Vulnerable Minds, Violent Times and a Zero-Trust New World Order

We're Well Past The Tipping Point

I nearly lost one of my young adult sons to the Internet. What I mean by that is that he was spending way too much time online, becoming too political, too radical, and frankly too consumed with his artificial digital life while neglecting the real one. I challenged him on this as much as I could, and one of the most significant ways I did so was to support him financially *just* enough so that he felt he had a safety net, but it would never be enough so that he didn’t have to work to help support himself. One time, he got into a car accident, and the repair cost around $3K to fix—money I knew he did not have. I paid for it, no questions asked, because I knew a working car was an essential lifeline for his future, but I stressed to him that it was on him to sort his future out. For a few years, he felt pretty hopeless as he worked minimum wage jobs, making just enough to pay for basics, while relying on support from me. We had many challenging conversations during these years—he saw no future for himself, more of his time and attention was fixated on internet culture, and he only became more despondent over the years.

I can remember many conversations where I’d say the same thing over and over again:

”You need to take the energy you’re putting into internet content and redirect it toward a vocation that will build your future.”

Finally, things clicked.

The first step he took was deciding that an HVAC career could be viable (a seed I had planted with him). The next step he took was to get his first job in the field. He struggled during this time and job-hopped from company to company (a common thing in this trade). He suffered setbacks. Shortly after investing nearly $4K in tools, his van was broken into, and all of his new tools were stolen. The small business he was working with never made it right with him, but he continued to struggle on.

Despite that struggle, something had changed in my son. He was no longer “extremely online”. He was tired when he got home and didn’t have the time or energy or nearly as much interest to consume polarizing online content.

He was steadily finding purpose through work and independence.

Today, he’s the happiest I’ve seen him in the past decade. He transitioned from residential to commercial HVAC. The work is brutal—long hours, physical, and he drives all over the state of Texas. He’s earning decent money now. He has little opportunity or desire to be extremely online, and his work provides critical infrastructure in a state where air conditioning is not a luxury but a necessity. I’m proud and grateful—but recent events have underscored for me how it could have turned out differently.

Vulnerable Minds
The internet, combined with the perfect storm of political, societal, and economic trends, is ushering us into a new era. My son’s state of mind during his most challenging years was vulnerable due to both his age, his life experiences, and his prospects, or lack thereof. I saw the dangers in this, and I went into parental overdrive to at least try to influence it the best I could. As I reflect on recent events, watching our country rip itself apart over the assassination of Charlie Kirk, on the heels of the unbelievably shocking video of Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska, I am convinced that we have an epidemic of vulnerable minds. It goes beyond adolescent boys, girls, or even those grappling with a host of mental health issues. There’s a rallying cry that’s going around conservatives mourning Charlie Kirk:

”We Are All Charlie Kirk!”

Right now, humanity needs a sobering rallying cry of our own:

”We Are All Vulnerable!”

Because we are.

Most of us are now well aware of fringe groups like QAnon that trade in unsubstantiated rumors. We envision cult-like followers who paint their faces and drape themselves in the American flag. But the truth is that numerous forces at play are making our minds more vulnerable to misinformation, rumors, and conspiracy theories—all of which carry the potential of exploding into an act of violence ranging from property damage to injury to loss of life.

Violent Times
Despite conflicts in the Middle East and Europe, the globe is essentially at “peace”, conventionally speaking. But in the US, our attitudes about political violence are changing. Luigi Mangioni, the alleged killer of United Healthcare’s CEO and his supporters are the canary in the coal-mine here—and I use this example intentionally because while it is is perceived as “extreme left” by many, it also has a dynamic that is similar to the scenario where my son was involved, and in his case influences veered “extreme right”. The common denominator: an intensely negative outlook on the future. Some would call this “grievance” and others may call it “injustice”.

Data backs this up, highlighting that there is a generational connection to our tolerance for political violence and age. A recent YouGov survey has cited a disturbing finding that nearly 20 percent of respondents between the ages of 18-29 believe it is justified to use violence to achieve political means, compared to less than five percent of respondents who are 65 and over. What’s worth noting is that with each generation, the tolerance for political violence increased.

