Get off Twitter

Maxims and arrows Go Premium Get off Twitter A hearty collection of the JC’s pithiest adages. Index: Click ᐅ to expand: Maxim Comments? Questions? Suggestions? Requests? Insults? We’d love to 📧 hear from you. Sign up for our newsletter.

Even before you delete Facebook, get off Twitter. The name should be enough of a clue. Don’t cast a backward glance. You won’t miss the hours you waste doom-scrolling through the hot takes, petulant arguments and virtue signalling. Twitter is even worse than LinkedIn, which in its own way is at least morbidly funny and, in a strange way, endearing in its well-meaning awfulness.

“But Twitter is the best source for breaking news”. Yes, and false alarms and conspiracy theories. If it is true now, it will be true tomorrow, and there will be an organised and coherent narrative around it — or, if it is a controversial topic, there will be a variety of organised and coherent narratives to consider and take the one that best confirms your own prejudices. (I know, that’s not a good thing, but to make sense of something, it is an inevitable one.)

Anyone who believes meaningful, complex ideas are best expressed via a Twitter thread is most likely not in the habit of having them, or receiving them.

I’ll just leave this here:

Get off Twitter.

~ Gets popcorn. ~

See also

• Virtue signalling