You Don't Need to Have a Take

I agree with the Governor of Utah: social media is increasingly toxic.

One thing seems clear about Charlie Kirk and his assassin: they were both creatures of the internet.

The internet has been bad to me. Yet here I am, talking to you on the internet. I wish I didn’t have to, but I don’t know how else to communicate. I guess I could stand on my roof and shout, but that has limited efficacy. And my neighbors wouldn’t love it.

I could tap out altogether. I’ve hinted at that before, in this space. And I’m guessing I’ll make that decision within the next couple years. I’ve noticed that some of my friends have taken leave of the internet, particularly friends who used to be very active on Facebook — and by “active,” I mean posters of politically charged words. Some of them have just left the space entirely. Sometimes I wonder what they do now with all of their takes. Tell their spouses, I guess.

Other friends of mine keep having online takes. Every week — sometimes every day — they have a hot take on the latest tragedy. I saw one today, a post full of outrage from a pastor of a small church, and I thought: his post has convinced no one of anything. It’s just shouting for the sake of shouting, like the stupid Slap Wars videos that I get served too often by the algorithm. Let’s just slap each other hard in the face until someone falls over.

When I blogged, news traveled slower. I had Google alerts set up so that I’d get notified anytime someone on the internet posted about “Tony Jones” or “Mark Driscoll,” or “emerging church.” Within minutes, I’d be banging out a post. Up it’d go, and everyone who subscribed to my blog in Google Reader or Feedly would get their own alert: Tony wrote a new post! I’d better go read it, maybe leave a comment. Then the comment section would turn into a circus, bringing people back to my blog several times per day. Every time they came back, I got a pageview, and the more pageviews I got, the more I got paid.

Sounds exhausting, doesn’t it?