The Economics of Attention

There was a brief uproar about words that were supposed to replace “nigger.” Because many White women were being called “Karens” in deference to weaponizing Whiteness to provoke before playing the victim, some were saying that “Karen” was the new “nigger.” As many people became radicalized by the horrific responses to COVID-19, many conservative people are claiming that “conservative” is the new “nigger.” As Black and brown people and communities continue to be ravaged by everything going on in the United States, we would take issue with these complaints, except that we know why people want everything to become the new “nigger.” For the first time in centuries, people are finally paying — scant — attention to what it means to be niggers.

Though it has been said by a number of different people–many of whom are probably running for office, or who are thinking about running for office–the United States is a nation run by people with a psychological deficit. Describing the psychological deficit of narcissism is actually easy — in fact, too easy, because it excuses everyone except those whom everyone agrees are narcissists. Saying that those in power are narcissistic is akin to saying, “Well, these people are pathological, and they are the reason that we have problems.” Most people who are dejected and despondent about how politics occur in this country can recognize that no one thing created this combination of crises to occur on such grand scales. I will attempt such a feat.

This nation is experiencing multiple crises because instead of being run by the consent of the governed, instead of being run by the sustainability of natural resources, and instead of being run by the strength of the populace, the United States runs on one thing: attention. The problems with attention are multifold, but the biggest problem is that for those who created systems which require attention, they will never get enough. For example, anybody who creates such a system is hoping that people will pay attention to that one person without cessation. Eventually, as people are trained to pay attention to that one person, that person needs to do less and less outreach. Consequently, not only will that person literally have to do nothing to capture the attention of people, the populace will chastise itself for not being able to capture that person’s attention.

Plumage is a determining factor for the mating of several species, even socializing among species. However, human beings do not get to be hypocritical and say that we are an evolved species, who can use technology and rise above conflict, while still saying that we follow the same rules of basic mating. I would also argue that requiring people to attract attention has led to more unprofessional behavior, i.e. messy inner office romances and unethical sexual harassment. When people use a skill that is biologically designed to mate, we cannot avoid crossing multiple boundaries with no regard for the pain caused.

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First and foremost, the only goal of attention seeking is numbers. Why is social media so important? Because we figure out how many likes somebody gets, how many friends we have, and how far a reach we have with our followers. Why is networking so important? Because we consider how many business cards we can get, how many donors we can attract, and how many genuine conversations we can hold to attract future collaboration, not to mention how many interviews we can get. How many, how many, how many, how many. With such an emphasis on numbers, there is little recognition of the inauthentic quality of those enormous numbers; “fortunately,” we have worked extremely hard to distract ourselves out of the notion that other people have feelings. We need attention to survive because according to the economics of attention, we are told that we deserve to be homeless and starve if people ignore us, which is irrational.

Such a dejected and depressed society exists because people have to constantly recraft their experiences and post on multiple different sites for cruel, racially-discriminating algorithms in vague hopes of crossing the eyes of individuals who might share resources. We owe all the exhibitionists apologies for mocking their efforts, because if one lives in a society where attention is the only currency that leads to the acquisition of resources, everyone is going to be doing anything and everything to gain attention. When we are all obsessed with numbers, none of us is blameless. There is no moral high ground to condemn those who do nothing but seek numbers because numbers are how we survive. If we were honest with ourselves, we would recognize that resumes are not designed to treat pathologies, and people conditioned to ignore others will not change for fonts, bullet points, bachelor’s degrees, or trade skills.

Secondly, an economy of attention is dependent on people’s capacity to attract others. People saying and doing outrageous things on a regular basis should be seen as incredibly normal. If no one pays attention to you unless you sit naked in the middle of the street with your legs spread, unless there are race riots, unless you say that women should not be talking about their sexuality, then people are going to do each and every one of those things. There is no limit to what people will do, up to and including murder. The incel movement, in which people are literally doing what they can to be as toxic as possible, is not abnormal; it is exactly what we should have expected. People will shoot people, run them down with their cars, rate people, brutalize animals in a park in Florida — whatever they can to get attention. Most people know that if they fail to gain attention, they simply become one of the masses, who is struggling to exist.

Thirdly, attention-seeking behavior requires external validation for internal worth. Why do people decide what to do? They decide what to do based on whether or not somebody else has approved of them having resources, having connectivity, or having power, so that they can have autonomy. A lot of people remain stuck if there are no jobs, stuck without capital to start or maintain a private entity, or stuck needing the external existence of somebody or some other resources. Educationally, professionally, and personally, if somebody is not getting enough of the “right kind” of attention, that person viewed as innately worthless.

We are all so trained to the economy of attention that we judge people who do not have the capacity to attract what little attention we may have. We judge people based on whether other people will pay attention to them, but really to us. That inability to respect all human beings has led to exacerbated dysfunction throughout society. That is the dominant narrative, where there are increasingly fewer people who are willing to share and engage with the rest of society. Of course, the more resources one has, the easier it is to avoid validating anyone else. The more external validation somebody has received, the easier it is to tell other people that they have no internal worth.

