The Danger of “Loving” Everyone So Much Here is a typical social media scenario. Person A posts selfie after 38 attempts to get the pose just right enough to look spontaneous and natural. Caption to selfie has no connection with selfie at all, just some brief commentary on what’s going on that day or moment. Person B sees selfie, doesn’t read caption, digitally likes the selfie (not the same as really liking it), and comments, “ILYSM”. For the uninitiated, those letters are short for “I love you so much”. This starts a cascade of ILYSMs that might number in the dozens or more. As you scroll through the comments, virtually no one has mentioned the caption. If satisfied with the response, Person A repeats the pattern later that day. If unsatisfied, Person A deletes the post, tries a different pose with unrelated caption, or a sympathy-seeking caption, and tries again. So why is ILYSM so dangerous? Because it is fool’s gold. The danger of mindlessly churning out over-the-top expressions of affection is not only that there is little substance to them, but that even more insidiously, it dulls a person’s ability to recognize genuine affection and fidelity. As Violet, from […]