Degradation in the World of Words

How can we stop falling into mediocrity?

Feb 09, 2025

Introduction. Inspiration

I’ve started reading a book by a Polish author, published in Poland, about the journalistic icon of America: The New Yorker.1

The cover of the book mentioned in the introduction. The tagline says: “Biography of the Magazine Which Transformed America”

The first chapters took me one hundred years back, to the beginnings of the magazine. Soon, I felt surrounded with a strikingly different reality than the world we live in today. The difference was not in another time, not in the noise of typewriters, not in the screeching of pencils. It was about the responsibility for the words published. Immediately, I recognised this aura of an exceptional magazine as familiar. When as an adolescent, over four decades ago, in my formative years, I read “Tygodnik Powszechny”, perhaps the only opinion-forming title not controlled by the communist party2, I must have felt as privileged to share thoughts with independent thinkers, as the Americans were while spreading the sheets of The New Yorker at cafeterias and at homes.

Reading about the first editor, Harold Ross, his painstaking care about fact checking and truth, I could not help comparing him to Jerzy Turowicz3, for me an epitome of intellectually and socially engaged journalist. Then, I stopped reading, thought for a while, the noise of all the Musks, Trumps and the like liars still reverberating in my head; and realised, how far from these ideals is a common reader’s attitude to words today.

Diagnosis

Roger McNamee, a Sillicon Valley entrepreneur and investor, had mentored Mark Zuckerberg in the years of early development of Facebook. Then Roger advised Mark not to deploy the “like” button. Next, implored him not to add news stream to the social platform invented for communication. The young wannabee Caesar of our times did not heed, and Facebook turned into an uncontrollable weapon of mass destruction.4

To publish a piece in The New Yorker in Harold Ross’ time—and I believe the standards are equally high today—an author had to pass through the sieve of proofreading, fact checking and editor’s revision. Who read an article there, could agree or disagree with an opinion, but at least was sure that he or she was not reading downright lies. Not everybody finds a kindred spirit in a particular editorial profile. Papers, magazines and websites sympathise with this or other side of the political scene, but adhering to any of them requires some intellectual effort, self-asked questions, and attempts to answers.

In the era of Facebook, Twitter (let alone its evil-managed morph X), anyone, with no effort at all—with a single tap on a button—can disseminate any content, no matter how distant from the truth it is.5

I’ve emphasised the word “content” to draw attention to another instance of lowering standards in the world of words. Content is a vestigial form; it is what has remained of texts, materials, articles, editorials; reportage, opinion, fiction.

Migration to the small-size displays of the phones, not only from paper but from large desktop monitors too, the demand to reply in an instant to every blip, and the infamous “fear of missing out” contributed to giving up on longer, thoughtful forms, in favour of trite, catchy, often inflammatory phrases.

This decline creeps out from the phones and insidiously poisons our habits of speaking, reading and writing in all realms of our lives, starting from the corporate workplaces. Individual ingenuity, even if only in a narrow field—an asset valued and appreciated in small teams—is trampled with mediocre procedures and bland guidelines. The process resembles the damage which the deluge of Google has inflicted on older, sophisticated and tailored software tools. With the recent deployment of Gemini, a badly behaved intruder which does not even care about asking for permission to interfere, I cannot help the impression that we are on a slippery slope to communicate in a cringeworthy Googlish soon.

The cure. What can we do?

No government regulations and no bans will heal us from the Google-X-Meta poisoning. Expecting these platforms to self-regulate is more delusional than just sitting and waiting for a miracle. We; everyone, must start the hard work of restoring the pursue of high standards of information. In a similar way like in an airplane in emergency, the first action is to put on one’s own oxygen mask, and then help others.

Get the news from trustworthy sources

The first action is to cut yourself from the direct source of fire. Never ever get the news from a stream on social media. Choose papers, magazines, websites which have a good record of being trustworthy, and subscribe to them. It may cost money, but providing reliable information is what the journalists do professionally for living, they deserve to be paid for their job.

Don’t “like” or share compulsively

Let some time pass, a couple of hours if not a day, between reading something and “liking” or sharing it. If you remember well what you read the day before, if it still inspires you, then share. See how many shares had been utterly unnecessary in the past.

A higher level: consider quitting social media for good. At least the most toxic one, X.

Become more and more independent of the ways of thinking the big tech tries to impose on you

Organise your work: the way you collect data, plan your actions, write outlines and final pieces of work, in your individual way, not necessarily following the way the programmers at Google have concocted for you. When you type, spelling correction may be a useful tool, but auto completion deprives you of your own writing style. Revive the flexibility and versatility of notes made in handwriting, on paper, in colours. Use A.I., if at all, extremely carefully. Maybe it can serve as a dictionary which you can ask a question. Perhaps as an extended, interactive search engine. Don’t let it write for you. If we let it substitute our creative work, we’ll end up as the illiterate.

Replace the infinite scroll with thoughtful reading of books and long-form journalism…

… and discuss with your peers real ideas, not squabbles in tweets.

We need to revive the fundamental virtues of truth, decency, the sense of duty, obligations. In the age of demagogues, it is urgent to recall philosophers.

Make your independence from the big tech enviable and inspiring

Be proud of finding your own ways. Share the benefits of thinkig independently. Highlight the power of reason over cults and manias.

One perfect example, which impresses and inspires me, is

The Analog Family

6, a victory of wisdom, common sense, and parental love over the digital dangers the young generation face.

The above is only the beginning, the fundamentals

Only by severing from feeds which are not the news, from revelations which are not truths, and from mirages which are intended to enslave us, we may hope for counteracting the populism and regaining confidence. To rebuild understanding in the modern world, in the first place we must revive and put in the new light the old, eternal truths.

If you have any thoughts on the above, please leave a comment. Your remarks may improve my future writing.