Not since ‘Video Killed the Radio Star’ has the blame placed on technology sounded so much like a broken record. From the rise in mental health troubles and growing social isolation, to the spread of conspiracy theories and endless distractions, technology – specifically social media and the internet – has become the convenient scapegoat.

Now, the crisis in reading has been added to the list. Books, newspaper columns, Substacks, and podcasts endlessly warn of a looming post-literate society, pointing the finger at the smartphone. Critics frequently invoke Neil Postman, who, in his 1985 book Amusing Ourselves to Death, warned that television was reshaping public discourse by prioritising entertainment over substance. Postman argued that this shift reduced culture to a spectacle, eroding meaningful engagement with critical issues. According to his modern-day heirs, Postman’s prediction has come true: the written word has given way to the image, which is now overshadowed by fleeting posts, viral videos, and snippets of audio. ‘My phone stopped me from reading’, has become the new ‘the dog ate my homework’.

Concerns about diminishing attention spans are nothing new. In 1792, the German publicist Johann Georg Paul lamented that ‘Germans today are no longer accustomed to read as our fathers did’, decrying a cultural shift towards a ‘hasty kind of reading’. This sentiment sounds familiar today. Nor is the anxiety over the quality and kind of attention itself new. In the 19th century, fears swirled that female readers could bring about societal collapse, leading to prostitution, crime, even revolution.

That said, the current situation does warrant genuine concern. Reading rates are declining, and a survey by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, which included 160,000 adults across 31 countries, reveals a troubling trend: with the exceptions of Finland and Denmark, reading proficiency has notably decreased over the past decade.

Nevertheless, blaming technology alone is a form of self-imposed ignorance, sidestepping a far deeper cultural devaluation of reading and ideas. While Neil Postman and the often cited Marshall McLuhan—who, with the rise of mass media in the 1960s, argued that the form of a medium, not just the content it delivers, profoundly shapes how it is received and understood – offer some insight, it’s important to broaden our perspective. If we step back and set aside techno-determinism, a more complex picture emerges.

In The Closing of the American Mind (1987), cultural critic Allan Bloom warned of the erosion of a shared cultural and philosophical heritage. He argued that students were becoming increasingly deprived of exposure to the great works of western philosophy, literature, and political thought – a loss that, he claimed, leads to intellectual shallowness and a decline in critical thinking. Some 40 years on, universities, where students should groan under the weight of their readings, bear out his prognosis. Assign a book to a class today, and you’ll encounter surprise and bafflement: only short excerpts will suffice. These abbreviated readings are no longer found in library stacks, which have become more like community hubs and cafés. Instead, they’re uploaded onto an online server where students often ignore them, with little expectation that they’ll engage deeply. Texts are discussed from a critical distance rather than explored. Novels, histories, and even the past come with trigger warnings. The canon is seen as elitist and in need of decolonisation, yet no clear alternative is offered – it is deconstructed but never rebuilt. While students are often held responsible for this situation, they are merely following current trends and meeting the minimal expectations set by their academic environments.

That’s assuming the academy remains open. Last year, up to 10,000 jobs in British universities departments were cut, and starting this September, Canterbury Christ Church will no longer offer English literature degrees. The remaining humanities departments seem to have internalised the perspective expressed by Charles Clarke, who, as Secretary of State for Education and Skills in 2003, suggested that education for its own sake was ‘a bit dodgy’ and that dusty medievalists, in particular, were irrelevant. For decades, education has been justified primarily in terms of the economic or social benefits it provides for ‘stakeholders’.

Outside the realm of the university, societal discussions about reading tend to be reductive and instrumental. The Reading Agency, a charity dedicated to ‘empowering people of all ages to read’, promotes picking up a book as beneficial for ‘health’, ‘wellbeing’, and ‘social mobility’ – as does the National Literacy Trust, which encourages people to read for as long as 10 whole minutes to ‘improve their mental health and wellbeing’.  This isn’t exactly inspiring or quite the point of tackling disturbing and complex works such as Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment or Anatomised by Michel Houellebecq.

Our low expectations stand in stark contrast to the 18th century, when neglecting reading or intellectual engagement was regarded as a moral failing. The Oxford English Dictionary traces its first reference to ‘distraction’ to a 1710 entry in the Tatler, where it was linked to the dreaded vice of indolence. During that era, attention was not just a virtue but a moral accomplishment. By the late 18th century, attention was seen as the cornerstone of education, as well as spiritual and moral development. Literacy increased, and bestselling novels were eagerly rented and read by candlelight.

As Jonathan Rose illustrates in The Intellectual Life of the British Working Classes, many working-class Britons from the 18th to the mid-20th century engaged substantially with literature, philosophy, history, and political thought. Despite limited formal education, resources, and time constraints, with many potential distractions, they pursued self-improvement through reading and intellectual exploration.

Cultural life flourished in the Welsh coalfields. By 1934, there were over a hundred miners’ libraries in the Valleys, each holding an average of 3,000 volumes. The Tredegar Workmen’s Institute alone boasted a circulating library of 100,000 books. For them, reading was about self-improvement and self-mastery, rather than the modern obsession with self-expression. As Frederick Douglass, once a slave and founder of a Sabbath School, put it: ‘Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.’

Sustained attention reflects what we value. The real issue today lies in a deeper uncertainty about what deserves our attention – if anything at all. It’s easy to feel distracted when it’s not clear what deserves our concentration. Engaging with ‘the best that has been thought and said’ seems overly earnest. In a world where cultural judgment is often seen as the exercise of privilege or social positioning, why would anyone invest hours in the hard work of reading the classics? Such aspirations seem outdated. Instead, we’re encouraged to consume undemanding entertainment that soothes us and embrace being our unchallenged selves – without striving to be better or more knowledgeable.

The truth is that we’ve stopped expecting children, students and ourselves to read. We live in a culture that struggles to affirm and celebrate reading for its own sake, which is unable to recommend one book over another. Blaming the iPhone, TikTok, or any other technological device is not just wrong – it’s lazy and evasive. Technology has long served as a tool for disseminating knowledge and encouraging deep reading. With collective intention and effort, it can fulfil that role once more.