Why Going Offline Isn't Realistic Anymore

[00:00:00]I'm trying to live a more analog life, so I'm getting rid of this cuz I got this.

[00:00:04]>> So, you want an analog life starting in 2026? Here's exactly how you can do it from someone who helped pioneer this movement last >> my screen time has been keeping me up all hours of the night lately, so let's have an analog evening to try to reset [music] my sleep schedule.

[00:00:15]>> What do all these videos have in common?

[00:00:17]A bit of a contradiction. They're making posts about how they're not on social media on social media. I do think these people might use social media less than before and only use it to post content like this, but if you still rely on social media to function in the world, then that suggests being permanently chronically offline isn't very attainable for most people. Articles and videos all over the internet, including ones I've made, have posted about how being chronically offline is becoming the new cool. And while I do believe there's a select cohort abiding by this mission, the reality might be that for most people being offline is a luxury that they cannot afford. So, let's explore why this is the case and why even though everybody unanimously agrees that social media sucks now, we still can't quit. The hype of an analog future began around the same time that this graph was created by consumer insights company GWI. In it, we can see that young people ages 16 to 24 have seen a consistent decrease in the average number of hours spent on social media per day for roughly the past 3 years. If we're to examine this critically, there are two issues with this. And the first is that graphs are misleading. There are spikes and declines throughout the graph, and it's very possible that we're just in an era where the statistics gathered from this specific company are experiencing a downward trend for only a few years. I also don't think it's really fair to consider social media as having peaked just because we aren't at the same levels of usage as we were during a pandemic. [music] And the second issue with this graph is that it doesn't seem to apply to America. If we take a look at the same stats across countries instead of ages, we can see North America's social media usage has continued to rise. It is here where we can ask why. Why is North America's usage still rising while all the other countries continue to fall. Well, at face value, this is going to sound a little dumb, but for a lot of people, being on at least one social media platform is a strategy for survival, especially in a volatile system like America. If we are to define social media as any platform where you can connect with other people, get news and share ideas, then almost every American relies on social media to achieve their personal and financial goals. I decided to take a look at the latest stats from GWI for 2025 and it backed up this statement. When people aged 16 to 34 are asked the main reason they use social media, filling spare time, aka consuming mindless slop, is all the way at the bottom. And near the top, making new contacts and work-related networking/research.

[00:02:40]If we extend this logic further, it becomes obvious why being chronically offline remains aesthetic more than reality for most people. In the modern economy, the internet is the infrastructure. Your ability to find work, maintain relevance, market yourself, meet people, build communities, learn skills, and even exist professionally has increasingly been tied to digital platforms. For millions of people, logging off entirely would feel almost like self-sabotage.

[00:03:05]Take LinkedIn, for example. I'm so glad I don't have to use this [ __ ] platform. The platform has basically become a public resume that updates with each new post. Recruiters actively search through it for candidates, and according to multiple hiring reports, around 72% of recruiters use LinkedIn during the hiring process. Some estimates suggest that over 3 million people are hired through the platform every year. Nearly 2/3 of people say finding a job has become more challenging, citing competition as the main hurdle. And how do you stand out among the competition? In many sectors and roles, by having a personal brand.

[00:03:39]Artists rely on Instagram, writers rely on Substack and Medium, freelancers depend on Twitter, Discord, TikTok, or YouTube to attract clients and audiences. Small businesses rely on algorithmic exposure just to compete with larger corporations. If you aren't born into obscene amounts of wealth that get you the connections to slither your way into any industry and pretend like you made it there on your own, that's the only way to get traction. And like I mentioned at the start, even many people advocating for an offline lifestyle are still being financially sustained by posting online content about being offline, including me. This has created a strange paradox where social media has become both hated and mandatory. Most of us love logging on to Instagram and getting plastered with ads every three stories or reels, consuming AI slop no matter how many times we say don't recommend this content, constantly turning every piece of content into profit, and not knowing whose information you can trust because suddenly everyone has a different opinion on what is true or false. And at the same time, being offline in many ways feels like you are socially castrating yourself and not understanding what is going on in the world, which is very necessary to understand. Most people you see making videos about why they don't read any news and why doing so is a psyop are people who are unaffected by the world's tragedies and aren't under threat of having their entire lives uprooted by a sudden change in the economic or social status of the world. And [music] while I'm all for watching less garbage news and propaganda from sources that are pedaling their extremely biased narratives, it's just a fact that not needing to know about a new job development or policy or regulation in this increasingly fast-paced unstable world is at least a minor privilege.

