Fifty Shades Of Rage

 As an occasional consumer of online pornography in my twenties, I still remember the emotional/mental patterns and behavior that accompanied it.

First, the external use of pornography as a dopamine gorge was usually triggered by an inverse internal discontent—ie, you were stressed, bored, lonely, etc. That feeling is undesirable, so you are looking to counteract it with something else, a few byte-sized portions of virtual alternative.

Next you pull up a chair and sit down with the online menu in front of you and discern what fancies your palate that evening. The anticipation itself injects an excitement into your otherwise lackluster existence in that moment. Part of the excitement comes from the fact that you’re engaging in something you know is not very good for you. Hunger is the sweetest sauce, as they say. It’s titillating, and the fact that it’s wrong is just extra icing on the creme puff.

There’s an unspoken understanding as well between you, the consumer, and the unfaced supplier: you are looking for the eternal, while settling for the temporal. That’s okay—it’s written into the virtual contract. Each time you think to yourself, “maybe I’ll get more than I bargained for this time.” But each time you return to your own room, your own bed, your own self. You left for a bit…but you’re still here. 

And so you return tomorrow, or next week, to the buffet once more (just once more!), hungry again, excited again, hopeful again, disappointed again…hungry again. And so on and so forth.

So, the funny thing is that having broken out of this cycle by God’s grace twelve years ago and never having returned, I see there are a bunch of cousins of sexual pornography still hanging around. They are a bit more dressed up, with a higher perceived degree of righteous moral standing, a little younger. But they still behave in the same manner—they still peddle in dopamine hits, still capitalize on our inner strife and malcontent, still promise things without delivering, still leave us feeling a little bit…hungry.

Louis CK had this brilliant diatribe on Conan I saw a few years ago that I think just captures the essence of what I’m talking about here:

“I think these things are toxic, especially for kids...they don't look at people when they talk to them and they don't build empathy. You know, kids are mean, and it's 'cause they're trying it out. They look at a kid and they go, 'you're fat,' and then they see the kid's face scrunch up and they go, 'oh, that doesn't feel good to make a person do that.' But they got to start with doing the mean thing. But when they write 'you're fat,' then they just go, 'mmm, that was fun, I like that.'

You need to build an ability to just be yourself and not be doing something. That's what the phones are taking away, is the ability to just sit there. That's being a person. Because underneath everything in your life there is that thing, that empty—forever empty. That knowledge that it's all for nothing and that you're alone. It's down there.

And sometimes when things clear away, you're not watching anything, you're in your car, and you start going, 'oh no, here it comes. That I'm alone.' It's starts to visit on you. Just this sadness. Life is tremendously sad, just by being in it...

That's why we text and drive. I look around, pretty much 100 percent of the people driving are texting. And they're killing, everybody's murdering each other with their cars. But people are willing to risk taking a life and ruining their own because they don't want to be alone for a second because it's so hard.

And I go, 'oh, I'm getting sad, gotta get the phone and write "hi" to like 50 people'...then I said, 'you know what, don't. Just be sad. Just let the sadness, stand in the way of it, and let it hit you like a truck.'

And I let it come, and I just started to feel 'oh my God,'and I pulled over and I just cried like a bitch. I cried so much. And it was beautiful. Sadness is poetic. You're lucky to live sad moments.

And then I had happy feelings. Because when you let yourself feel sad, your body has antibodies, it has happiness that comes rushing in to meet the sadness. So I was grateful to feel sad, and then I met it with true, profound happiness. It was such a trip.

The thing is, because we don't want that first bit of sad, we push it away with a little phone or a jack-off or the food. You never feel completely sad or completely happy, you just feel kinda satisfied with your product, and then you die. So that's why I don't want to get a phone for my kids.”

I used to see this in myself while on social media, and in some of my online friends as well—this unsettled need to stoke fires, to fling words, to get reactions, to indict others, to stir the pot. As everyone knows, negative/tragic/scandalous posts gets more hits, likes, comments, etc than the good-Samaritan type tales. And while liberals seemed to have their share of it, I really think it’s those on the right that are hooked on the rage sauce, the righteous indignation….the outrage porn.

And there’s no shortage of things to get outraged about in the Church and the world. But like sexual pornography, attention-seeking outrage porn numbs you after a while. You may not even realize it, until, like habitual users of porn find out, you suddenly have ED at 28 years old. With outrage porn, you just become flaccid to real tragedies, real injustices in the world. Because you’ve been soaking your dopamine receptors for so long in it, it’s harder to get your ire up due to overuse. We weren’t meant to take in all the injustices and tragedies across the globe in online sittings day after day, just like we weren’t meant to see thousands of pictures of naked bodies in our lifetime. 

Outrage porn can be addicting, especially for people to reach beyond the walls of their homes. It’s kind of like a warm compress—you get a little bored with the tasks in front of you, the people in front of you, the sad in front of you, so you “push it away with a little bit of phone, a little (proverbial) jack-off, a little food.” Essentially, a little distraction from what’s in front of you. And because it’s righteous and kosher and sanctioned, even though you know you have that kind of guilty pleasure receptor going off in the midst of shit-posting, you do it anyway. The way you tell yourself this is the last time looking at porn online, but you know you’ll be right back to it next Friday night. 

At least with sexual pornography, it’s clear it’s wrong and there’s no excuse for it. With outrage posting, everybody’s feeding it, and everyone is seemingly righteous, so it doesn’t really seem like it’s harmful or disquieting to the soul. It promises to accomplish something, resolve something, bring justice. And sometimes, when it’s done appropriately and responsibly, it can and does. 

Edit: I just came across the clip of Liv Boeree speaking on Lex Fridman ("Social Media Is Dangerous", 25 Aug 2022), a few days after I wrote this post and she says it brilliantly, so it's not just me noticing this it seems. Minute 16:00-18:00:

"All everyone is trying to do within the system is to maximize what's getting them the most attention because they're just trying to make money in order to keep their thing going. And it's not just about attention on the internet, it's about engagement (comment, retweet, etc). And of all the seven main emotions, the emotion that happens to be the most useful for the internet is anger. Because anger is such an active emotion...if someone is disgusted or fearful, they're less likely to engage. But if they're enraged by something, it taps into that tribalism mentality. The attention economy [to feed this Moloch] is rage." 

Outrage never sleeps, is never sated, always needs willing participants. But it’s also subtle. If you’re getting off on the interaction, feeding it, dinging receptors in your brain every time you see a red “1” reaction, feeling like you should stop but the outrage feels good and righteous…maybe it’s time to pause and take stock of what you’re doing and why. 

When you consider leaving porn, like St Augustine’s sirens trying to keep him from the shores of Continence, you think you cannot possibly live without it. Then you leave it, and you’re still alive. I think people addicted to outrage porn can trust they can and will live (and thrive) without engaging in it anymore. And maybe find that elusive peace in the process.