Doomscrolling. Isn’t that an ominous term?

Doomscrolling is one more term that’s entered our vocabulary in the age of COVID. Others include “long-hauler,” “mask shaming,” “flatten the curve,” “social distancing,” and so forth. These are all terms I’d just as soon we drop, honestly.

But doomscrolling is a little different. It’s not a recognized term in the Merriam-Webster yet, but probably will be. Wikipedia offers this:

Doomscrolling (also known as doomsurfing)^[1] is the act of consuming a large quantity of negative online news at once. Mental health experts^[vague] have stated that the practice can be detrimental to mental health.^{[2][3][4][5][6]}

That last sentence? Well, duh.

Here’s what I’m observing, and what I’d like you to consider, too.

First – do you self-identify as a doomscroller? I’d guess that you’re perfectly aware of how you spend your online time. You may not be as aware of what it’s doing to you by making you anxious, depressed, or feeling isolated. Ugh.

Here’s a helpful exercise.

Pick the social media platform you spend the most time on, especially if you’re a poster, or tend to respond to others’ posts frequently.

We’ll use the ubiquitous Facebook as an example.

Next, do an audit of your posts. Go back a couple of weeks or more and see what you’re saying or responding to. More on that later.

Here’s your red flag: If your posts or your replies tend to be about how awful things are, you are a certified doomscroller. You, consciously or not, are loving being negative.

I mean. Is that healthy?

We live in a chaotic world, and I’m not denying that. Most of the chaos we can’t do anything about, because it’s simply out of our hands. What we can do is manage our response to chaos.

Think about it, and I’ll focus on last year. 2020 was a Greatest Hits of Awfulness – George Floyd, COVID, the presidential election … and those are just for starters.

True, you could take action on those issues. The death of George Floyd certainly ramped up my awareness of racism. COVID divided folks into warring camps – maskers vs. non-maskers, vaccine takers vs. vaccine rejectors, Trumpers vs. non-Trumpers, and so forth. And conspiracy theories about all these abound.

I’ll make a clear distinction between the things you can actually take action on and influence the outcome vs. the things that we can’t. That’s where doomscrolling comes in.

There is this awful human tendency to dwell on the negative. Sometimes, it seems that some folks are actually embracing the negative.

Here’s what happens. You are drawn to awfulness. I think this is a hard-wired part of our nature. The sense is that what’s bad can hurt us, so in order to protect ourselves, we focus on the bad so that we can avoid it.

In 2021, it doesn’t work that way. We don’t avoid the bad. We marinate in it.

Earlier I mentioned doing an audit of your posts. I have some FB friends – and they really are friends – who post incessantly on how bad things are. I get that. I also wonder about their mental and emotional state. When I’ve asked, a couple of them have admitted that they’re in a bad place, but they keep on wallowing in bad news.

What’s worse, folks who are doomscrolling tend to want to have others join them in their misery. So they feed off each other’s posts, agree with how bad things are, and end up in a cycle of wretchedness.

My simple question: Is this helpful?

My mail order psych degree informs me that this isn’t a good thing. Unless you get some sort of perverse delight out of being miserable, doomscrolling will take a toll on you.

My counsel? Just stop.

Let’s say you run across something on social media that troubles you. You scroll through all the responses, because you want answers. You want to know what’s really going on. And the further you did, the worse you feel. You assume that if you can find an answer (was the election really rigged? Is COVID a Chinese plot? Who was actually responsible for the attack on the Capitol? Was it the Illuminati? Aliens?) you’ll feel better. But in that search, you’ll find that your soul can become tarnished.

Just. Stop.

Here’s how to stop. It isn’t original with me. It’s ancient script from Philippians 4:

⁴ Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! ⁵ Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. ⁶ Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.⁷ And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. ⁸ Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.

Believer, you better pay me some attention here. This will help you.

You were just bombarded by God’s truth in the passage above. When you doomscroll, you are saying, “Yeah, that’s good biblical counsel right there, but I’d much prefer immersing myself in awfulness.”

Don’t reject God’s truth on this one. I mean, He flat-out tells you what to think about.

Don’t be disobedient. I know it’s hard. Simply walk away when you find yourself going dark.

And look at pictures of puppies.

Be well.

Comments welcome.