Screen time and face-to-face conversation
I spent almost 11 hours last Sunday staring at screens, not counting the TV. Between my phone, tablet, and computer, I ended the so-called day of rest with tired eyes, a fried brain, and a bit of frustration.
Not all those hours—an excess even for me, who works looking at screens—were wasted. I spent a good 40 minutes, for example, talking to my parents via video call. It’s hard to think of better uses for the screens that surround us than that.
The problem was the other 10 hours, or most of them.
***
Some time ago, I realized that the digital world represents a kind of “refuge,” a space where I can exercise my almost-obsession with control — or delude myself with it — without any significant consequences.
I also noticed that my screen time spikes when I’m feeling a bit down.
During these phases, I become obsessed with two almost trivial topics, to which I dedicate many hours of screen time: tinkering with the layout of my websites and brainstorming the replacement of all the proprietary software I use with free alternatives, like Linux on my computer and a “degoogled” Android phone.
I wasted my Sunday researching used computers that I could adopt in place of my laptop, probably the best computer I’ve ever had, one that I’d have a hard to find issues, just because… I don’t know.
***
Identifying such symptoms and my crises’ triggers has been important steps in learning to deal with the moral hangover that hits me after they pass.
I can help myself, and although I have implemented some measures in this regard, I feel that it is something bigger than me, than any individual.
What measures? One of the most effective is blocking access to social media at the network level, with the help of NextDNS.
Even the so-called healthier ones, like Mastodon and Bluesky, eventually become compulsive destinations, accessed automatically during moments of waiting, boredom, or even the smallest difficulties, and, worse, also when I should be doing something more important or enjoyable.
The friction — having to open the NextDNS panel, uncheck the blocked domains, turn the network off and on again — is a great help for self-control, serving as a counterpoint to the compulsion to access time-sucking black holes without thinking, on autopilot.
Just two or three times of typing “mas,” “red,” or “bsk,” hitting Enter, and running into an error screen is enough for me to let it go. As a side effect, I think I become more aware of the time I spend looking at screens. I focus better on what I’m doing without the distractions.
***
Another measure that has helped me is stash my tablet in the drawer. The comfort of the large screen and the convenience of having it always at hand is an irresistible combination. The long articles I used to read on the tablet are no longer there. Today, I print them out and read them on paper.
None of this is a definitive fix, as it is not sustainable in the long run. I have relapses, and even before them, I would be lying if I said that access to addictive sites and apps isn’t missed.
The platforms I access — Mastodon, Bluesky (less so), Reddit, and Hacker News — have a good signal-to-noise ratio, meaning I consider them beneficial when accessed sparingly. I find fun, interesting, and useful things; part of what appears in my blogs or inspires me to discuss certain topics here comes from those places. In this sense, the work I do is a kind of digital mining, except that instead of toxic dust destroying my lungs, the internet is wearing down my neurons.
Even though they are useful, would they be essential, in the sense of “I couldn’t live without them”? Obviously not. The block of X in Brazil in 2024, lasting just over a month, proved to many addicts that there is life outside of it. In the United States, some people lamented the very short duration of the TikTok ban on the eve of Donald Trump’s inauguration.
In fact, for many, the ban was a revelation followed by great relief. Abstinence and overcoming. The parallels with conventional addictions, such as drug addiction, are shocking.
***
There has been a lot of talk about the convergence of the modern phone, which has replaced a handful of gadgets we used to carry around with a rectangle of metal and glass with infinite possibilities.
While it is part of what we might call the problem, I believe the smartphone is not the only villain, nor even the main one.
After much reflection, lengthy readings, and one-topic therapy sessions, I’ve come to believe that the root of excessive screen time lies in the scarcity of eye contact. The screen, which I use here as an umbrella term for the internet, has not only replaced gadgets but also a whole lot of social interactions, from the fragile to the strong ones.
I am fully aware that I don’t help myself in this regard: I am introspective and careless about nurturing relationships, a melting pot of traits and feelings that finds comfort in the blue light of the screen.
But the problem isn’t (just) me. Sometimes I get the impression that everyone is in the same boat.
Rosie Spinks has better defined this… zeitgeist? Can I call it that? We can blame the screens, the internet, capitalism, the way of life that my generation has created (or has been shaped to adopt), plus a pandemic thrown in.
“Our brains were simply not designed to operate this way,” Rosie writes. “And there, I think, lies the crux of the friendship problem: We are so burned out by the process of staying afloat in a globalized, connected world that we simply don’t have the energy for the kinds of in-person, easy interactions that might actually give us some energy and lifeforce back.”
None of this is new; it just seems to be getting worse over time, with the so-called technology “progress” in our lives. How do we look at screens less in a world where everything and everyone invests time, money, and are lobbying to keep us glued to them, atomized in our homes, alone together in the same misery, each in our own? I’m open to suggestions.