15 out of 16 people are completely wrong about this amazing fact!

You will never believe your eyes!

…really? You clicked on a link with that title? Are you a complete fucking moron? Why would you do that? Don’t you realize that titles with this style and format are used by spammers and virus-distributors?

Now, I realize that some of you are reading this because you are fans of this blog. If that’s the case, then this post is not directed toward you.

Unless you read Buzzfeed…. in which case it is directed toward you.

Buzzfeed is just one example of many that I honestly believe are destroying journalism. I’m not being hyperbolic or dramatic. They have pushed the curve of what it means to do journalism by focusing entirely on “clickbait” and catering to people’s basest instincts, and if left unchecked journalism itself will become a completely meaningless endeavor.

Like a poorly behaved 6-year-old, these websites have learned that by standing on a table and pulling down their pants in a restaurant, they can get attention. So they keep doing it over, and over, and over again. And it is making people stupider: by transforming online journalism into moronic sensationalist titles and collages of shocking or feel-good pictures interspersed with inane commentary, these websites are actually training the average American mind to be even dumber than it already is.

Do they hold all of the blame? Well, Buzzfeed and the rest of the websites that are going along with their strategy for garnering attention are doing it because, in the capitalist context in which we are all embedded, it works. So capitalism has some blame.

And so do you.

Please stop clicking on crap titles like this. If a title doesn’t tell you anything about the actual contents of the article, it’s a scam. It’s bullshit, and it’s crap journalism, and you need to avoid it not just to protect yourself but also to stop being complicit. Please trust that any actual “information” you might get from a site like that, you will be able to get from a different site that actually knows how to write decent online articles and decent online titles.

So please just stop it: never click on a link to an article with a title like this one again.