Striving to be Human - Preserving Hope in the Face of Despair

Every year, Wikipedia runs an ad at the top of their pages, asking for donations to help keep the world’s largest online database of collective information running. And each time I see the request, a particular phrase jumps out. They refer to their site as “the internet we were promised.” And as a late-stage Millennial, I know exactly what they mean.

I was raised during the era that promised that the technological innovations of the 2000s would revolutionize everyday life. Facebook would bring community together in a way that was unfathomable to our ancestors. Amazon would ensure that any product we would ever need would be available to us with a touch of a button. Apple would reimagine the tools we use to create and communicate. The future was bright and beautiful. The reality, though, has been a profoundly different experience.

Instead of a utopian era of free-flowing ideas, connections, and problem-solving, we have seen what Cory Doctorow has termed Enshittification. In his latest book bearing the same name, he describes the process as “the theory that explains the accelerating decay of the things that matter to us, explaining why this is happening and what we should do about it.” (Enshittification, pg. 4) We are living the consequences of digital technologies that have prioritized profits over people, while companies continue to abuse their customers in order to create maximum shareholder returns.

We have all felt the process in our everyday lives. It is the DoorDash order that promises to be delivered in 30 minutes, only to arrive in 90, cold and containing someone else’s order entirely. It is a health insurance company throwing around words like wellness and care at the same time that they jack up prices to ensure that they have as limited responsibility as possible while raising premiums exponentially. It is an airline that promises luxury and ease while overselling flights, charging for every conceivable aspect of the experience, and ensuring that it is impossible to actually speak to an agent. In simplest terms, we live the reality of Enshittification every time we suddenly realize that we are screaming at a customer service representative in a foreign country with no real means to help solve the problem we didn’t create in the first place.

Add this corporate abuse to the political reality that sees billionaire politicians making decisions that will have grave consequences on the most disenfranchised citizens and you wind up with a situation that feels both inevitable and insurmountable. Simply put: everything seems to suck and there doesn’t seem to be much we can do about it. After all, what is one person supposed to do when confronting the forces of both a massive capitalist system and a global political structure that is nearly impossible for an individual to change?

As a scholar of Judaism and sacred texts, it is not the first time my people have confronted this kind of existential crisis. In fact, the story of Jewish history is replete with moments of threat, destruction, and impending doom. It is profound, then, that our generations of collective learning can help to ground us in a path forward. In Pirkei Avot, the Wisdom of our Ancestors, there is a quote that says, “In a place without humanity, strive to be human.” (2:5) And in the face of our modern reality, there is perhaps nothing more powerful than insisting on preserving the sanctity of our shared humanity.

At the same time that companies are continually treating us like case numbers and aggregated statistics, what does it mean to insist that every individual with whom we interact has inherent worth? What would it mean to see the cruelty that is ubiquitous on the internet and demand a higher standard from one’s self? There is, perhaps, no greater act of rebellion against a system that grinds society into clicks and dollars to demand an appreciation for the full complexity of our species in its imperfect, brilliant glory.

Central to the process of participating in the companies that are ruining our lives is the agreement that we are consumers, that we can buy the sense of peace and contentment to which we inevitably strive. But the truth is that we are not one purchase or one vacation away from being our best, most holistic selves. No, the real work of finding fulfillment in our lives is doing the spiritual work to appreciate our humanity, as well as being able to acknowledge the humanity of others. This can feel like a lonely business; after all, these phenomena are so ever-present because a huge percentage of those around us are buying into the process. But that doesn’t mean we have to agree to the terms. In fact, refusing to play is the best way that we can win.

Our world needs people. People willing to lead with kindness and compassion, rather than self-preservation and manipulation. People who are able to see the imperfection in one another, yet love each other anyway. People who refuse to allow the brokenness of the world break us.

Now, I see the contradiction in writing a blog to help fight against the abuses of the internet. The reality, though, is that change will only happen when we begin to take ownership of our digital landscape. The technologies we use today aren’t going away any time soon. We only have three options: participate in the problems, abstain altogether, or engage in a resistance movement. I hope this ongoing conversation can be a place to convene that conversation as we move forward.

Doctorow describes Enshittification as a contagion, spreading to others and perpetuating itself. But a movement to uplift and inspire the best of humanity can be just as infectious, if only we insist upon the preservation of hope. The systems that abuse us are too big to change quickly. But each and every one of us can decide that today is the day that we will express our humanity in the most powerful of ways, and in so doing remind others that there is another option beside blindly accepting the inevitable. Let us figure out what it means to be human in the 21st century together.