This is also why I view advertisement, in general, to be an invasive and incredibly dangerous. TV, online or elsewhere. It's all bad. It doesn't just let people know a product exists. It shapes the way we think about ourselves and the world around us. I view it like a cancer that we need to cut out.

Everyone likes to think they're 'immune' to advertisement. That they're somehow mentally above the whole concept and it doesn't affect them at all. Total nonsense.

I know the post mostly already says this, but related, this is also part of the danger of modern social media algorithms. Negative, outrage-inducing topics tend to get more attention in the short run. However, if someone watches it even once, that causes the algorithm to send a more of that kind of content. Before you know it, some people are getting fed and endless stream of the worst possible news, the most depressing takes, over and over. It can aggravate existing mental health issues or give them to people who did not have them before. The algorithm isn't 'designed' to do this, it's just trying to maximize metrics like time spent. It doesn't 'care' if the topics are negative or positive. But they have to be reshaped to consider the damage they can do when you start multiplying that by hundreds of millions of people.