The Internet Is Driving Boomers to the Right
While younger people are growing aware of the harmful effects of social media, people over 65 are consuming increasing amounts of far-right content online — and it’s impacting real-world politics.
Reports show that people aged 65 and above have become terminally online. (Peter Macdiarmid / Getty Images)
In the digital world, attention is king, and because clicks feed revenue, our social feeds are now full of AI-generated ragebait and misinformation. But according to a recent report in the Financial Times, we are now past peak social media. Unless you’re over the age of sixty-five.
Infinite scrolling was invented by Aza Raskin, former head of user design at the internet browser Mozilla. It refers to how social media platforms are designed such that content is continuously refreshed.
Psychological research on this compulsive consumption has linked doomscrolling to heightened anxiety and mental distress. Raskin had no illusions about doomscrolling’s effects on our brains: “I know as a designer that by taking away the stopping cue, I can make you do what I want you to do,” he said in an interview in which he also apologized for the harms his invention had caused.
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