Just as the title asks I’ve noticed a very sharp increase in people just straight up not comprehending what they’re reading.
They’ll read it and despite all the information being there, if it’s even slightly out of line from the most straightforward sentence structure, they act like it’s complete gibberish or indecipherable.
Has anyone else noticed this? Because honestly it’s making me lose my fucking mind.
What?
Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?
They don’t think it be like it is, but it do.
Hey, 1970s baseball slugger Oscar Gamble is in da house!
You’ve got to be kidding me. I’ve been further even more decided to use even go need to do look more as anyone can. Can you really be far even as decided half as much to use go wish for that? My guess is that when one really been far even as decided once to use even go want, it is then that he has really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like. It’s just common sense.
Is this what it’s like to have a stroke?
Oh thank goodness I thought it was just me. When I read that I thought ‘dang covid messed me up’
Been a few years since having covid, but my wife and I both feel like we lost some memory and brain power from it, even though we were both vaccinated and had less evere symptoms than others.
In our 30s by the way
nah its a copypasta internet meme from waaay back in the day. Probably like around 2004.
Shhh! Don’t tell them my age!
Depends on where really.
This feels like reading a language that you only kinda know.
This☝️ so true
Wow that genuinely was a struggle to read
It roughly translates, in-context, to “Has any [video game publisher] gone to such lengths to make something so realistic?”
This comment is psychological warfare.
Somebody get this man a doctor, I think he’s had a stroke.
A stroke of genius?
Oh good. I thought it was me.
Such as, the Iraq.
Anyone read like comprehensive reading numbers of memory such as
Fuck this is actually funny
Tbh, that was my response lol
I understand what you mean, but I haven’t noticed people not comprehending basic information. Can you give examples?
As a lot of people have already pointed out it’s mostly prevalent in arguments. Like a comment I made on a video about lane splitting on motorcycles.
The video was explaining why lane splitting is safer for cyclists and shows a cyclist get rear ended at a stop light. The title of the video was “Most people don’t understand lane splitting”
I simply commented “No we understand this specific scenario but to continue driving between stopped traffic is completely different”
All the replies to my comment were about lane splitting at a stop sign/stop light. The very thing I specifically stated I understood.
lane splitting is legal on the highways in california, I don’t know about on all streets. it sounds like maybe you shouldn’t do it on streets where you’d run into stop lights, or generally anything more complex than the interstate. personally I’m always careful whenever I see a motorcycle.
why is lane splitting safer? intuition suggests that treating a motorcycle like a car and giving them the same space or more would be safer, especially since you could predict what they’d do better since it would be the same as a car
When all the cars have stopped, that’s the safest time for the cyclist to slither up to the front of the line. At 20 mph on a crowded freeway, it’s a little more dangerous but legal in CA as long as they don’t go more than (iirc) 20 mph faster than traffic. At 65 mph on a still-crowded LA freeway, having a bike race past you doing 90 can be disconcerting to say the least. At least you know if they cause an accident and you’re injured, they’ll probably be your organ donor.
One reason I’ve been told lane splitting is allowed is because motorcycles are air cooled and stopping for prolonged periods in a traffic jam can be bad for the engine. Also by allowing motorcycles to move forward it frees up space for more cars, though that seems like a small impact.
I’m not trying to be rude but did you understand what I said? Lane splitting at a stop light/stop sign/stopped traffic is safer for the cyclist. Lane splitting and continuing to drive between the lanes of stopped traffic is not.
Well that’s sort of a bad example. What your explaining are two separate things. Filtering (moving to the front of a stopped lane by moving between vehicles stopped or by stopping) and lane splitting (moving between lanes at highway speeds).
Iirc filtering is safer but splitting is like way more dangerous but I’d have to look it up.
Legally they are the same.
Depends on where you say legally.
I have to say I find it ironic that all replies here are about the lane splitting too.
I agree with those replies, your message is not clear.
Good evening Ozzy !
I disagree. It’s a very good game, but I think Donkey Kong is the best game ever.
But does that make us morally superior?
Ew, Cheese Squeeze makes my eyeballs itch
You say that, but in her defense she was a prostitute.
Hey don’t bring George Bush into this!
