I do this alot. I like making them lose money and I like free things.

Why Do Things Feel So Off Online?

You’ve probably noticed:

• Outrage-heavy posts dominate your feed
• Thoughtful, nuanced content barely gets seen
• Suspicious accounts repeat the same phrases across threads

That’s not chaos. It’s design.
And it’s increasingly optimized for influence—not information.

How It Works

Social platforms like X (Twitter) prioritize:

• Emotion over accuracy
• Engagement over transparency
• Repetition over source credibility

When Influence Becomes Infrastructure

This is how ideas—sometimes extreme or unconstitutional—go from joke, to debate, to policy proposal.

1. Trial Balloon

A wild idea is floated—framed as a joke, “hypothetical,” or misquote.
Example: “A third presidential term, maybe?”

• If it flops, there’s deniability
• If it takes off, it earns media coverage
• It functions like a live poll for public reaction

2. Amplification via Platform Mogul

A powerful figure (like Elon Musk) amplifies the message.

• Algorithm tweaks surface aligned content
• “Free speech” claims justify selective visibility
• Fringe ideas start trending

3. Testing the Public Response

The platforms and campaigns track your reactions.

• What trends? What enrages? What sticks?
• The algorithm does the testing automatically
• Media coverage becomes part of the experiment

If people don’t push back—push further.

4. Desensitization (Overton Shift)

The more often you see something, the less extreme it feels.

• Repeated exposure through memes, bait headlines, and quote tweets
• “Joke or serious?” framing blurs resistance
• Gradual normalization kicks in

5. Political or Social Maneuvering

Once the outrage fades, proposals quietly begin.

• A hearing here, a bill there—sometimes symbolic, sometimes not
• Supporters claim it’s “grassroots” demand
• Opposition is framed as censorship or elitism

What This Looks Like Right Now

• High-profile politicians get boosted without filters
• Their messaging trends more easily
• Government-aligned posts are vague but emotionally charged
• Emotional narratives outperform fact-based content in reach and reactions

Why This Matters

This isn’t about left vs. right.
This is about engineering public perception using bots, algorithms, and emotional manipulation.

If you’re confused about what’s real anymore—
That’s not a bug. It’s the feature.

What to Watch For

• Identical comments across unrelated threads
• Viral content with no clear source
• Threads filled with emotionally charged replies
• New accounts hyper-focused on one issue
• Outrage spikes that vanish within 48 hours

This Isn’t Panic. This Is Literacy.

You’re not imagining it.
You’re not “doomscrolling.”
You’re just finally seeing the game.

Ask yourself: Why am I seeing this?
Then ask: Who benefits if I believe it without question?

You don’t need to argue with it. Just recognize it. Then help someone else recognize it too.

Disclaimer

This post is for educational and media literacy purposes only.
It does not make legal claims or accusations.
The patterns described here are based on publicly observed platform behavior and reporting from 2021 to 2025.

Sources & Further Reading

• Stanford Internet Observatory – Generative Language Models and Automated Influence Operations (2021)
• Washington Post – Twitter admits bias in algorithm for rightwing politicians and news outlets (2021)
• Clemson University – Infektion’s Evolution: Narrative Laundering and Digital Platforms (2023)
• Platformer – Elon Musk boosts his own tweets with algorithm tweak (2023)
• MIT Tech Review – X disables visibility filters on trending posts (2024)
• Fox News – Trump says DOGE found something 'horrible', keeps Musk on board (2025)

**Updated formatting**

Where does one find stuff people are throwing away? For example in Stockholm apartment complexes have recycling rooms. You can take anything that has been put in there. In 12 years, I never had to buy any household plastic. In the US cities I lived , people would leave stuff on the streets for trash pick up. There was lots of competition, so one had to know the trash pickup schedule to get stuff. Asking this question because I just moved to Belgium with only my checked bags. Don't want to consume a lot of new shit.

I can't go completely Amazon-free, because my job requires frequently purchasing books and materials that are only available on Amazon (either because that publication only sells through Amazon, or because a certain material isn't sold in the more rural part of the US I live).

So to slow down my shopping, I switched my Amazon account to business only.

