FAREWELL to INSTAGRAM

 

Need to take a small break from catching up on the Presidential notes (those rogues can wait), in order to expound a bit on the need to take a large, and hopefully final, break from a social media tool: Instagram.

This has been on my to-do list for quite some time, this departure from that platform. My reasons for leaving the thing are two-fold.

One, I have started to invest way too much time on it, and I have placed way too much importance on the number of 'likes' any particular post gets or doesn't get. I can see how harmful the thing is to adolescents and their feelings of self-esteem. I mean, if a 67-year-old codger-guy like yours truly can get even mildly bent out of shape for only generating four or so 'likes,' how does a 14-year-old girl, already overly preoccupied with comparing herself to others, feel when she senses hyper-criticism for being ignored with no 'likes' or 'shares?'

The harm done to the country's young people leads into the second reason to quit the platform. Mark Zuckerberg and his 'Metaverse' have far too much influence in the world, and I don't see any sense of accountability on his part for the negative ramifications of Facebook's (and Instagram's) shadier side.

As Instagram is part of the Meta family, I choose not to be a part of it. Please don't tell me Blogger has anything to do with that evil empire. Yeah, yeah, I know; Google's no innocent puppy, either.

Peace to all, and how about a nice game of Wordle?

Back to finishing up those brief words on the presidents. I have another 15 to go, I believe, and then I will concentrate on other things.