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At work if I ask 2 questions in an email I’m guaranteed 1 or 0 answers.
My boss is horrible about this. He also doesn’t organize his inbox in conversation view so he’ll randomly pop up in different parts of an ongoing thread and can’t keep track of what people are talking about.
You should fire your boss. Sounds like they’re not a great fit.
OMG fr. I’ll ask my boss, shall we do option 1,or option 2? and he’ll write back, Yes.
Actchually, that is a perfectly correct response according to propositional calculus.
One or the other? Yes, one or the other.
That’s not just reading comprehension. People are always answering my questions with unapplicable answers.
“Is it on the left or the right?”
“It’s 67, the one with grass in the yard.”
Just answer the damn question rather than providing me other information you decide would be more helpful!
Ok so in defense of dumbasses, we don’t always understand the question. Eg, whose left? In those cases we don’t want to make your clarify the question and drag things out, so we give you what we hope is an unequivocally clear response. It comes from a deep-seeded fear of miscommunication resulting in too many mailboxes with their flags on the wrong side or whatever. We apologize for the pedantry, though. I get that it’s annoying.
When we’re driving typically left means left.
Depends which direction you’re coming from though
Now we’re starting to see another problem that might be at play when people say “I’m not getting answers to my questions”
One key to happiness for me is to start from the assumption that I’ve been unclear.
Not if we’re in the same car.
Maybe because there’s 10 kinds of email replies at your workplace
Hah!
I think it has something to do with everything trying to get your attention, and waste your time for metrics.
We ignore signs because we don’t want to read another popup.
We skim text because we don’t want to know about your life story, just the chili recipe, thanks.
We skip or misread instructions because we’ve been doing the job for years, and we’re halfway on autopilot.
We can’t find a restaurant or shop right in front of us because we’re starting to learn to ignore bright colors and flashing lights.
We browse the internet while watching a movie because we’ve seen the same cliche Marvel movie before.
The problem is that sometimes we get so used to these things that we also do it when we shouldn’t be.
May I suggest that you don’t get a job in IT?
“I try to do a thing on my computer and I get an error message.”
“What does the message say?”
“I don’t know.”
The story of me helping people with computers.
To be fair, that’s learned helplessness.
How many times have you said ‘yes yes, just click through that, jeeze’?
There is so damn much horrible shitty UX out there; 90% of the time users are just trained out of using common sense, and you can’t blame them for it.
That other 10% though, goddamn. I swear if you moved their doorknob an inch to the left they’d starve to death in their home.
Also one my favourites:
„Nothing works, and this annoying message keeps popping up. I keep closing it, but it just comes back every time. Can you help me?“
Them: “All the PCs are broken”
Me: “ok, cam you see any lights on the monitors or on the front of the pcs”
Them: “i dont know”
Me: “ok I’ll come have a look”
walks down
Me: “Ok show me one of the broken ones”
Them: “ok well its actually just this one”
Me: dont get mad, they are just an idiot
Me: turns on screen
Them: “how did you do that?”
Me AAAAAARRRRHHHHHHHHHHGGGGGG “magic 😀” AAAAAAARRRRRHHHHHGGG
The amount of people who work on a computer every day and still don’t know the absolute basics is astounding.
I fully understand that someone who never used a PC doesn’t know their way around one, that’s absolutely fair, of course. But if they’ve used one for years because of their job, and are still not able to work out where that one file is…
That’s just inexcusable.Great job security for IT and tech support though.
I think some people are just wired to think in a way that makes the ways computers work difficult to understand. (Just like some folks don’t have an inner monologue or can only think in images, or can’t visualize anything at all). I’ve been the liaison between tech folks and non-tech folks in the same conversation with me needing to translate between both parties. They could not understand each other even in the same conversation.
I can’t find files because they’re buried in subfolders or split into separate drives because IT decides to change the structure of everything and who knows where where to find what if there’s not a shortcut to what I need on my desktop. Did they put it on X drive or G drive or H drive? What folders did it get buried in?
Windows search is trash at being able to actually find anything.
I once had six monitors shipped to us from onsite, complaining they were all dead.
Each one, just twiddle the brightness knob right on the front (yes this was the 90s, CRTs with analogue knobs…) and they were absolutely fine.
