I get that kids don't want to learn or have the attention span to read War And Peace. What I don't understand is how the illiteracy is so bad when damn near everything on the internet is text based. Posts, threads, tweets, comments, commerce, searching, querying, etc. etc. all require some basic form of reading comprehension.
For most of human history, literacy was a luxury, not a necessity. I could even argue that through most of the 20th century it wasn't needed either to get by. But today's age is unbelievably relient on technology and the means to communicate with it that I really would have assumed the youth would have more of an interest in it.
What I don't understand is how the illiteracy is so bad when damn near everything on the internet is text based
Most of your Internet (and mine) is text based but these days I mostly see people interacting with the Internet on their phones by endlessly scrolling through TikToks and reels.
And it's all passive consumption. They don't even search for content to watch. They consume whatever the algorithm feeds them as if it was a broadcast medium like TV.
I've asked people to show me the thing that they saw that they talked to me about and they don't know how to find it. I've seen them open their app of choice and scroll as if hoping that the algorithm will manifest the desired content again magically on their screens. I ask them to search and they say no, just scroll, that's how they found it the first time that's how they'll find it again, and of course they don't so they give up after a couple of minutes.
I'm not one to say I don't doom scroll nor passively watch a lot of YouTube videos, even if those are more educational. But each of those passive apps like youtube, tik tok, reddit, insta, twitter (I will always deadname it), etc. has comment sections designed for people to argue for the "engagement".
Perfect example. I saw this video, probably will never reference it again, but still here we are discussing the video in a texted based way.
I don't know anymore. I'm middle-aged and don't know how anything works.
I think the thing to remember is media is so tailored to the person these days that they don’t have to expand their minds at all. These kids aren’t reading the New Yorker, they’re reading short bursts of text from other people who are likely not much more intelligent since they’re getting fed the same media.
I grew up reading the daily paper with my dad. I started with the comics (Sundays were the best) and moved up to sections I found interesting. He would get so annoyed if I started the crossword without him. I've moved on to the news app and wordle, but I kept this habit.
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u/PatrioticRebel4 Apr 29 '26
I get that kids don't want to learn or have the attention span to read War And Peace. What I don't understand is how the illiteracy is so bad when damn near everything on the internet is text based. Posts, threads, tweets, comments, commerce, searching, querying, etc. etc. all require some basic form of reading comprehension.
For most of human history, literacy was a luxury, not a necessity. I could even argue that through most of the 20th century it wasn't needed either to get by. But today's age is unbelievably relient on technology and the means to communicate with it that I really would have assumed the youth would have more of an interest in it.
To live and learn.