The Digital POW Camp

Special thanks to rojie for today’s daily prompt. Incidentally, she has an entire list of monthly props that go up every month. You can check out her prompts for August here.

Are we more informed than ever or more overwhelmed? Or both?

I actually have conversations with people a lot on this topic. Yesterday I wrote a little thing about restoring one’s faith in humanity, but that’s only part of the story.

think a big reason why we think the world is so much harder and more cynical today is because of the sheer volume of information we get exposed to. We don’t hear a lot of “good news” in our media, so we assume that the world is a more dangerous, unforgiving place than it was for previous generations. That’s the psychological toll we pay for being exposed to so much information today.

I had heard once—probably in school—about the psychological conditioning used during the Korean War. Both Chinese and North Korean forces implemented intensive political re-education and isolation programs for prisoners of war, a process the media and researchers at the time labeled “brainwashing.” They systematically cut POWs off from any outside reality, fed them manufactured narratives about total defeat, and convinced them that America had been destroyed and the war was already lost. The goal was to break their morale and drive them into a state of learned helplessness so profound that they stopped resisting entirely.

That’s a pretty messed-up set of circumstances. But I bring this up because I feel like that’s what our modern-day media has done to us. Most people realize there is still good in the world, and many recognize it isn’t necessarily as bad as what we see on the news every night. But when we are constantly deluged with bad news, negative stories, violence, homicide, and death, even the wisest, most media-savvy of us start to believe the world is a really shitty place.

And it was bad enough before the internet and social media. Thanks to that one-two punch, we are now constantly deluged with information. And it’s not just bad news we’re getting too much of; the internet is still the Wild West. Yes, we have access to more information than ever before, but there is also so much inaccurate information, outright lies, and propaganda out there that people fall for it. Some people still live by the belief that “TV is my friend, the radio is my friend, the internet is my best friend.”

While I can make this observation, I have to admit I don’t really have any answers for how to avoid it. I used to see bumper stickers back in the day that said “Kill your television.” But let’s face it—killing your television might be a viable solution, yet the internet and our smartphones are just about essential tools to navigate the 21st-century world. For me, my iPhone isn’t just a phone; it’s my GPS, my primary internet connection, and where I write my blog. It really has become my modern-day tricorder.

And of course, as a fifty-something-year-old man, I catch myself complaining that younger generations are too connected to their devices. I still hate walking into a restaurant and seeing a family or a group of friends sitting together with none of them actually socializing because they’re all staring at screens.

The only real answer I have—and I know I don’t exercise it nearly enough myself—is to just put the phone down every now and then. Sometimes, even when I’m home, I’ll make a conscious effort to walk away from it. If I’m going downstairs to switch over the laundry, I’ll leave the phone behind in another room. It’s not much, but it’s a little break from the noise and a little break from the temptation to just grab the screen and expose myself to more negativity.

Ultimately, I think it’s up to all of us individually to determine what really works for us, though kids obviously need some parental guidance so they don’t fall entirely down the rabbit hole. I’m not suggesting banning kids from having smartphones—that usually just backfires and makes them view it as a forbidden source of rebellion. But something has to give.

Because at the end of the day, the internet tells us we’re entirely divided, but reality proves otherwise. Take a guy I went to high school with, for instance. We weren’t close back then, but we stay connected on Facebook through our reunion network. Politically, we are miles apart—he leans conservative, and I lean liberal. Sometimes we get into back-and-forth arguments in the comments when I post something politically charged. But more often than not, those exchanges evolve past the partisan tags. We get to a point where we realize there’s middle ground, and that as human beings, we have a lot more in common than either of us—or the media—tries to make us believe. If we sat down and had a couple of beers together, we’d see right through the screen noise.

One has to be incredibly careful, incredibly tech-savvy, and quite frankly, willing to get out in the real world and actually talk to people just to dispel all the misinformation, rumors, and manufactured outrage we’re force-fed every single day.

Rebuilding a life takes grit, consistency, and a lot of ‘Option C’ thinking. Having crossed the 1,000-day milestone, I’m now charting the territory beyond. The mission remains the same: No glitz. Just the work. New to the blog? Start your journey here to see the blueprint and the ‘Tricorder’ perspective behind the rebuild.

Today’s post is inspired by the WordPress Daily Prompt. While I’ve taken the topic in my own direction for the Road beyond 1,000 Days, you can find more responses to today’s prompt HERE.

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