What makes this study a canary in a coal-mine is that it does not look at past data—instead, it takes a current snapshot and raises a question about the future. If the trendline of what’s considered acceptable violence has increased in four generations, does this continue? Also, what will the world look like when today’s youth take the reins of power? These remain open questions.

A Zero-Trust World Order
Having spent over a decade working with Edelman, the curators of the annual Edelman Trust Barometer, I am beginning to conclude that we’ve passed the steady trendline of distrust in institutions, mostly by less informed non-college-educated citizens. We’re transitioning into a “zero-trust world order” where even highly educated “elites” have also lost trust and faith in our institutions. I don’t have data for this, but I’m starting to see the signs. A peer of mine recently posted something that stopped me in my tracks, firmly asserting that a young black man in Mississippi was lynched. I knew exactly the story he was talking about—I watched the rumors of a lynching spread across social media despite mainstream media reporting that the death was a suicide.

But let’s say the mainstream media is wrong, and that officials are lying. My highly educated, high-income peer didn’t post something expressing doubt, calling for an investigation—he made a firm assertion that this was a lynching, full stop. And made it a point to share that assertion with his network. I posted several news articles in an effort to call out what the current available information was. He had two responses:

”Be wary of ‘verified’ media.”
”One word… Mississippi”

His extreme skepticism and bold declaration of what he feels is the truth is one anecdotal story of what I think is happening all across the country, if not the world—we’re increasingly not trusting once-trusted sources, or even in some cases, our own eyes.

Skeptacism isn’t bad—in fact, I think it’s a fair assessment that more journalists should be even more skeptical in their search for the truth—but the post I’ve highlighted here isn’t skeptacism, it’s blind faith in what’s been presented on social media vs. what is being laid out through traditional media. The choice of words on the Facebook post makes it clear:

”This definitely happened.”

None of us is immune to this. On Friday, I speculated that Charlie Kirk’s assassin plausibly had some connection to Antifa, and I based this on two evidentiary phrases that Antifa is known to use. But I was speculating. In contrast, many of my peers were asserting that the assassin was likely a “Groyper”—a follower of a far-right personality named Nick Fuentes. The keyword here is “speculating,” which we were all doing. This is the state of play of our new reality in a zero-trust world order—we’re all going to be tempted to “find truth” and remain skeptical as truth unfolds. Speculating becomes our way to process what we want to see.

Lastly, AI is going to make the zero-trust world order even more challenging to navigate. During times like this, it’s all too easy to generate media that people are already using to manipulate algorithms, sentiment, and beliefs. Below is an AI-generated image designed to create outrage and spread across social media:

This accelerates the zero-trust world order because ultimately, it leads to not trusting our own eyes, and it also gives bad actors the cover, “it wasn’t me, it was AI”. We won’t be sure what’s real, what’s manufactured, or what can be believed. To call this a crisis of trust is a gross understatement.

The events of the past week or so have underscored a reality that’s been steadily building for some time. We’re in a perfect storm of events where technology, politics, economics, culture, race, and geopolitical ambitions are all conspiring to degrade our collective humanity and societal pillars. I don’t know what the answers are here, but to go back to the story of my son—I think having a sense of purpose that gets us up in the morning, contributing to society and providing for ourselves (and our loved ones) probably has something to do with it. Then again, we’re also seeing job loss in the white collar world and fewer opportunities for entry-level workers…

We’re well past the tipping point of absolute truth, objectivity, and civility. There are no easy answers here, but the stakes couldn’t be higher.

Visually yours,

Click on my signature to find out more about me

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David Armano is a CX strategist and digital transformation leader who helps professionals connect brand, product, and customer experience. He’s known for his unique approach to visual thinking and insightful but grounded takes on intelligent experiences, culture, and leadership.

In addition to his day job, he writes David by Design to turn complex shifts into actionable ideas.