More like my computer doesn’t work. Error message at least implies the computer booted up.
The process of trying to get someone to explain their problem is so painful.
Even people on our fucking helpdesk write up tickets like that.
“Caller can’t log in”
Okay what are they logging in too? What creds are they using? Are they getting an error message? what is it? WHY AM I HAVING TO FOLLOW UP WITH YOU TO ASK THESE QUESTIONS YOU STUPID FUCK.
Or the classic “I can’t send email”… sent to us by email.
Well, I’ve had this happen before because the error is half a screen long with a bunch of random (to me) characters, only shows for half a second and it won’t let me screenshot it and isn’t always repeatable because it already showed me the error message, so why would it again?
I hate when that shit happens.
(Kent Brockman voice) JUST TAKE A SCREENSHOT, PEOPLE!!
Aside from reading comprehension, it seems as though people absolutely lack the ability to problem solve. Head scratching is as far as many will go. I can’t count how many times I’ve found inefficient, tedious, or straight up broken systems or out of date info in my office and when I ask people if they’ve ever contacted IT about it or tried to figure it out they just say “Eh, nah, I just leave it and it works itself out.” No. My guy, you’re just doing it wrong/taking an extra 15 minutes to do everything you’re doing because of the workarounds.
I feel called out 😅
“I understand your issue, can you please provide me w, x, and y so I can proceed? Also did you try Z?”
“Sure, I tried Z! Here is W”
That’s better than average tbh
I feel this.
What is the actual point of publishing knowledge bases and documentation if nobody reads them?
Well some people read it. Just noz everyone.
Show me these people you speak of.
Well I… ok, I’ve read like 5 pages of doxumentation in my entire life, but at least it’s not nothing.
Preach
Or customer service for that matter.
I help companies sell products on Amazon.
One sold protein powder. Product title says “25g of protein”. First bullet point says “25g of protein per serving”. Main image of the product clearly shows “25g protein” on the label. Second image makes it more clear with “25 Grams of Protein Per Serving” in big bold letters. The A+ content (images in product description) repeat this information in big bold letters as well. Both the image gallery and the A+ content showed a picture of the supplement facts panel. The top rated review for the product called out that they liked the 25g of protein per serving.
Customer messages me, “How much protein per serving? Doesn’t say anywhere on the listing.”
Rage. Instant, immediate, and intense rage.
Yep. I’ve noticed this in maybe the last 3-4 years. I’ve actually wondered if i’ve started getting dyslexia.
I think realistically it’s more to do with the way I use the internet. I scan articles rather than read them unless it’s something i’m really interested in. Google search results, half of them tend to be bullshit so i’ve gotten good at scanning them at insane speed.
Yeah, I literally began typing this response before finishing your post.
…
It’s like with increased information we’ve learned to scan for relevance a lot better, but at the expense of overall comprehension.
Like it gets us by, and gets us through the excess in time.
But, when emotions fly? It’s getting volatile.
Massively! I used to read loads of books now I struggle to get through them at all.
I find it easier to listen to a podcast and scan the internet barely taking any information in from either. I have to really concentrate to do either now. I am working at it. Treating reading articles/podcasts as more of a hobby where I try dedicate some time to it where that’s my only focus.
I recently got into a long, really dumb argument. I used the phrase “lesser of two evils” and what seemed like fifty people (actually two or three) seemed to think that meant I approved of, strenuously endorsed, and would defend the actions of the “lesser evil.”
To me, this seemed like a basic misunderstanding of what the phrase meant, so I defined it. Their response to my definition was to say the same sort of thing they’d already said while claiming to totally know what “lesser of two evils” meant.
I lost my cool, and explained what the phrase meant again. One of the folks explained themselves calmly while the others seemed to think I was a congenital idiot because I kept repeating myself.
I don’t want this to get any longer, so I’ll just say that we were talking past each other. Nobody (well, except fr the one guy who stopped to explain what he meant) was really comprehending what the other person said. So everyone was a dumbass, basically. Story of my life, really.
At least, I think that’s what happened. Watch the asshole who called me a liar and an idiot show up here to not explain how I’m a liar and an idiot again.
