Disgustingly educated? I'll say it – I think we've lost our minds. It seems that the social media-addicted girlies, after hours upon hours of dead-eyed doomscrolling, have started feeling their brains seeping slowly out of their ears. It's a little modern-day phenomenon fondly known as brain rot. And listen, we've all been there. But instead of, I don't know, putting the phone down and picking up literally anything else, a large portion of people are turning back to social media to proclaim this their era of education.
What does "disgustingly educated" mean?
“The goal is to be disgustingly educated,” countless videos proclaim, usually alongside aesthetic photos of pretty girls poring over books or moodily browsing libraries.
TikTok content
TikTok content
TikTok content
Countless others include book stacks, information consumption tips or bite-sized historical overviews, promising to make their viewers “disgustingly educated” in a matter of minutes.
The trend is presented as an antidote to the more mindless, shallow content that fills the platform – and an answer to the all-too-familiar brain rot that follows.
For the most part, I think this trend actually probably comes from a pretty good place – namely, from a desire to improve a social media-drained brain; a desire to be a more interesting, more clued-in person.
After all, social media does have a real impact on how the brain works.
“What people are calling brain rot is not a loss of intelligence, it is a loss of depth,” explains clinical psychologist Tracy King. “When we scroll for long periods, the brain is trained into rapid novelty seeking that gives us tiny hits of dopamine (our reward and motivation chemical). The constant switching, with no time to digest or integrate what we see, can leave the nervous system overwhelmed with a sense of dissatisfaction, like something is missing.”
Ok, so something is missing! However, I must admit, this trend does smack just a little of performative self-improvement – of turning intelligence into an aesthetic or a label. The very fact that the trend uses the word “disgustingly” suggests a certain self-brag rather than a genuine, sustainable, personal intellectual curiosity. And, of course, ultimately it's about generating clicks and views. In other words, it's about keeping you on the platform – the very place where the whole problem began.
According to King, it's unlikely that more scrolling and more videos – even ones about self-education – will help the problem.
“When we scroll, the nervous system is seeking nourishment of some kind, but the short videos we see on TikTok and other social media are a ‘red herring coping strategy’ that really only function like the quick hit of junk food,” she says. “Learning requires sustained attention, curiosity and a sense of progression. The craving for learning happens when we are trying to regain a sense of agency and competence, rather than passive consumption that is completely out of our control. Passive consumption leaves us feeling unsafe and puts us into survival mode.”
That being said, King does believe that the trend might help some people – as long as they approach it with the right mindset. “It depends on how the content is being consumed and what state the nervous system is at the time,” she says. “A short educational video can spark curiosity and remind someone that their brain is capable of more than scrolling. In that sense, it can be a bridge to doing more.”
But it's more likely that people will fall back into old habits and patterns.
“Even educational TikToks are still delivered at high-speed and this is the issue,” she says. “TikTok is an algorithm-driven environment that rewards novelty over depth. It can help someone remember what learning feels like, but it does not rebuild the muscles of attention, reflection or synthesis. Those only return when the brain is allowed to slow down and stay with something long enough for meaning to form."
How to be “disgustingly educated”
Instead of consuming videos about educating yourself, King suggests:
- Long-form reading, even ten pages at a time, rather than scrolling.
- Listen to audiobooks or podcasts without multitasking.
- Follow one idea through rather than briefly cover twenty.
- Learning also needs embodiment. Writing notes by hand. Talking concepts through out loud. Teaching someone else what you have just learned. These acts tell the brain this information matters, store it, and integrate it.
- Allow boredom back in. That uncomfortable, empty space is where curiosity regenerates and creativity emerges. When the brain is no longer constantly fed, it starts asking its own questions again. That is where our full potential awakens.
- What is essential is a move from being pulled by content to choosing what you want. Without this, we are engaging in a process of self-abandonment, which is a very unsafe place for the nervous system to be.
And, she adds, learning can take many forms. “Brains are not all built the same way,” she says. “For people with ADHD, attention does not regulate through stillness in the way it does for others. An ADHD nervous system often needs interest, movement, novelty, and emotional engagement. So, slowing down does not mean sitting still, reading quietly, or consuming information in long, linear blocks if that drains. For an ADHD brain, slowing down might mean fewer inputs, but richer ones. Learning through walking, listening while moving, following a thread of curiosity deeply rather than widely.”
All of this being said, perhaps being proudly, disgustingly educated shouldn't be the goal. Instead, picking up a book or a newspaper and spending some real time with it, on your own, should be. And maybe, you don't even take that picture of it sitting next to your scented candle or flat white!
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