I use ad blockers and open source privacy focused software whenever I can but occasionally I have to use computers that don’t belong to me or an older phone where my usual applications aren’t installed and seeing all the advertisements just feels dirty and dystopian.
I think the worst ads are the text to speech ones that say “Download this app today”. The unblinking energenic people saying you can make a living at home are probably a close second.
Ads nowadays are little more than psychological assault and it can’t be healthy to be exposed to it regularly. My Home Ec teacher back in the day had a whole unit about the different manipulations present in advertisements and it was really enlightening and upsetting. Modern advertising should be banned or severely regulated.
I support significant regulation, but it won’t happen. But having a course like the one you took as well as media-literacy should be required middle-school education with a more sophisticated follow-up in high school. That also won’t happen because then you don’t get the people who vote for GOP pieces of shit. It’s in their interest to have citizens who are easily manipulated.
My father said babies were being aborted basically when ready for birth. I said there’s no way that was happening, said send me a link. One glance at the page and I didn’t need to read the article because of the gimmicks all over plus obviously bogus ads. He had a doctorate of mech engineering, but he couldn’t handle life on the internet. Typing this, I’m horrified to realize that I’m glad he passed when he did and didn’t end up with ever-increasingly wacko beliefs that could have harmed our relationship.