Remember when the internet used to be wall of texts. People used to write like writers do. Sentences and paragraphs that comprise a distinct idea. A collection of paragraphs that elucidate the point of view in their head… These days the style of writing online is some kind of line-by-line disjointed train of thoughts. Something resembling a collection of 140 character social media posts. I find it more difficult to grok. Impossible at times. It’s like people aren’t writing for readers. They’re brain dumping one liners off the top of their head.
It’s measurable.
In my country we have a central test for kids at various age, and reading comprehension is also measured. Every age group is doing worse and worse every time.
It’s mind blowing to me, as a kis I didn’t understand the point of the test, like you read an A4 page or two and answer questions about the text, that is literally in the text right there, it felt pointless. Well as it turns out it’s not.
We are literally getting worse and worse understanding what we read. The future is scary.
I am a documentation writer at my day job. I spend an obscene amount of time writing and rewriting support materials for our software to make sure the instructions are as clean as possible. The end users of the software are busy doctors and nurses so I get why they dont have time to read and just want quick answers from our support team. I get that.
What I dont forgive is how many times the support team will complain to me that a scenario or a feature isnt in the documentation, despite me bolding, bullet listing, and highlighting THE EXACT THING THEY ARE COMPLAINING ABOUT. I usually relink it to them and screenshot the relevant section.
People. Do. Not. Read.
I think part of the problem is that so many people nowadays are conditioned to consuming information in bite-sized chunks (eg. tweets), they now just focus on key words and assume they have all the context they need.
It’s akin to the problem I see with technical support help desks, be it the IT support team at work, or my ISP or mobile provider.
They read a few words and parrot the nearest response from their knowledge base/AI bot, and call it a job well done.
I’m literally dealing with this at work right now. Three times on my ticket I’ve been told to undertake a series of steps, which I not only stated I’d done when I first opened the ticket, but I also attached screenshots proving it.
Fucking frustrating.
That may also just be a resources issue. Too many tickets, not enough reps, and the expectation of low average handle time are not exactly conducive to encouraging those deeper dives.
Yeah, I assume when support people do not understand what I am telling them that they cannot afford to understand what I am telling them. Either they need to solve my problem in 30 seconds with a stock response, or else they need to get rid of me as fast as possible so they can deliver more stock responses to other people.
they now just focus on key words and assume they have all the context they need.
In other words, any text around the keywords is supposed to just be a decoration. Because the purpose of a comment is to choose sides in their greens-vs-reds game, you are not supposed to convey any thoughts, what a thought even is again?..
Had this happen to me taking a marketing course (bleh) the other day.
“The word count is 2000 but I’m close to done with a lot less than that, do I need to have ~2000 words?”
“Hi! You can go 10% over the word count. Thanks! :)”
They also had a glaring issue in a quiz that, apparently, was never noticed by 500 people over the span of two years. Blows the mind.
I’ve been running into this so much with paid customer support agents; it’s been driving me mad.
And the amount of times no matter what you say they just respond “have you tried uninstalling and reinstalling?” 🤬
As a counterpoint, I’d like to mention that people often scream “reading incomprehension” when actually, what they wrote was ambiguous or unclear.
Not saying you do this, just that I see this far more often than I see people misreading anything.
Well, I mean it comes down to a matter of costs… If you can’t afford it, you really shouldn’t buy it.
Yeah I mean personally I prefer it on the left but completely
Sometimes kids have to learn self-reliance though, you can’t always do everything for them, as tempting as that might be.
I completely get you. Bathing in the sun once or twice is not that bad for you.
Brie is only good as a spread though, if you’re eating it straight you gotta go for cheddar or something
Look, if you’re going to operate a dangerous piece of equipment without the safety guard that is your choice. But if you’re making an instructional video, at least mention proper safety procedure.
Say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it’s an ethos.
Mitochondria is the power house of the cell.
Yes, I’ve been having trouble concentrating on reading, and understanding written text, ever since I started chemotherapy. They tell me the brain fog could last between four and ten years.
I’m also reading that some long COVID sufferers are having similar effects. I’ve managed to avoid COVID so far, hoping that I won’t get anything that makes the brain fog worse.
I think he was asking if you notice this happening more in general interactions with others, not in yourself. Can’t tell if this is a good example of what he’s talking about.
But why male models?
