Internet Rule

Morals isn't even a word most people can define today, if you ask them on the street
Try it sometime
It used to mean actions that were right and wrong
And now it's used as the BELIEF of rights and wrongs

They were so much simpler back then, if not Just
When there was no gray area to fight against
These days, we're expected to believe what's right and wrong is
Dictated to us by influencers, judicial threat, and guilt created by the gamification of social movements

The screens make us feel bad if we take a chance that our
For lack of another word our idols think is wrong
Being an autonomous person is tough these days
Just being who you are and making upyour own mind about morality

People who do make up their own mind are ostracized, kicked out of the so-called polite company
Labeled something nasty, looked down upon, kept out of fun things, out of community
They're led to believe there's something wrong with them, especially if they're young adults
They really do start to think there's something wrong with them if they don't see things the

Way everyone else seems to, and doubt rises in their minds
Boys who realized this way of living was harming them got gaslit and ridiculed
Girls were made to feel insecure and broken
And for all those in Gen Z who didn't grow up religious, who aren't from the more conservative

Families, they had no words to express how this made them feel
There was no language left
They can't talk about morality or loyalty, can't articulate any sort of spiritual degradation
The world population in the West has lost its spirit

There's no belief in it, no belief in anything
But the surface of a person, no deeper truth to a human
The wheels of consumerism as jaded government rule has made us believe their services are
A natural need, and anyone who didn't accept this was a problem

Until the only words we had left were their sales strategies
Maybe that's the best kind of marketing
Maybe the most powerful sales pitch is the one we can't even see anymore
The one companies have convinced us is common sense, our own opinion

When something becomes this addictive and out of control, when we can't conceive of
life without it, we have to call it a good thing
It's easier to reassure ourselves that this is
Ordinary and healthy, that anyone who opposes it is repressed

Otherwise, what the hell have we done
It's the same with childhood spent on screens
Something becomes so common we console ourselves that there's no other option
This is how life is now

And so there's little outrage, so few protests, campaigns, marches, or talk of trauma
For most of us, the best way to start is with our words
To most regular middle-of-the-road folks who've always seen themselves as sensitive and insecure
I say your voice is more important now than ever

It's time to use it to young men who don't want to degrade themselves anymore
Who believe there has to be more to life and love and themselves than this
Who want to be dignified and dependable, now is the time to be different

Because I'm beginning to see that all along, against all this cultural messaging, the marketing
Strategies, the trivialization, the gaslighting, the bravest of us were those insecure enough
To insist that this is not okay
Those who have had every reason to resign themselves, but they refuse

Because it's easier, far easier, to pretend these things are fine, to act as if this isn't happening
But by doing that, we'll leave another generation
Without the words for why this is wrong, and convinced the pain is all in their heads
We have to be brutally honest

Now if I have your attention, we really need to stop violence against trans people
Especially trans girls
Some of them just follow these influencers
But some are genuinely in truth about who they are, and violence against them should be stopped

They're in this too, they're not just a result of this social strategy of internet rule
Just look at us now, the older end of Gen X and middle aged Z, look at these liberated
Lonely generations trying to feel something, anything from screens, a generation losing

Belief that love even exists, who increasingly expect infidelity and betrayal, who find it
Hard to look each other in the eye
I can't help but think we are traumatized, and yes, I know that word's used too liberally
But maybe our actual trauma is one we can't bring ourselves to admit

The thing too unbearable to type out, too shameful to face, perhaps the issue with the
Least outrageous, the fewest protests, cuts deepest of all
For the next generation, for their livelihood, for their childhood, for their chances at
Love, we have to find our voice, we have to process the horror of pre-teens losing their

Spirit, acknowledge the scale of what's happening from endlessly scrolling and getting our morality
From reels, confront what we've done and its consequences
Only by facing it will we find some words of our own, I hope we're not afraid to use them