[00:05:23]What I've discussed so far is much of what I discussed in my Being Chronically Offline Is the New Cool video, narrowing my focus to the reliance on social media the modern world has funneled us into.

[00:05:32]But there's something else that I think these people who are making these videos or articles about how the analog revolution isn't actually happening are missing, including the Substack by Eugene Healy, which was a big inspiration for this piece. He makes great videos and articles, by the way.

[00:05:47]I'll leave the link to his stuff in the description. And the thing they're missing is that the cohort of people that are actually disconnecting from social media could never really be measured. Like there's probably a good chunk of people who have quit social media, even if they couldn't really afford to, who are living a primarily analog lifestyle. The thing is, we would never know because they wouldn't post about it. I bring this up because I want to recognize that there could, in fact, be some cases in which an analog revival is happening, even for people who don't feel like they have the luxury to completely go offline. I want to touch upon that point again a little bit later in the video, but right now I want to address the main question of this video even further. If we hate social media, why can't we quit? If we know social media is, for the most part, an addictive slot machine, and the more time we spend on it, the stupider, more anxious, less energetic, less empathetic, and more uncertain we feel, why do we still choose to go on it so much? Most people would answer this with the most obvious statement, because it's addictive and addictive things are hard to quit. But I think it goes much deeper than that, because even though crack is extremely addictive, you don't see me loading up a pipe. What I really think is going on here is that we do actually crave what social media gives us, and in our modern world, there are little to no replacements for it right now. The first thing that we like that social media gives us is attention. On social media, there's a constant feeling that something is happening and we must keep up with it. There's always new information, new drama, new memes, new trends, new updates, and new people becoming famous overnight. Even if most of it is meaningless, it still creates the sensation that we are plugged into the pulse of society. If you log off for even a week, you suddenly realize how quickly culture and trends move now. And ironically, because technology itself is accelerating the pace of culture, the very thing making the world harder to keep up with is also the thing we rely on to keep up with it. It's this symbiotic relationship where we engage with social media and technology to stay tapped in, then that engagement speeds up culture, which makes us feel like we need to stay even more tapped in, and so on and so on. Now, compare this to real life. Where exactly are you supposed to get that same feeling of participating in culture offline? Most physical spaces today revolve around work, consumption, or isolation. You drive to work, you sit in a cubicle, you drive home, maybe go to the gym with headphones on where nobody talks to each other, maybe you order food through an app, maybe you watch Netflix alone afterward. There are fewer communal spaces where people naturally gather without spending money, fewer third places, as it's called, and fewer environments where culture is experienced collectively in real time.

[00:08:33]So, even if social media often feels hollow, it gives people something that modern life increasingly struggles to provide, the feeling of being involved in something larger than themselves. The second thing that social media gives us that we crave is distraction and escapism. Most people say social media is addictive because it's engineered like a slot machine, and yes, that's true. But I also think many of us scroll because modern life leaves us mentally exhausted while simultaneously stripping away healthier forms of escapism. I've said this many times, but it's much easier to scroll than sit with boredom, especially when your work is bleeding into every aspect of your life. When you only have small fragments of free time left over after work or all of your other responsibilities, social media becomes the easiest possible form of stimulation. It asks nothing from you, and you can do it very quickly and easily. Conversely, things like, let's say, reading take a good amount of effort and dedication and attention.

