Over the last few days, I've been slowing deleting my archive on my Instagram. I do maintain FB, Instagram and Threads for work, but it has become increasingly intolerable to put up with the myriad changes that Meta imposes. The (now somewhat redacted) changes to their ToS which basically amount to 'you give us permission to rob you blind' was the final straw.
Meta is not alone in this, however. All social media places are either actively vacuuming up data for AI or passively allowing it to happen. Perhaps it is simply because they can, and no one can stop them. Perhaps it's because no one really cares all that much until something disastrous happens. Perhaps people simply do not consider their data to be something of themselves (admittedly how much attachment do you have to a stupid photo of a bunny shaped cake, like so?)
But things are different for me. I am an artist and an illustrator. Everything I create is, to some degree, an extension of myself. For years I have scattered and shared bits of these across the internet. For what? For no reason other than to share what I have, what I AM with other human beings. There is something about the process of sharing art, that feels fulfilling for a creator. It's not about garnering the most Likes or hearts or whatever. But to know that your creation (and thus a part of you) connects with the larger, invisible stream of consciousness... it touches something inside.
Over the years though, it feels like the larger consciousness increasingly spits back instead. There are still lovely people who do appreciate the work, without asking for anything in return. But theft of the art has existed since I started posting over 20 years ago, and it's just gotten worse since then. Enter the age of AI, and now I have Meta and the likes straight up telling me I'm their bitch and I should allow my art (and therefore myself) to be robbed all day every day for their pleasure, because I dared to exist.
Since no one seems to want to help me and other artists out of this, I've begun to think that the only way out is to simply... nope out of things. Which means sharing less online, or taking off what has been put out there. Sharing less does have the knock on effect of distancing yourself from other people (as anyone knows, you stop posting and your interactions go down).
As I delete stuff, I wonder - will this leave me unconnected from others? Will I just be alone again? The internet has been my main connection to society for 2 decades. Will I be able to adjust to a world where it's just me and my husband and our cats?
And is it that bad in the end? I grew up without the internet. I spent the first 10 years of my life only showing my art to my family and a couple of friends at school. I never felt the need to expose my art or myself to thousands of strangers.
Maybe that was the healthier way to go about it actually. Maybe this whole being connected to society thing was not something actually good in the first place. Maybe being (mostly) alone again really is the more natural way to be?
To think that only yesterday
I was cheerful, bright and gay
Looking forward to
Well, who wouldn't do
The role I was about to play
But as if to knock me down
Reality came around
And without so much
As a mere touch
Cut me into little pieces