I rarely have Thoughts about Things but this morning something occurred to me. Seems like a big part of the masculinity crisis is about toxic adolescent thought patterns (i.e. evil teenage boy brain or ETBB for short) persisting into adulthood in a way they couldn't have before the internet. 1/ - ThreadSky

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davidsh.bsky.social • 5 days ago

I rarely have Thoughts about Things but this morning something occurred to me. Seems like a big part of the masculinity crisis is about toxic adolescent thought patterns (i.e. evil teenage boy brain or ETBB for short) persisting into adulthood in a way they couldn't have before the internet. 1/

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davidsh.bsky.social•5 days ago

In olden pre-internet times ETBB would generally wither away via social reinforcement of norms in the late teens and early twenties when boys stop spending all their time around each other and start doing adult stuff with other adults who they've never met and have to get along with. 2/

davidsh.bsky.social•5 days ago

With the internet there are now plenty of places were ETBB can thrive and fester and become sticky so that it takes longer to wither as boys become men. Or maybe it never goes away. And then some of these adult men with hardened evil teenage brains become influential role models. 3/

davidsh.bsky.social•5 days ago

And these role models set new norms, so the olden-days social cues that used to help ETBB wither away became less effective, and boys with bad brains are never effectively separated from each other because the social spaces where ETBB can thrive are in everyone's pockets. 4/

davidsh.bsky.social•5 days ago

And now actual teenage boys (and younger) are exposed to a radioactive firehose of the thoughts of sad adult men with teenage brains, exaggerated for engagement of course, and they think it's cool because they've got the same kinds of brains, but man it really seems to be doing a number on them.

davidsh.bsky.social•5 days ago

Thank you for coming to my ted talk.

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