Unraveling This (Par)asocial Life
Most days, I’d rather hang out with YouTube than my real friends.
I’ve been spending a lot of time on YouTube lately. In the way an earlier incarnation of me might promenade about the village square and say Bonjour! to everyone like Belle, I open up my YouTube app and check in with all my subscriptions. I get that hit of dopamine that reminds me I’m a part of something whole.
This love I feel for my parasocial YouTube relationships is genuine, I think. They’re idealized in ways I recognize can’t be good for me, but it feels so good all the same. Even if they’re one-sided, these relationships still give me a feeling of connection and context, a sense of position within a wider world that renders my life meaningful, even though I’m all alone, staring at a screen.
I’m ashamed to admit I’m addicted to it, but I am.
It feels better in this bubble. Out there — in the world outside my window — it’s cold and dark and people are strange. Relationships are difficult and so easily turn toxic. Friendships feel more like distractions than nourishment. Not here, in this parasocial love affair with a screen. Here, my relationships are perfect.
My parasocial friends don’t interrupt me. They don’t judge me or project weird insecurities onto me. We have all…