[00:09:30]Pursuing a hobby for no other purpose than to get better at it because you enjoy it requires a great deal of effort and free time. And showing up to the same place consistently in real life to build a community takes way more time and effort than just opening up your phone and scrolling mindlessly for 10 minutes. And the third thing that social media gives us that we crave is a sense of belonging. Another way that I put this a while back is that social media is like surveillance disguised as connection. We can all watch our friends Instagram stories or share posts through DMs, which is what I usually do to stay in touch with friends back home, or follow things they're doing out in real life, and it kind of feels like we are participating in this experience, even though we may not have spoken to these people in weeks, months, or even years.

[00:10:15]And at the same time, the real-life counterpart has become increasingly difficult to maintain. Genuine friendship now requires fighting against schedules, exhaustion, distance, inflation, work culture, and cities designed around isolation. Every time I go out to hang out with my friends now, it's like bare minimum, I'm spending like 50 bucks to do whatever the [ __ ] we're doing. And many public spaces are designed to move people through them efficiently rather than encourage lingering in conversation, like I discussed in my death of American community video. So, social media becomes the path of least resistance because it imitates connection just enough to temporarily satisfy the craving for it. And this is why I think a lot of people misunderstand our modern relationship with technology because, you see, most people are not scrolling because they are stupid. They are scrolling because social media has monopolized fundamental human needs that the real world is increasingly failing to provide. What it would really require for everyone to unplug is a complete systemic and structural overhaul of our cities and economy. That means more public transportation, less car-dependent infrastructure, an economy that isn't based around speculation, hype, and VCs throwing money at [ __ ] tighter regulations around addictive platforms, more of a push to open free public spaces, and more public spaces designed around relaxation and lingering with other people. If we actually had those things, I would argue that most people would barely feel inclined to go on social media as much as we do right now. Those are the real issues we need to tackle. So, goddammit, just get into those fields if you can.

[00:11:53]Instead of just posting about how society is cooked online like my stupid idiot self right now, even though, you know, I'm trying to provide solutions, we need more people to get into these fields that actually provide the change that I'm talking about. And no, I don't mean that everybody needs to become a politician or urban planner, but more of us do need to understand what's going on in our cities and how we can actually engage with the community and get involved in these things. If you care about walkable cities and less isolating infrastructure, there are entire movements and creators dedicated to this. Channels like Not Just Bikes and organizations like Strong Towns break down why modern cities often feel socially dead and what can actually be done to improve them. If you want to get involved locally, sites like Strong Towns local conversations help people connect with groups trying to improve their communities in tangible ways. If belonging is the thing you're missing, then unfortunately, there is no perfect app that replaces true friendship, but there are ways to intentionally create more opportunities for it. Meetup.com is still one of the best tools for finding local groups centered around hobbies, sports, writing, philosophy, or anything else you can think of. Volunteering sites like VolunteerMatch are another underrated way to meet people while doing something that actually matters.

[00:13:07]And if your attention span feels destroyed, or let's just say your focus, because I don't really believe in your attention span being destroyed, you have to rebuild it like a muscle. It sounds cliché, but it is true. You have to increase the friction between you and activities that are just mindless stimulation. Read books again, even if you can only focus for 10 minutes at first. Go on walks without headphones.

[00:13:31]Leave your phone at home when you can.

[00:13:33]Create environments where your brain is allowed to experience silence again. I said it before and I'm going to say it again, increase the friction between you and these attention-hungry, energy-sapping platforms that want to convince you that there's nothing we can do to create the world we want to inhabit and inconvenience yourself for the good of a group. Because while becoming fully offline is unrealistic for most people, you can reclaim enough of your attention, community, and identity from the internet so that technology becomes a tool again instead of the environment you permanently live inside of.

[00:14:08]Let me know your thoughts and other solutions in the comments below and another video like this is why Gen Z can't start a revolution, why it's hard for us to even think about all coming together and enacting the changes we want, and how we've been sedated to think this way. And I'm going to go.

[00:14:25]Go chill, go have some fun, go experience new things, go do things that scare you. Goodbye.