Introduction- Many, if not most people were shocked at recent events. The rise to power of people who would have been unthinkable a few short years ago now seems to be accelerating. It’s normal to feel overwhelmed, but giving up is not an option.
This is my attempt to list a few simple things we can all do to resist what seems so unstoppable. And save our sanity.
The Short Version
- Walk or bike. Ditch the car.
- Delete your corporate social media accounts (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook)
- Use Mastodon for social media. Bring your friends.
- Stop shopping. Buy only what you need.
- Get a library card and use it.
- Volunteer edit Wikipedia
- Change your email provider to one that respects privacy
- Use a privacy-focused browser, like Vivaldi.
- Install ad-blockers. Don’t click on ads, ever.
Walk or Bike Everywhere
Every trip you take on foot or on your bike deprives the oil and gas industry of money. And money is their blood. It’s also the best bang for your buck at getting healthier.
Also, a healthy person is a person who’ll use healthcare less and need fewer prescription medications. It’s also good for your calm.
Delete corporate social media accounts
Corporate social media like Twitter/X, Facebook, Threads, Instagram aren’t on your side. They write algorithms designed to enrage you and increase your anxiety level because they know that paradoxically, it keeps you glued to their sites and their ads. The longer you stay there, the better for them, the worse for you. You don’t need what they’re shoveling at you.
Join Mastodon
Human connection is still a thing we’re wired to seek out. Connecting with people who support you or lift your spirits is important. Now that you’ve left the corporate, algorithmic social media sites behind, it’s time to reach out with a better social network. Get your friends and family on Mastodon. I recommend you send them straight to Vivaldi Social and maybe walk them through how to register their account.
Support your local Mastodon instance. Don’t be a barnacle. Even if you can only afford a few dollars a month, if a lot of people do it, it will make a difference. Too many Mastodon instances are cannibalizing their admins’ pocketbooks. It’s not fair to the admins. Do your part.
Stop shopping.
It’s not supposed to be entertainment or a way to fill a hole. Money is their power. Stop giving them your power. Things are going to get expensive in short order. Do your future self a big favor and radically cut back or even stop your discretionary spending right now. Having money in your pocket to pay rent or buy groceries will be a lot more satisfying than that novelty t-shirt or fancy new phone.
Most especially stop giving it to people like Jeff Bezos. Buy nothing from Amazon. If you do have to go online to buy essentials, but them directly from the company that makes them. And make every effort to buy things locally.
As an aside, now is the time to get back into using cash. Not only has it been proven that you’ll spend less if you use physical bills and coins than if you use a credit card, but your purchases should be your business only. Don’t help big business nail down your profile by using credit cards.
Another way to stick it to Amazon is to download free books for your kindle. My favorite sources for copyright-free e-books are The Gutenberg Project (https://gutenberg.org) and Standard Ebooks (https://standardebooks.org). You might also want to check out some books from your local library. Which brings us to the next point.
Get a Library Card.
Libraries are under attack. We can’t afford to lose them. Libraries use the number of active library cards and users to justify their budgets. Use the library a lot. You can even take out books online with your library card in most cities.
Edit Wikipedia
This is a direct way for you to fight misinformation. Wikipedia makes it relatively easy to start editing wikipedia articles. You’ll have a mentor and at first they’ll suggest some easy edits for you to try, so you get a feel for it and gain confidence.
Register an account on Wikipedia. Become an editor. People use Wikipedia all the time. Start small and work your way up. Don’t get overwhelmed, but start today.
THINK like a resistance fighter.
Change your Email Provider
Change your email account to a company that respects your privacy. Tuta, proton, …
Use a Better Browser
Use a privacy-focused browser. Vivaldi is my go-to. It’s versatile enough to customize it almost the the point of ridiculousness. Trackers and ads are blocked. And you can customize that, too.
Firefox is a good choice as well. It’s the default on Linux, and is the only mainstream browser that isn’t based on Google’s chromium.
Support Vivaldi. Or Firefox, Or whatever browser you choose. While I chip in a few bucks every month towards Vivaldi, you can do small things like using a search engine that also helps support Vivaldi’s development. My favorite is Startpage.Com, because of the way they make it easy to view page results in “anonymous view”
If you choose not to use Vivaldi, install ad blockers on your browser- AdBlock Plus, uBlock Origin, Ghostery and Privacy Badger all come recommended. Ad revenue is money for the wrong kind of people. Don’t funnel that money to them. Starve the beasts.
