> Constant need for something in your ear is a very new phenomena and for some reason a lot of people have gotten in the habit of isolating themselves from the world around them and stopped being in presence of the reality. Sad.

Convenient narrative, but not at all a new phenomenon. I had friends like this in the 90's. And I'm not seeing more people like this than in those days.

I know we're kind of used to rapid societal change at this point, but I'd still consider the 90s or even the 80s recent enough that I could call things that arose in those times as "new phenomena"... from a broader societal standpoint at least.

Not even just the 90s. This is self-stimming behaviour. People have been doing this for as long as there’ve been entertainment. This is just normal human behaviour. People using technology to aid them in this is just the modern day version of it. It’s normal. And it’s frankly quite ridiculous to see adults thinking this is ye old “people are soooooo into tech nowadays, them junkies!!!111!!!11!1!”. C’mon now.