Hello, friends! Welcome to this month’s meeting of the Insecure Writers’ Support Group, a blog hop created by Alex J. Cavanaugh and co-hosted this month by Victoria Marie Lees, Sarah Foster, Natalie Aguirre, and C. Lee McKenzie. Are you a writer? Do you feel insecure? Well, then this is the support group for you! Click here to learn more and to see a list of participating blogs.
People don’t read anymore. People’s attention spans are too short due to social media, YouTube and TikTok, podcasts, A.I. generated slop content, yada yada, et cetera et cetera… I’m sure you’ve heard this before. I’ve been hearing it a lot lately. It’s almost enough to make me worry. I mean, if it’s true that nobody reads anymore, what’s the point of me doing all this writing?
Except I don’t think it’s true. Certainly, social media addiction is a thing. Brainrot is a thing, and some people’s attention spans are being affected by that. These are real problems, but I think self proclaimed experts-on-the-zeitgeist exaggerate how big and how universal these problems really are. When I think about the people I know in real life, do some of them spend too much time online? Sure. But most of them don’t.
And as for the assertion that nobody reads anymore… again, when I think about the people I know in real life, I know a lot of people—people of all ages—who are avid readers. Their taste in literature may be different than mine, but they’re still avid readers. Granted, I also know some people who don’t read much. Turns out some people enjoy reading and some don’t. That’s nothing new. That was true before, too.
It is a fact that some people are struggling with various flavors of Internet addiction. It is also true that some people don’t like to read. Extrapolating from those two data points that nobody reads anymore because everybody’s got brainrot? That doesn’t add up. And the people who keep saying things like that? These same people tend to make a lot of broad generalizations about what’s going on in the zeitgeist these days. I have no idea what their agendas are, but they’re wrong. It’s time to stop listening to them and get back to writing.
i-love-space.com 
Hi,
Nobody reads any more ? In our family, a different literacy poblem has just been diagnosed. Apparently the four year old is hyperlexic and hypernumerate too.
Perhaps, and fairly soon, will enjoy your books ?
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I didn’t know those were words, but those sound like good words to know! Are there any downsides to being hyperlexic or hypernumerate? I can’t imagine there would be.
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Knew only dyslexia.
Downsides ? Terrible ones. Poor social skills, allegedly. Husband, grandfather to this 4yo, said the diagnosis would fit both of us. Elder daughter – his mother, rebelled against school reading course, asked to bring the book she was reading at home. Class teacher appalled, needed to speak to us. What was the worst aspect of the offendingh book ? Intended bigamy, false imprisonment – surely ‘ coercive and controlling) or the inappropriate relationship with teenaged employee ?
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Probably fits me too, then. I allegedly have poor social skills, except when I’m talking about space and/or books.
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From what I’ve read, there’s been a general downward tend in reading for pleasure, but it’s not precipitous, and it’s been going on since the 1950s starting with widespread adoption of TV, and continuing with video games and the internet.
Books do have a lot more competition than they once did, something we have to keep in mind when writing stories. People aren’t going to give us a hundred pages to get to the point like they did with the classics. Books that can show momentum early will likely be more successful, at least from what I can see.
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I’ve read that, too. It kind of amuses me when I hear about daily life in the 18th or 19th Centuries, with people reading piles and piles of books because they have literally nothing else to do. Although I also wonder, when I hear things like that, if we’re talking about everybody or just the upper class.
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In the 18th century, it probably was mostly just the upper class. In the 19th, with the industrial revolution, literacy became more widespread, and you had the rise of the penny dreadfuls and other serialized fiction. But I’m sure even then the upper class had a lot more free time to fill.
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Unfortunately, I’m definitely guilty of not reading like I used to. Swiping through TikToks after a long day of work just seems less daunting than picking up a book. Definitely something I need to try harder on.
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I’m a little guilty, too. It depends on what kind of day I’ve had.
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Hi, JS! I know plenty of avid readers! I, like others I know, can’t go a day without reading. Long live reading! It’s really good for your brain.
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It is good for the brain!
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I’ve been hearing that comment often too, especially lately. Just the other day, one of the writers in my actual writing group said, “No one reads books anymore.” I thought, if you believe that, why are you in this group?” LOL!
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I feel sorry for that writer. If you come to really believe that as a writer, that must be so depressing.
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It definitely seems like nobody reads anymore, and while a lot of people dont, you’re right about that being a generalisation. There are a lot of negative thinking people out there who feel like they always have to make generalisations like that in which i have them in my own family. However, I always remind myself that what they say is not true. As long as we write and help keep books alive, there will always at least be an esoteric minority that like to and do read.
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If there really is a downward trend for reading, I’m proud to be part of the esoteric minority who still reads. But I honestly don’t think that’s what’s happening. More often than not, if the subject of books comes up in conversation, I find that people are reading something. It might not be a book I’ve heard of or that I’d ever be interested in, but they’re reading something.
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I know lots of people who are avid readers still, including me. But some people, including my daughter, don’t like to read for pleasure.
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There’s always going to be some people who enjoy reading and some who don’t. I don’t know how old your daughter is, but it took me several years after I graduated college before I started reading for pleasure. School kind of ruins reading for some people, in my experience.
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My husband does not do TikTok, but he does do YouTube. But…he IS a reader. So am I. I believe reading a complete story or nonfiction book helps to keep our minds sharp. My oldest has trouble reading. Still. Other than that, four out of our five kids read for pleasure. Oh, by the way, I don’t do TikTok. Or YouTube for that matter.
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I believe that, too. I do watch YouTube, but I kind of think of it as junk food. It’s not so bad in moderation. Reading a good book, on the other hand, is like having a proper meal.
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There is little truth to the fact that people don’t read as much as people once used to once.
But thanks to Bookstagram and booktok—I’m seeing people who would have thought books yuck, holding books and liking posts about books. Bookstagram and booktok however—has many problems around it too.
There’s plenty of time to read books—if doom scrolling didn’t exist. I can’t speak for everyone but I know about the teenagers and young adults around me—here in Kerala.
Reading isn’t exactly dying. It’s evolving though.
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I think that’s a fair take on things.
I’ve heard good things and bad things about Bookstagram and BookTok. I’m not on either of those platforms, though, so I didn’t feel qualified to talk about those things.
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I think it depends on who you are talking to. I do think it’s harder to keep readers’ attention (like you need to use less description and make sure you have strong stakes), but that doesn’t mean people aren’t reading.
Maybe it’s just the people I talk to on and offline, but a lot of people are still choosing to read hard books. Even though kids’ books are trending shorter now, I think that’s more about actually listening to what the audience wants (most kids are intimidated by a 400 page book).
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I didn’t know that, that kids books are trending shorter. I don’t have kids, and I don’t really know anybody I.R.L. who has kids, so I guess that’s not a thing I’d notice.
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