Go and do something small today. Fight back.
In review:
I think we need more balance today, not going towards the other extreme. So I’d like to add some comments.
1. For some people, the car is a necessity. Going shopping, going to the job, travelling with the family, etc. Then, the impact of a single person on the oil industry is practically zero, even if a large portion of the population would give up driving cars. The greatest oil consumption is generated by large industries and lately the artificial intelligence or the cryptocurrencies, so no, as individuals we have a negligible impact. But walking and using more the bike is a good thing, in my opinion, but not exactly for the stated reasons.
2. We use social media so as to keep in touch. The reality is that most people are on Facebook and lately on Instagram. Maybe I don’t like this reality but this is the truth. Now, it is true that there are algorithms but most real-life persons I know use WhatsApp and sometimes the Facebook Messenger so as to keep in touch, so even if the large social media sites use algorithms or are full of advertising, we don’t really care. I have a wide presence on almost every other known platform but the reality remains the same: people won’t follow me elsewhere. As for the anxiety levels, it is up to each of us to keep our mind sane, regardless of the attempts of the tech companies to manipulate us or our attention.
3. I am with Vivaldi since the beginning and with their Mastodon instance also since its inception. I expanded a lot on Mastodon, voluntarily, but I ended up finding myself in an empty space. Everything started when Mr. Musk bought Twitter, people came to Mastodon and then most of them left, returning to their old profiles on the classical social media platforms. Now the tide comes again with Mr. Trump and again with Mr. Musk, but it will fade away again as well. I did hope to see Mastodon stronger but… I don’t know… perhaps it takes time… or perhaps the algorithms on the classical social media websites are so much better at customer retention…
4. I am frugal and I buy locally when I can. But I will also buy cheaper if possible, although I never bought something from Amazon, it wasn’t necessary. People will always look for the cheapest solution, it’s in their nature, so I doubt they will follow your advice. As for credit cards, they are here to stay, and they are the present/future. I do feel uncomfortable not to use cash but… this is our present time! At least I use a physical card and not a virtual card or an app so as to pay, but this is not far away unfortunately and an all-encompassing control is unavoidable I’m afraid. As for books, I use both pdfs and physical books, but reading is slowly disappearing so it doesn’t matter anymore, at some point everything will be electronic and in an audio or video format.
5. Libraries are for younger people, for workshops, fairs and for socializing. I mostly use torrents and other means to get my books online.
6. Wikipedia is for general knowledge, not for being used as a “resistance fighter” as you say. That is, Wikipedia should be free from any ideologies and also free from any fights or resistances, which are only one step away from personal interpretations and then ideological extremes…
7. In my country (European Union), each ISP (internet service provider) is required by law to keep a copy of everything I exchange online for a minimum of 6 months. So, everything is stored, by law. Now, changing the email provider doesn’t matter. Almost everyone I know has a Yahoo account and some use Gmail, which I avoid. Banks, services, orders, invoices, social media, everything goes through one email. Nobody sensible would take the time to change an entire structure built for more than 20 years when one knows oneself already legally surveilled…
8 & 9. I am an Opera and then Vivaldi user since time immemorial. Ad-blockers included, for a long time. Also a StartPage user for many years, it seems to be the best for me.
It was interesting to read your article and thanks for taking the time to read my comment!
Thank you for that considered comment. I appreciate your perspective!
I quite literally stumbled upon your post just now. I didn’t even mean to click on Blogs on Vivaldi, but this was featured, caught my attention, and is very much in line with my current thinking as well.
The emphasis on minimal, focused spending is one of the best ways to make your voice heard in a society where “money talks”.
I love your observation that we’re in a society where money talks. I hope more people make their silence a roar by taking whatever economies they can.
Thank you for your wonderful reply to my humble blog.
Excellent post. I can say I’m half way there or even a bit further. I hate cars all my life so this one isn’t really difficult at least for me. The most challenging things are to convince friends to leave Facebook and quit google myself, because I have some important information on my gmail and for now it would be difficult to export it all, I guess I need a better time management haha, but having both autism and ADHD is not helping. Anyway, thanks for sharing your thoughts!
Thank you for your most excellent comment! Yes, it is difficult to de-google our lives. It seems we’ve all put a large amount of our information there bit by bit, and it takes quite a lot of effort to untangle that. I hope you get to that point eventually. Many thanks again.