Fourthly, people with enough attention are granted the capacity to have healthy social lives. So many of us are indoctrinated into the economy of attention that we believe we are worth next to nothing if we fail to achieve the right kind of external validation. With little exception, we strive so fervently for “the right kind” of external validation that we are willing to diminish our own self-worth in favor of acquiring it. It is extremely stressful to attempt dating people, networking, or even making new friends if one does not have enough attention. Yes, human beings seek connectivity, but intimacy and connectivity are different from attention. Attention is what we pay to shows that we watch consistently; connectivity is actually understanding that we have kinship on a subliminal level.

If somebody has not had enough external validation to have enough resources, society has said that that person should live a life of isolation until they manage to acquire the right kind of attention that will allow them the possibility of a social life. One of the favorite trends of people with resources is to say, “I have no idea why they’re having kids or getting married, or hanging with friends, when they’re in debt.” If the whole purpose of spending time with anybody is to affirm that we have gotten enough external validation, then so many friendships and romances have broken because one party — or more than one party for the polyamorous — has failed to acquire the “proper” attention. Therefore, the other person feels entitled to criticize and demean the other person, leading to emotional, financial, and even physical abuse.

Finally, rest is one of the rewards of attention, which means that only the well-attended are well-rested. When people are unable to acquire the right kind of attention, they have to work all the time; they get almost no spare time and no reward; they have to stay awake and there is no time to breathe. Without fail, they must have all their time devoted to attention-seeking because otherwise, they are eligible for unceasing strain. The exhaustion of the masses is further proof that economics based on attention is not sustainable. One of the reasons why we are seeing so much mental illness during these crises is because people cannot either physically rest because everybody keeps demanding to be served, nor can they emotionally rest if they are unemployed. This is supposed to be freedom. The freedom to attract attention is the only freedom that exists in the United States. Everything else is just indoctrination and servitude to people who can never receive enough attention.

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True freedom is the freedom to be invisible. Freedom is a bad resume with as much vacation time as we need. We need the freedom to avoid networking events, and not have to get likes and clicks on our social media. We should feel free not to be recognized for all of the work that we do without the penalties currently foisted upon us. The freedom to be invisible means that people are able to exist without having to work so exceedingly hard just to do so. Someone might ask me what policies I have in place to transfer the economics of attention. I am self-aware enough to say that I am not aiming for the power or control to answer those questions by myself. I am only ever interested in working with other people because solitary leaders are prime targets for corruption.

So many people in charge of policymaking are people who demand attention without cessation. Instead of policymakers and representatives, we have insatiable attention-seeking monsters who were invulnerable to all of the crises. Nobody has been effected outside their stock portfolio, and all of them are eating well and supposedly working. All of our politicians are safely ensconced in their homes; nobody is homeless, or even under the threat of eviction. No politicians had to look for jobs, even though they would argue that their election is a job. They lack the skills to craft policy and enact change; they only know how to get and maintain attention. A microscopically small number of politicians have compassion and are responsive to the needs of the populace; most only know that they have to get the attention of the populace to maintain power. None of them lacks health care because as politicians, they get great health care; all they live for is fundraising and making speeches. They do very little in terms of making decisions and following through in a way that benefits the public.

If one wants to argue private sector could be doing something, I will absolutely agree. Many of these real estate holders and billionaires could have used this time to demonstrate, “No, we do care about our fellow human beings. In fact, because we are millionaires and billionaires and we have the money, we will be freezing rents and student loans.” Freezing and freezing and freezing. All the private sector had to do was do it. No voting was required, even though some will argue that shareholders had to vote. I would argue that if you are the CEO of a company, and you surround yourself with people who are opposed to your putting a freeze on bills during multiple national crises, and you feel no remorse about maintaining the current structure of your company — that you should not be in power anymore.

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During these crises, none of these things have happened. Neither the public nor the private sectors has demonstrated any leadership in the acknowledgement that people cannot constantly vie for their attention, however many emails or phone calls they get. The so-called politicians and business leaders live for being in public, and being adored. They live for being constantly sought after and fake modesty. When somebody actually sees them, they get to preen over the fact that they cannot even go out in public without somebody begging for their approval. Those are the economics of attention. If people really want freedom, then everybody has to have the right to survival during a pandemic without starving. We have to be able to live and breathe during multiple crises. It barely takes a catastrophe for those with the least amount of attention to merely keel over and die. Because of the attention-seeking of this election cycle, people actually have died.

So the economics of attention says that people with it have the right to ignore people without it through no fault of their own. There is no consequence to ignoring the plight of somebody else in favor of oneself. Statistically speaking, it is impossible for everyone to garner excessive attention. If we want to become a truly free nation, then we have to break ourselves out of the economics of attention and embrace the freedom to be no one. Also, for everyone still whining that some other word is just as bad as “nigger” to gain attention, no one is asking you until your continued existence is a license for relentless exploitation on multiple levels.