I am horrified how often I think of using Amazon. I was just thinking of buying rain boots on their because my back yard keeps flooding. What's extra horrifying is that the idea isn't because I couldn't buy elsewhere (though admittedly the only reasonable "elsewhere" for me is Walmart, which isn't much better), but because I don't want to get out of the house during flash flooding. But for some reason I'm okay making an overworked employee unsafe???

Really eye opening and awful how many times I chose price and convenience over ethics. Some publications I could buy direct from publisher, but used Amazon anyway for fast shipping. And those are easy swaps to make, since it's both online shopping!

This is what killed my belief in true capitalism. I used to believe capitalism was a self-regulating system, because companies would be forced to change when consumers wouldn't buy from them due to bad practices. But I'm increasingly aware just how much we're willing to put lives on the line for convenience when we don't have to personally deal with the result of that. Terrible to think about.

https://www.wsj.com/personal-finance/americans-cheap-goods-consumption-storage-77890798?st=pxtxQ8&reflink=article_copyURL_share

“Americans in 2024 bought 5.7 times as much flatware and dishes and 3.5 times the furniture compared with 1994, according to Commerce Department data. They purchased 2.5 times the clothing and footwear”

"Removing these advanced manipulation tools would force everyone—politicians included—to snap back into reality."

I need food, gas and California distilled bourbon. I shop from farmers markets, local non-MAGA stores, Costco and independent gas stations. I stopped buying from Amazon and Target and products from tariffed countries because it only adds to the mango doofus coffers. #resist #fuckelon #fuckbezos #fucktrump

Aussie here.

With the craziness of Trump's economy management it really finally hit me somewhere harder than my pocket: my peace of mind.

I went through all subscriptions I had and trimmed it down: Netflix, Apple music, LinkedIn (for jobs), Amazon prime.

I did keep YouTube as my wife pays for it as a family and she won't stop paying so that's it.

The hardest one, and also last was doordash which I used mostly for McDonald's.

The prices on doordash are outrageous. 18 dollars for a double big Mac with badly mixed coke and wet fries as usual made me very upset though I hadn't cancelled until today.

the overnight price hike of the bundle for two which had two price hikes in the last 6 months, from around 30 dollars to 32 and this week from 32 to 36 dollars was the final nail in the coffin.

I'm still in the process of replacing Coca cola to LA cola / aldi cola but detaching yourself from products you consume all your life is a process somewhat similar to addiction, in special with cola drinks.

My peace of mind is directly linked to how much of an hypocrite I am and I truly can't keep funneling my paycheck to companies with values that actually hurt me directly with outrageous practices and prices. It makes no sense.

I won't be able to enjoy any of these services / food while my brain hammers me with guilt for financing this entire circus.

I'm better off without them.

Sorry for the rant.

I’ve noticed how easy it is to rely on digital tools for everything organizing, thinking, even decision making. But behind the screens, there’s a huge system of servers, energy use, and environmental impact. Have we just traded physical clutter for invisible consumption?

Wondering how others here are balancing the benefits of tech with the desire to live more consciously.

⸻

Let me know if you want a different spin on the topic!

Saturdays used to be spent with a trip to Target and lunch at some kind of chain restaurant. Today we opted to pack a picnic lunch and meet some friend at a local lake and it was much more fun!

This is a sub for people who oppose consumption. Is the nature of this opposition to consumption moral, that is to say, is consumption of goods inherently immoral, or is it opposition to the consequences of mass consumption such as pollution, lack of regulation, harm to consumers, and so on.

I think it really matters why people oppose consumption. For all of human history, humans have consumed goods by taking things from nature or animals for their own use. With the rise of industrialized capitalism and mass production, many goods were available to the great masses of people at low prices. Of course this same capitalism also produced terrible inequality, labor violence, environmental destruction, and many other consequences. However, one could argue that we could have a form of capitalism with regulations to protect workers, consumers, and the environment. If you oppose capitalism, what alternative models of economic and/or political systems do you propose? It seems to me that most people like having access to cheap goods, and furthermore, a decentralized system of production would probably be less efficient and more wasteful.

If you are morally opposed to consumption, why? Is it because you are opposed to the scale of production and consumption? Or because it disrupts 'traditional' values or ways of life?