(Why) did it turn wrong? Wholeness or totality of the Internet

The Internet was created as a space and a structure to share knowledge, information, and opinions for the sake of science and progression of humanity. Today, the Internet is co-created and modified by its users networking from all over the world. It is a representation of humankind, a social structure reactive to local and global societal processes. For the youngest generations the Internet is an integral part of their social milieu influencing both normal and pathological development from their very first year of life. Discussing the roots of totalitarianism, Erik H. Erikson distinguished between wholeness and totality in personal and social development and provided a wonderful metaphor of productive and pathogenic functioning for the impact of the Internet. Conceived as a fruitful association and organization for the development of wholeness in individuals and a future humanity, it largely keeps this promise. But under unfavorable social conditions and/or pathogenic individual predispositions, it can take a totalitarian structure and mode of action. © Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis 2024.