Our society is currently pushing toward the future with a focus on climate change, sustainability, and AI. We’re achieving rapid advances in the latter. But I think our focus on and faith in tech is misplaced.

I keep seeing the headlines…children are suffering. They can’t even read bro. Why are we researching language models when our children can’t read fucking language? These computer scientists think that further tech advancements will solve problems like this… many of these issues were created by tech advancements in the first place. We’re all addicted now because they rolled out their flashy tech too fast.

Now as a compsci major, I’m not against tech advancement in any way; if it saves the whales and cures cancer then don’t hold back. But goddamn, can we at least have an equally strong societal push to improve public mental health understanding so we don’t screw up future generations like we did with mine? Intentionally or not, these devices and sites prey on your mental weaknesses and ensnare you in distraction. As a society, we don’t have enough training in and knowledge of how to take care of ourselves and our minds to wield the advanced technology at our fingertips. It’s like everyone’s been given a powerful lightsaber despite no training and a weak Force connection. Of course they’re gonna get hurt when they try to wield it in real combat—they’re not ready yet.

We must build this cultural infrastructure as soon as possible. Let’s get more people into therapy. Let’s dive more into eastern practices; the monks seem like they’ve got this mental health shit figured out more than we do. Let’s make mindfulness, presence, love, resilience, and connection central to our culture so they can diffuse throughout our art, music, fashion, living spaces, institutions, social interactions, and school curriculums. I can already see the seeds of this new cultural movement sprouting, so let’s make it grow and blossom for the sake of our future.