Can I get a description of the subjective experience of unfun superstimuli? Usually for me, I’m having fun—but clearly many others don’t but do it anyways.
For some reason I seem to be much less susceptible to consuming unfun superstimulus, which is weird given how I am generally impulsive/lazy/low executive function/etc and even used to have harmful compulsions.[1] If I didn’t already know better I would predict I’d have a problem with unfun social media!
Short form video generally is boring, it don’t want to see more unless I feel like the next might be good.[2] I generally prefer text over video. The content is banal and so doesn’t hold my attention for long. When I was much younger I’d scroll reddit for memes but those (along with video games) became less interesting. It’s like when people talk about celebrities I don’t care about, or sports, except at least then there’s some substance to engage with and they can talk in more depth about it.
Here are some other examples of superstimuli, most of which I enjoy; I also don’t feel that my joy in other stuff is dampened (a common concern of superstimuli):
I drink a lot of soda, but I genuinely enjoy the flavor and in my ideal world it would be costless and healthy; likewise for other junk food. The food definitely isn’t diminished, plain water might be a little bit. (I’m lucky enough to be effortlessly skinny)
I’m glad the world has makeup and that I get the opportunity to see prettier people (both in meatspace and on TV).
Probably this makes me feel worse about my appearance via ingrained standards, but internally it doesn’t feel that way (it internally feels bad if I look anti-pretty, good if I look pretty, and while I wish I looked super pretty it really doesn’t feel like it makes me feel worse about myself), and it also doesn’t diminish my enjoyment of romantic or sexual partners.
I’m glad I get to listen to songs much better than anything I could ever do and being able to seems to lead me to sing more often and to enjoy it more often.
The closest example I can think of is sex: I seem to be drawn to types of porn, masturbation, and sex that gives lower enjoyment. It’s actually pretty strange how it affects enjoyment and I don’t know why I’m like this. Example: despite enjoying visual porn (as you’d expect from someone who likes looking at pretty people) it seems to produce worse experiences than pure audio? So it’s not that surprising that my instincts haven’t figured out what ends up more fun.
Likewise I really like staying up late, even thought it has bad consequences. It’s like (a weaker form of) chilling with friends when you have work to do—it has a cost but it’s part of what makes life fun.
Obviously many don’t feel this way, I hope someone describes what they hate about it and how they are drawn in anyways. It’s unfortunate that most who feel like this and write about it assume it’s universal, as they had the perfect opportunity to explain it to me.
From when I was younger and depressed: banging my head on tables and finding it difficult to stop despite the experience sucking. It’s like scratching an itch that actively hurts to scratch, even knowing that you’ll make things worse by doing so and not wanting the wound to grow.
Likewise I struggle to do work in a way that feels somewhat similar. I would think social media for others is analogous, but also when I describe my difficulties getting myself to e.g. fold my clothes, people tend to not relate.
My twitter feed sometimes has cool stuff, but othertimes is filled with boredom, so sometimes I find myself scrolling past boring stuff hoping to hit something cool even when this expectation is unreasonable. But if my feed never had cool stuff then I think I wouldn’t have the problem.
Can I get a description of the subjective experience of unfun superstimuli? Usually for me, I’m having fun—but clearly many others don’t but do it anyways.
For some reason I seem to be much less susceptible to consuming unfun superstimulus, which is weird given how I am generally impulsive/lazy/low executive function/etc and even used to have harmful compulsions.[1] If I didn’t already know better I would predict I’d have a problem with unfun social media!
Short form video generally is boring, it don’t want to see more unless I feel like the next might be good.[2] I generally prefer text over video. The content is banal and so doesn’t hold my attention for long. When I was much younger I’d scroll reddit for memes but those (along with video games) became less interesting. It’s like when people talk about celebrities I don’t care about, or sports, except at least then there’s some substance to engage with and they can talk in more depth about it.
Here are some other examples of superstimuli, most of which I enjoy; I also don’t feel that my joy in other stuff is dampened (a common concern of superstimuli):
I drink a lot of soda, but I genuinely enjoy the flavor and in my ideal world it would be costless and healthy; likewise for other junk food. The food definitely isn’t diminished, plain water might be a little bit. (I’m lucky enough to be effortlessly skinny)
I’m glad the world has makeup and that I get the opportunity to see prettier people (both in meatspace and on TV).
Probably this makes me feel worse about my appearance via ingrained standards, but internally it doesn’t feel that way (it internally feels bad if I look anti-pretty, good if I look pretty, and while I wish I looked super pretty it really doesn’t feel like it makes me feel worse about myself), and it also doesn’t diminish my enjoyment of romantic or sexual partners.
I’m glad I get to listen to songs much better than anything I could ever do and being able to seems to lead me to sing more often and to enjoy it more often.
The closest example I can think of is sex: I seem to be drawn to types of porn, masturbation, and sex that gives lower enjoyment. It’s actually pretty strange how it affects enjoyment and I don’t know why I’m like this. Example: despite enjoying visual porn (as you’d expect from someone who likes looking at pretty people) it seems to produce worse experiences than pure audio? So it’s not that surprising that my instincts haven’t figured out what ends up more fun.
Likewise I really like staying up late, even thought it has bad consequences. It’s like (a weaker form of) chilling with friends when you have work to do—it has a cost but it’s part of what makes life fun.
Obviously many don’t feel this way, I hope someone describes what they hate about it and how they are drawn in anyways. It’s unfortunate that most who feel like this and write about it assume it’s universal, as they had the perfect opportunity to explain it to me.
From when I was younger and depressed: banging my head on tables and finding it difficult to stop despite the experience sucking. It’s like scratching an itch that actively hurts to scratch, even knowing that you’ll make things worse by doing so and not wanting the wound to grow.
Likewise I struggle to do work in a way that feels somewhat similar. I would think social media for others is analogous, but also when I describe my difficulties getting myself to e.g. fold my clothes, people tend to not relate.
My twitter feed sometimes has cool stuff, but othertimes is filled with boredom, so sometimes I find myself scrolling past boring stuff hoping to hit something cool even when this expectation is unreasonable. But if my feed never had cool stuff then I think I wouldn’t have the problem.