I get the TikTok addiction, but before that it was fb, before that was the tv, before that the newspaper/magazines, before that the books, before that table games etc

I don’t know it seems that regardless of the technology the brain needs dozing off from reality.

I think there is something distinctly unique between dozing off from reality by letting your mind wander or twiddling your thumbs, and scrolling short form video.

> the brain needs dozing off from reality

Sure, and the body needs to be fed, but it still matters what and how much you feed it.

This is just a nonsensically reductive argument.

Reading is obviously healthier than scrolling tiktok.

You read the newspapers, books, watch a movie: eventually there is an end and you have to do something else

Also, books, TV, board games, newspapers didn’t disappear. So it’s compounded in some ways

In my personal experience short form content is easier to get sucked into for hours on end than those other ones and something I’m more likely to regret participating in. (Learning this early I stopped so I’m not the biggest consumer of it and may have an atypical opinion compared to 1-2 billion people actively watching tik tok for hours a day.)

Hmm... this doesn't quite add up. Do we have brain scans showing that critical thinking centers of the brain turn off when people read books or play table games?

Exactly, should the "control regions" being deactivated be something that is activated all the time, or is that associated with burnout, or chronic stress?

They are different categories. Brain rot isn’t an imagined thing and we aren’t confused about where it comes from

"It's not that bad, everything was toxic befor so we can continue as if nothing was bad."

Something feels different with the short form, rapid fire stuff, at least to me

The Reddit tier mental gymnastics on display here to avoid any kind of acknowledgement of the dangers of short form video specifically is impressive.