against you, rather than for you. But you believe them when they say they are there for you. I see you unable to find a relationship that is not solely driven by you. I see the pain and I understand the apathy.
I see the hard work of keeping a family going. But a family requires massive amounts of energy. I know it’s hard — but don’t lose it. Don’t lose your energy for them. Including your extended family. In most cases, this is a blessing and a life force of importance to your children.
I am reaching out to a world of hurting people to say.. if not to keep trying, who then? is for Him on this digital battlefield…
Is our quiet staring getting us anywhere? Or the sudden outbursts, rants and critisisms on the social feeds? and in person (if you’re lucky enough to get an “in-person” visit and confused enough not to know what the hell you did to deserve that dose of instant screen sickness? because where did that come from anyways? I was just talking about comedy?).
We “buy,” purchase digital influence in every isolated corner of our lives.
Who the hell cares about anything or anyone anymore? Certainly there’s a large generation that doesn’t. And I am here for you if you relate to what I’m saying.
I know it’s a bold reach.
Because it’s true. It hurts. “Because grief is only love. It’s got no place to go.” - Stephen J. Wilson — (yeah, more songs.)
We grieve for what is missing. Good and decent characteristics. People, dogs, places, that give us strength, comfort and simplicity without madness. They have our backs. We have theirs.
Genuine Love.
It’s home in our soul.
How I miss the past for it’s ability to cope without a screen in hand 24/7 entertaining and horrifying the world simultaneously — leaving us all crippled and struggling with things humans never struggled with before “in abundance.” Mental problems that were reserved for lower numbers — are now spreading like wildfire. But then, virtual worlds, digital games came first. Nothing is new. Just more. At mach 200 mph.
Social media users falling apart over lack of attention, too much attention, exposure to online bullying, abuse, murder, self-doubt, and the need to stay on the influence earnings wheel. Spinning out of control in a world that I know is so lost — it has to get worse before it gets better.
I mean we have to use it right? The world is making it almost impossible to keep up digitally and impossible to live off-grid without it. Each, a different, but not new, force of isolation.
A force due to the lack of a normal grey area. It/they controls us. Or we try and control it/them. It’s how it works. City/country.
The questions are: Are we healthy users of anything? or are we obsessors in need of a priority adjustment? Are we idolizing? Trained. How do we get out of it? and do we care — about those questions? About the madness you know you are feeling.
Social
anxiety
hiding
behind
soulful
living
yearning to
be seen
together
in flesh
and blood
rising in
endorphins
of well-being
a family
to touch
and hold
in my
passiveness
rise
above
the mud
of civil
disobedience
to what
they say
and do
with
the elephant
in
the
room
of digital
apathy.
Digital Apathy | The New Civil War - 2024He says, “Be still, and know that I am God” - Psalm 46:10
He is in all the details of this digital life and beyond. Create a life worthy of His creation, in whatever way you are able, and keep praying daily. Get out of the matrix. Remember, a smile, a wave, or a hello to someone outside, as you walk, grocery shop, etc., could change the entire course of someone’s day…
I have found this digital disease has affected my own personality. The more I feel ghosted, by genuine ghosters, the more I stare now. It’s as if my apathy needs to be taken out on an innocent person that would totally text me back within a few days (or maybe right away). Do you relate? It’s not good. But then there are times I am overwhelmed with busy life stuff and I just can’t get back to someone that fast. I get tired. Well, at least within a few days. The healthy norm now. So maybe I am healthy?
Don’t live to consciously create regrets.
It’s not civil.
I feel your passion here Deborah.🔥
So many injustices we could lose our shit over. I’m with you. I always liked the Fred Rodgers quote about looking for the helpers. The good people. Whatever evil we are being slowly (or quickly!) marched into, I keep believing that for the most part humans are born good and innately want to be. It’s all about trying to have them see the goodness inside themselves. Coax it out.
A lot of love still out there xx
Much of this out here through all age groups. the young people is what frightens me because they do not understand that your youth is where you make your foundational connections when nothing is at stake. Once the job, marriage, family, mortgage comes that is the endgame.