I knew it was time to declare a state of emergency on my well-being when I caught myself doom-scrolling on TikTok repeatedly, without even pausing to take in the videos I was swiping through. I realized things had taken a turn for the worse—and crashed right into catastrophic alley—when I began to see videos on Instagram that I had already seen on TikTok. It felt like I was in a horror movie where my only torture was to repeatedly engage with the same posts, regardless of the social media platform I was on.

It’s not news to my regular readers that I have never liked TikTok. I’ve always had the strong conviction that it contributes greatly to the steady degradation of people’s ability to think deeply. TikTok, unlike every other social media platform that has existed, accommodates all sorts of chaos, and revolting antics easily get broadcasted. So, when I actively began to use TikTok, I felt like a bloody hypocrite, but it helped fuel my disgust.

Before taking a social media break from all platforms (save WhatsApp), my TikTok algorithm began to regurgitate the same kinds of videos—(did I mention how much I hate the word “content”?)—for me. At some point, I had to ask myself: what exactly would I be missing if I suddenly stopped using TikTok? Nothing!

But what would I be gaining? Way more. I would have time for the two books I still haven’t gotten around to reading because I’ve been “busy.” But do I somehow have time to watch the same dance steps to Kelebu by Rema, and AI cats slaughtering yet another giraffe and eating it? Very much yes! I would also be able to study for my upcoming examination which I fear facing due to the time I wasted learning the lyrics of Escaladizzy!

I fear greatly for my future!

The overall drain being immersed in social media at the expense of my personal development cannot be quantified. I began to struggle with basic day-to-day living. I started waking up super tired after a long night’s sleep. My eyesight got worse; it watered even when I wore glasses. I couldn’t use the restroom unless my phone was in my hands. I’d place my phone on a mantle in the kitchen while cooking, and every time I did that, my mother’s voice would yell in my head about how I wanted to ruin her life by killing myself untimely! (She lives in a mortal fear of gas/phone interaction)

I was a zombie automatically picking my phone first thing in the morning and getting suddenly smacked by my phone because I dozed off while holding it. It was getting crazy. The decline of experiencing other habits and hobbies and chasing digital dopamine was turning me into a moron. My thinking dwindled drastically and I struggled to write properly. And I also learned a bitter truth:

We are turning into robots, and the robots are becoming more human!

I’ve seen people on Twitter asking Grok, Twitter’s AI, to verify basic facts they could easily search up online. The laziness is palpable. “@Grok, what is my name?”

Then there are the people who rely on ChatGPT for everything. Now, before I proceed, I believe the use of AI is already problematic in itself, but not being able to apply simple human intelligence in its use spells more doom for us collectively. People have gotten so lazy they can’t even be bothered to edit out obvious ChatGPT cues, like random emojis and overly excited sentence formations.

In fact, during an employee engagement session at my company today, someone used ChatGPT to answer a question and shamelessly pasted it without editing, emojis and all, into the chat box. And guess what? Many people in that session called it out, rightly so. Because why?

People are using ChatGPT to name their babies. People are asking ChatGPT to tell them what to do. People input a series of life stories into ChatGPT and ask for advice. They follow that advice word for word, forgetting that it is not a human being—one who understands the nuances of emotion and has lived experience—talking back to them. This feels like a well-written sci-fi horror, but the unfortunate thing is that it’s happening in my generation.

Why should it be my generation? Why am I not old and about to totter over to the other side before this whole AI madness began? Why is it my generation that faces an impending future of finding it harder and harder to sift truth from lies?

I literally saw a video of Michael Jackson laughing with Tupac and cracking jokes with him. Michael Jackson is dead. Tupac is dead, even though conspiracy theorists are willing to die on the hill that he’s vacationing in some foreign country somewhere, but even so! I saw videos of different dead American celebrities talking and engaging in activities that were not typical of them when they were alive. This is scary. Imagine what a psychopath could do with that if they haven’t already started.

All these technologies have started directing and controlling people’s lives, and it all starts with consent until that consent is taken away. These people have willingly outsourced their thinking, the very thing that makes them who they are, to a robot. They’ve given AI the power to play God.

People would rather sit in front of their computers or scroll endlessly on their phones, watching video after video. Students are finding it hard to study or concentrate in school. The standards of everything keep falling. It reminds me of the proverb about how the strong birth the weak. What is going on?

The generation that didn’t have quick access to information or instant gratification learned formidable lessons and grew from those drawbacks. This generation, however, doesn’t have to struggle as hard to get twice the gratification. I mean, porn used to be treated as hush-hush back then, and getting access to it was within specific circles. Now? Two taps on your phone and porn is in your face.

The interest in the arts is reducing. Innovation is crumbling. Nobody wants to think anymore.

I am scared of what the future may bring.