[SirMaster]

>The average person has zero chance against all-pervasive, ultra-manipulative, highly-engineered systems like that.

So you are saying I am not an average person because I have the willpower to simply not install the TikTok app or watch short form video on any platform?

Has the bar for the average person really sunk this low?

[tvink]

If only you could reach out of your own experience and ponder what might cause otherwise reasonable people to do so. Young people peer pressure, current marketing landscape, you're forced there if you want to make money as a creative, so many reasons. Great, you can live your life without. Can you live your life without assuming everyone has the privilege of your situation?

[integralid]

You also probably don't use heroin. Everyone knows it's a bad idea and yet for some reason we have very severe punishments for people that distribute it. Why?

Because addictive things are addictive, and addicted people suffer, and everyone can get addicted if their guard slips.

We prefer to regulate highly addictive things instead.

[D-Machine]

    > You also probably don't use heroin. Everyone knows it's a bad idea

About 1–12 months after using heroin, only 23%–38% become addicted [1]. Occasional and controlled heroin users do in fact exist and are documented [2]. And, most famously, the use of heroin by American soldiers during the Vietnam war was largely situational [3].

So what "everyone knows" here is not very impressive. I still very strongly believe you'd be a fool or at least reckless to try heroin, but it really isn't the bogeyman people want it to be.

[1] https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/...

[2] https://www.drugsandalcohol.ie/3906/

[3] https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.64.12...

[zapzupnz]

Congratulations, you've won the "Works on My Machine" award, except for self-control instead of software. Well done. Everyone's very impressed.

[Jensson]

> So you are saying I am not an average person because I have the willpower to simply not install the TikTok app or watch short form video on any platform?

Yes, since more people use Tiktok than not. The average person is also fat today, so this shouldn't come as a surprise to you.

People didn't grow fat and addicted to screens due to changes to themselves, its due to companies learning how to get people to eat more and watch more since the they make more money.

[foobar_______]

Maybe? I really don't know. I don't want to believe it but the data and just looking around in public and seeing the scroll addition seems to indicate otherwise?