The trope is real, and what we are experiencing here is simply the "nerdification" of mainstream society. Everyone is more screen addicted in 2024 than even the most nerdy person was circa 2008.
I honestly love it though. Sure, there is a "dystopian" bent to the idea of most people zombifying themselves in public - but all a westerner needs to do is spend even a week in a very communal society to realize that the radical individualistic society we have cultivated is actually pretty awesome. I LOVE the idea that I can be who I want to be and genuinely not care about what some "community" of people think of it. Everyone pretending that no one around them exists and being screenlocked means I can pick my nose in public, or do any number of even more weird shit without being noticed. Compare this to japan where eating a burger without covering your mouth as a woman is a social death sentence.
Western individualism (and east asian hermitism and maybe eastern european depressive paranoia) are by far the most productive social situations for tech development, as we now have far more "tech autistic" types who tend to be the primary drivers of code innovation. Is it any surprise that there is basically consensus that the best "hardcore" games tend to come from either the west (usually the USA or northern europe), a post soviet state, or japan.
Everyone in this thread bemoans the things that cause the youth mental health crisis, but honestly, I wouldn't go back and I think that higher youth mental health rates are simply worth it. Actual "nerds" in 2024 are less likely to be bullied than in the eras of good youth mental health, and the average becky or chad can learn to deal with the same things that the nerds of 2009 learned to deal with a fortnight ago.
I honestly love it though. Sure, there is a "dystopian" bent to the idea of most people zombifying themselves in public - but all a westerner needs to do is spend even a week in a very communal society to realize that the radical individualistic society we have cultivated is actually pretty awesome. I LOVE the idea that I can be who I want to be and genuinely not care about what some "community" of people think of it. Everyone pretending that no one around them exists and being screenlocked means I can pick my nose in public, or do any number of even more weird shit without being noticed. Compare this to japan where eating a burger without covering your mouth as a woman is a social death sentence.
Western individualism (and east asian hermitism and maybe eastern european depressive paranoia) are by far the most productive social situations for tech development, as we now have far more "tech autistic" types who tend to be the primary drivers of code innovation. Is it any surprise that there is basically consensus that the best "hardcore" games tend to come from either the west (usually the USA or northern europe), a post soviet state, or japan.
Everyone in this thread bemoans the things that cause the youth mental health crisis, but honestly, I wouldn't go back and I think that higher youth mental health rates are simply worth it. Actual "nerds" in 2024 are less likely to be bullied than in the eras of good youth mental health, and the average becky or chad can learn to deal with the same things that the nerds of 2009 learned to deal with a fortnight ago.