TLDR: This started as a response to @trucklife-family recent post about Raising Awareness and though it went completely off-topic (because awareness is important, but not mandatory ), it turned into a post of it's own.

But also: We need to make a game of coming up with a snappy acronym or something for "The Steem Ecosystem" because Steemit is just a viewer, not the "Be All, End All" of Steem. Perhaps @crimsonclad could toss that to her audience on mspwaves?

So now, a sappy love-letter to Steem, lol.

Love this post. Believe it or not, I'm currently trying to achieve exactly the kind of lifestyle that you spoke about... less-connected, less-aware, peaceful and blissful quasi-ignorance. And here's why.

When I was on Wastebook, I was overloaded with Outrage-Industry crap... all of it liberal.. I was once a tireless "crusader" (re-poster) for LGBTQIA-unmanagebly-long-alphabet-soup-BBQ rights, as well as hardcore SJW or "Fundamentalist Liberal" as I now call it politics. Awareness was important MANDATORY, and I was going utterly insane... Because the thing I realized, through many extremely painful lessons, is that A: I really am but a whisper in a cacophonous storm, and B: a gigantic amount of that cacophony was fueled by profit.

It really came down to the election of Trump, and the hysteria that followed. I couldn't bring myself to vote for Hillary, because of the Bernie-blackout, when the Mainstream Media in the US did everything possible to prevent people from hearing his message, and subsequent admissions by the Democratic party that they are under no legal obligation to run a fair nomination. They are not a government agency, they are just a supremely powerful liberal special interest "umbrella" organization, just like the Republicans are on the conservative side. Political parties are -not- necessary for democracy... Just quite convenient. I'll never give a single $$ to the Libs or the Cons again. I'm truly independent now, and largely only interested in State and Local elections. I've donated, even campaigned for democrats in my area, but it was entirely due to analysis and reason, not because of manufactured political tribalism.

And after Trump got elected, and the furor of meme's and re-posts and "action alerts" by different sites, I realized something. Not one of those sites turned off their advertising because of the crisis at hand. In fact, those were their biggest days, advertising-wise... Therefore, it is most lucrative for there to ALWAYS be a crisis, always a reason to be shocked and fully believe "This Will Not Stand!!!!111" and re-post, get the message out there, organize and protest.

But those protests never happened.. that organizing never happened. I had a job, I had transportation issues, and I was so frantic about real life concerns and THE PANIC that I never went to any of those things. I had no time or money to do anything other than re-post, and raise "awareness". So I ended up being nothing but a parrot who supported aimless hysteria (cause nobody else I knew had time or money either) and pretty much just being a viral outrage Industry marketer of One. And like I said.. I was freaked out all the time, because there was ALWAYS another crisis, on every front, as every one of those liberal blogs was in competition for $$$. Eventually I found a web extension to filter everything political out of Wastebook, but my friends were still mired and re-posting, so I unfollowed all my friends, and more filters, and VPN's to fool the advertisers, and I finally managed to get it down to a small group of cool-headed folks and cultural pages/groups that actually interest me.

And then: STEEM.

"unhappy Eagle needs hugs"

I'm so much happier here, because everything I follow is something that's actually relevant to me. Something I enjoy.. and the content here is brilliant and funny and full of heart. I'm trying to onboard some cool folks who I think could really appreciate it. In fact I know some folks that would totally rock this place with well-reasoned critiques and smart posts.. serious assets to The Steem Ecosystem... but they are still caught up, they just can't disengage.

Since I've been here, I've started looking into all kinds of interests that I never would have touched before, and finding value all over the place. Some of it is in direct opposition to my earlier "manufactured political tribalism"... Things I simply can't talk about on FB without being immediately excoriated and excommunicated as a blasphemer (when I said SJW's were Fundamentalist Liberals, I meant it) by some SJW folks. I'm halfway scared to even post about some of them here, even. So I'm taking it easy, might bring it up sometime.. might not. But only after forming my own opinion, either way.

I'm still huge about SAGA "Sexuality and Gender Acceptance" (beats the shit out of LGBTQIA-BBQ) and mostly liberal interests.. but the more I see, the more I learn that the really BIG issues are all strictly Human issues, there is no division... and largely lost in the cacophony, very much on purpose.

Cause that's the thing about The Steem Ecosystem... it runs on what we Murica'ns call "island time"... It's more laidback, not so hypercompetitive.. folks here aren't nearly as materialistic or vain as Wastebook or Murica'n culture at all. This was a place of healing more than anything else, and now a most worthy pursuit in it's own right.

Steem is kind, Steem is fun, Steem is Righteous.

It reminds me very much of the early days of the internet, where you had your favorite sites, and everyone chatted on AIM or ICQ (now discord). Net Society is FUN again...

Viva la Steem!