The “rules” thing is underdiscussed imo, the most important thing any online scene (or before the internet, any Culture) imparts upon an individual is how its archetypes interact with each other. This was the purpose of mythology — the interactions between Zeus and Hera, Aphrodite and Hephaestus, etc. were the substance of reality, just as today the interactions between Queer and Homophobe, Frat Guy and Sorority Girl, Boomer and Progeny, etc. underlie “reality.” These things are observational in a sense, sure, but more importantly they script reality for all parties. The internet asks two questions: “what if the reality-scripts were entirely democratized, instead of being restricted to a caste of epistemic priests?” and “what if the representation of reality fully preceded that reality, and physical happenings contorted themselves to fit the script rather than the script being shaped around physical happenings with the goal of incremental change?” It’s total epistemic breakdown on one hand, but on the other hand it’s pure opportunity. To post is to legislate reality before it happens
When the most important thing everyone does is Scroll and one’s entire info-diet starts orbiting around one “scene,” that person quickly starts interpreting all reality thru the ingroup memes and rock-paper-scissor rules of that meta. Gigachad cucks soyjak, etc.