Jump Scared

It's neither surprising nor news that millennials are having fewer children: The economy is screwed; the environment is doomed; there's a raging pandemic; and we've culturally moved beyond the heteronormative go-to-college-get-married-have-babies pipeline.
Jeva Lange "Lamb is the bonkers new A24 horror film you won't stop talking about"

Perhaps it's just me, but pointing the finger at Facebook for making people angry and depressed seems a little like scapegoating when a review of a horror film seems to go out of its way to paint real life as just as bad as any fictional dystopia.

So, while I haven't been to a haunted house in literally decades, I still remember them as fun, and understand the wanting to be somewhat scared yet understanding that there's no real danger. And I think that a lot of people look for that. The posts that people have lifted from Facebook and shared with me are often all about people expressing their anger or depression at the state of the world, and these posts can rack up large numbers of "likes."

Of course, "the algorithm" serves up these posts like toxic candy, but on some level, people eat them up. This how "the algorithm" learned that this is what it should serve people. An old co-worker once posted on LinkedIn that one should always think prior to responding to something that pushes one's emotional buttons. Of course, it's unrealistic to expect everyone to take that advise, but there's still a lot of daylight between that and casting people as broadly incapable of understanding that it's maybe good to stay away from something that they've concluded is bad for them.

And that would lessen the number of news stories that lean heavily on promoting anger and despair, too. Making the case that Millennials tend to find the world dismal has nothing to do with Lamb. It's not not necessary to help a reader understand either the film or it's themes. It's just a random bit of doomsaying; maybe it was hoped that someone would share it on Facebook.