Why I'm Pausing Social Media (And You Should Too)

My experiment of digital detox The progressive process lasted 153 days, during which I confirmed one thing: social networks are no longer public squares. They are algorithmic slaughterhouses where we are bred to be commodities (or monsters).

It only took me 153 days!

One hundred and fifty-three days of posts, experiments, and conversations (some with an AI that's more human than many verified profiles). Sixty-one articles published, with an average of 252 clicks per article. Numbers that on paper say "“it's working”.

But working for what? Well… The Rickyverse It was born with a very specific purpose: to create an independent blog and gradually cut ties with social networks.

I no longer felt like feeding a machine that gives me nothing but anxiety, anger, and the constant feeling of screaming into the void while someone—or something—decides whether my voice is worth hearing.

So now it's time to… come back to my house!

This blog is my home. Social media was just a parking lot. And a seedy parking lot, at that. Or a condominium with paper walls, where you have the illusion of being able to isolate yourself but in reality everything hits you: noises, shouting, anger, disturbances of every kind. .

It's not just a personal issue. It's structural. And if you're here reading this, maybe you too have felt something broken. Let me tell you what I saw from the inside.

1. Hate as a Business Model

Open Facebook, Instagram, X. What do you find?
Anger. Division. People yelling at each other. Flame wars under recipe posts. Gratuitous insults. Bots spamming propaganda.

And you know what the worst part is? It's intentional.

The algorithm learned one simple thing: hate is more engaging than love. Anger keeps you glued to the screen more than beauty. So what does it do? It pushes content that pisses you off. It doesn't matter if it's true, if it's constructive, if it adds something to the world.

The only metric that matters is the residence time. And you—we—are the product.

2. The Institutional Paradox (or: fuel on the fire)

Let's face it. Those who are supposed to care about us—politicians, government officials, institutions—what are they doing on these platforms?

He doesn't use them to listen. He doesn't use them to unite.
He uses them for lie.

I see world leaders using the same tools as trolls to produce fake news by the millions. I see institutions that, instead of putting out fires, pour algorithmic fuel on them just to gain a handful of votes or distract public opinion from real issues.

They spread hatred scientifically. They polarize. They create imaginary enemies.

And should I be in the same "public space" as those who poison wells? Should I give my attention, my time, my presence to platforms that enable (and encourage) all this because it generates traffic?

No. I don't want to be a number in the statistics of those who are dismantling democracy with tweets.

3. “It's social media's fault” (The big lie to clear your conscience)

How many times do we hear it?
“According to social media…”
“Social anger…”
“Social media thinks…” “The social pillory…”

Let's stop. Social media doesn't "think." Social media doesn't "say.".
It's us.

Behind every comment that pushes a young girl into anorexia, behind every insult that drives someone to take their own life out of shame, there isn't "social media." There's a person.

Say “it's social media's fault” It has become the most convenient way to shed the monstrosity we carry inside. It's the perfect excuse to avoid admitting that we've become ugly, bad, unworthy people. Incapable of empathy. Ignorant. Devoid of humanity.

Social media is just the distorting mirror that has given us permission to be monsters without paying the consequences.

But I don't want that mirror in my house anymore. I want to look people in the eye, not their angry avatars.

4. Fraudulent Advertising (Who cares about honest people?)

Scroll through your homepage. Miracle investments. Magical weight-loss products. Deepfakes of celebrities promising you easy money.

You report them. Nothing. You report them again. Nothing.
Why? Why? pagan. And as long as they pay, they can stay.

Meanwhile, small, honest businesses—those that could truly create value—must shell out ridiculous sums of money to get organic visibility wiped out by the algorithm. The message is clear: either you pay or you don't exist. And if you pay enough, you can even scam with impunity.

I'm not here anymore.

5. The Psychological Massacre of the Youngest

Zuckerberg, Musk, and various CEOs appear on television to philanthropize. "We care about young people's online mental health.".

Nothing.

The data speaks for itself: exponential increase in depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and self-harm among adolescents Since social media became legalized drugs. Algorithms designed to create addiction. Notifications that exploit dopamine. Popularity metrics that destroy self-esteem.

It's not a side effect. It's the pattern.
If they truly cared about mental health, they'd close shop tomorrow. But they never will. Because money is more important than lives.

6. The Pornography of (Fake) Pain

This is perhaps the thing that disgusts me the most.

Scroll through and you'll find a photo of a child in the mud, or a three-legged dog looking at you with big, shining eyes.
The text below is ungrammatical, clearly mistranslated: “Today is my birthday and no one wishes me a happy birthday”, or “Why don’t you share if you have a heart?”.

Below, thousands – thousands – of comments: “I pray for you 🙏”, “"Amen"”, “Poor angel”, “What a shame the government is”.

The truth? That child doesn't exist. That dog doesn't exist.

These are images generated with Artificial Intelligence in three seconds. They're as fake as a three-euro coin.

These are clickbait pages (often run by bot farms on the other side of the world) that exploit the pity of naive people to drum up engagement and then resell their accounts.

È emotional fraud.

If reality no longer matters, I exit the simulation.

7. The Algorithm Steals (But Only When It's Convenient)

Have you noticed how it works?
You publish an original idea. The algorithm takes it, analyzes it, uses it to train its AI models, and sells it to third parties.

Your intellectual property? The social data privacy? Your privacy?
“You have accepted the terms and conditions.”

But try using three seconds of a copyrighted song, perhaps playing on the radio in the background without you even noticing. Immediate ban.
The rules only apply to us. For them, anything goes. I prefer to keep my ideas where I can control them.

8. The Illusion of Community and Empty Numbers

“Stay connected.” Really?
I only see likes, no conversations. Generic comments. People who follow thousands of accounts but don't know anyone.

It's not connection. It's simulation.

Followers, Reach, Engagement… numbers that don't measure value, but measure how good you are to play the algorithm's guitar.
And I don't want to play for him anymore.

So I built myself a house of my own.

Here, my little digital bunker. An independent blog, like in the early days of the Internet, before social media, which were nothing more than deviant microblogging platforms...

There are no algorithms here. There are no likes. There are no ads. There is no data collection. There are no metrics that tell me whether I'm worthy or not.

There are only stories. Mine. And those who decide to read them do so by choice, not because an artificial intelligence decided they "might interest you.".

If you want to follow me, Subscribe to blog notifications. I'll write to you once a week, on Tuesday mornings. Only when I have something worth your time.

No spam. No noise. Just substance.

And if we don't see each other on social media anymore... oh well. 🤷‍♂️
I know where to find myself. And where to find the people I love.

See you on the other side of the mirror!

Ricky