Ep. 371: Is it Finally Time to Leave Social Media?

Deep Questions with Cal Newport

Cal Newport

Technology, Self-improvement, Education

4.8 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 22 September 2025

⏱️ 86 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

We seem to be stuck in a purgatory when it comes to the worst of the social media platforms. We know they’re not great, but it’s hard to muster enough motivation to bother to leave. In today’s episode, motivated by the assassination of Charlie Kirk, Cal puts on his technology critic hat and offers a step-by-step technical explanation for why these platforms are strictly and incessantly making your life worse and why the only reasonable response is to quit them. He then answers listener questions on the topic and reacts to some recent news about the US Congress getting involved.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Two days after the assassination of Charlie Kirk, I sent a short essay to my newsletter.
0:08.1	I wrote it in about 15 minutes, but it was about as raw or as pointed as I ever get.
0:15.1	The essay started like this.
0:17.7	Those of us who study online culture like the use to phrase Twitter is not real life.
0:23.0	But as we saw yet again this week, when the digital discourses fostered on services like Twitter or Blue Sky or TikTok do intersect with the real world, whether they originate from the left or the right, the results are often horrific.
0:36.0	This should tell us all we need to know about these platforms.
0:38.6	They are toxic and dehumanizing.
0:40.7	They are responsible as much as any other force for the unraveling a civil society that seems to be accelerating.
0:48.4	All right.
0:48.6	Then later in the essay, I reached the following conclusion.
0:53.2	After troubling national events, there's often a public conversation about the appropriate way to respond.
0:59.5	Well, here's one option to consider.
1:01.7	Quit using these social platforms.
1:04.2	Find other ways to keep up with the news or spread ideas or be entertained.
1:07.7	Be a responsible grown-up who does useful things, someone who serves real people
1:12.2	in the real world.
1:14.8	And in the over two decades or so
1:16.7	that I've been writing that newsletter,
1:18.2	I don't think I've ever received as large
1:20.1	or as positive of a response as I did for that
1:22.5	post. I'm at something like 200 email
1:24.4	replies and counting in nearly
	...

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