These are shows that are supposed to be about people just hanging out, playing video games together, etc. Listening to people talk about their lives is just immediately stressful now.

There's another show I had to take a break from because it felt like they referenced COVID in the past tense in every single episode. I tried to revisit it today, and they spent the whole intro talking about how risking their health in a life-threatening activity recently made them feel fearless...

One show I watched had someone describe their recent experience with what sounded like "brain fog". Then later, in an unrelated conversation, they chatted about how, even though the pandemic ended a while ago (according to them), some people are now feeling delayed stress from that trauma...

I still remember many years ago when I was hanging out with classmates outside of school, and I gave some money to an unhoused person. A classmate mentioned that one of their teachers said most people asking for money are faking it, and I guess they believed that and felt the need to tell me...

The audacity of releasing the latest season of your most popular show, where the new plot is all about how caring for one another is still important even in a post-apocalyptic world, when you've removed COVID precautions from your own sets...

Every time they do something publicly cruel & nothing happens, it trains helplessness/hopelessness collectively into us

It forces people into a survival state like fawning, freezing, or a complete nervous system shutdown

And many people don’t know how to regulate themselves out of it

All the LED bulbs I've purchased myself were carefully selected to match the few incandescent lights in here. So everything is normal except the one closet that looks like a creepy gas station bathroom now.