What is the attraction...

What is it about escapism? Gaming, blogging, internet surfing, gambling [insert favorite vice here] ...why are these things so infinitely appealing?

Is it that it's all just easier?
Am I wrong is assuming that there's more to life...more meaningful pursuits?
Or do these pursuits fill a void that is essentially being unmet by people's "normal" daily lives?

I'm really curious...

Your knowledge of a second or third order discipline is insufficient to warrant expending the keystrokes required to take this discussion further.

Thank you for trying ... keep reading and look critically at everything you engage with or in, whilst mastering the basics of our culture.

Have a happy life ... ignore the sociological imagination.
Goodbye.

That reference was to C Wright-Mills' book "The Sociological Imagination".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Wright_Mills

The Sociological Imagination (1959), Mills' most influential work, describes a mindset—the sociological imagination—for doing sociology that stresses being able to connect individual experiences and societal relationships. The three components that form the sociological imagination are:
1. History: how a society came to be and how it is changing and how history is being made in it

2. Biography: the nature of "human nature" in a society; what kind of people inhabit a particular society

3. Social Structure: how the various institutional orders in a society operate, which ones are dominant, how are they held together, how they might be changing, etc.

In The Sociological Imagination, Mills asserts that one must look inside oneself to help important research problems, and that social scientists "translate private troubles into public issues." [2] Additionally on this topic, Mills maintained throughout The Sociological Imagination that it is very difficult for most individuals in society to link their personal troubles to the cultural institutions in which they live.

The Sociological Imagination gives the one possessing it the ability to look beyond their local environment and personality to wider social structures and a relationship between history, biography and social structure.

What's stopping you from taking your children with to the grass hut? [/loaded question]

The present state of our society the direct result of the inner drive to achieve it. We as humans have this inner drive genetically to forge ahead with little thought about it. As long as we "feel" we're moving ahead, or progressing, everything is as it should be. Or is it?

Escaping I think is the wrong word. We're not "escaping" so much as we're not taking the time to actually absorb what's going on. There's a disconnect between us and ourselves. Sometimes you need to slow down to go faster, but genetically and socially we're not "allowed" to. Most can't slow down and actually think about what's going on, what it means to us, and most importantly, how we feel about it. Ironically you're considered weak if you actually contemplate this while others mindlessly pursue nothing but "progress" with no clue as to why.

This IS your quandary. You can't look beyond yourself until you first understand yourself. I don't mean in selfish terms, I mean in an understanding way. You'll never understand the outside world if you don't first begin to understand yourself. It's all bullsh*t and life's between your ears. You must first come to grips with how you feel, think, and relate to things before you can start beginning to understand how you feel and fit in with everything else. Everything beyond yourself is just plumage and open to interpretation. None of it will ever sit well with you until you're comfortable with yourself, you're feelings, and how you want to relate to it all.

Lovely ...

/goes outside to pour salt on snails.

What the heck - I thought this place was closed down?