Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

531–540 of 687 posts

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#531

Post by neilk »

standardUser wrote: post #449

It used to be that if you were queer - in any sense of the word - and lived in one of the countless small, conservative, traditional communities in this country, you were shit out of luck. Now, thanks to the internet, there exists inclusive and positive communities for people of every type of background and experience. This simply did not exist for most people just a few decades ago, but now it's accessible to almost…

The focus of the article is how Instagram knows that their product is harmful. It's not saying that all products, or even all similar products, are harmful for everyone.

I think this thread is at the very least offtopic; at the most, it's intentional whataboutism. This could well be your honest reaction, but maybe consider carefully before shifting focus like this.

Large tech companies would like the conversation to shift in exactly this way. They want us to choose between "the internet" and no internet, but the real choice is between their internet and other possible internets.

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#532

Post by xgulfie »

standardUser wrote: post #516
xgulfie wrote: post #505

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a queer in several senses of the word, Instagram is not a place to find a supportive queer community. Instagram is the most one-way of all social networks — i.e. it's almost all plebs following celebrities.

That is not how I experience it. Obviously, it is 100% about who you follow, and two people can have two entirely different experiences depending on those choices.

Yeah that's totally fair

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#533

Post by Dma54rhs »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #383
malfist wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook might be asking girls where their body image issues came from, but boys/men are not much different. It's reasonable that if one gender is developing self esteem issue from a social network, then the other gender _probably_ is too.

I wonder, though, if body image issues tend to manifest differently in boys and girls. I suspect that we're somewhat better at spotting girls' issues than we are at boys'.

No one cares about the boy issues and while maturing they find out about it very quick.

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#534

Post by mandevil »

richwater wrote: post #451
mikeyla85 wrote: post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hard disagree. Facebook does not need to optimize profit and growth in every product decision. They make choices about what to amplify, knowing the consequences of those choices.

> They make choices about what to amplify, knowing the consequences of those choices. You think Facebook specifically crafts algorithms to make teen girls self-conscious...?

I think that Facebook knows that Instagram is doing exceptional- worse than other social media services popular with teens- damage to teenage girls minds, and doesn't care enough to fix it[1]. Just saying "the algorithm did it," as if humans didn't create that algorithm, constrain it, and are now carefully monitoring its destruction of people's lives, is to absolve the people who work for Facebook of their agency. They built those algorithms and are responsible for their actions. They made a choice to build the algorithm and to give it power.

Much like tobacco companies knew that their product was doing exceptional damage to their users lungs, and clearly didn't care either.

[1]: They know that because they are quoted in the original article saying that- that Instagram seems to be worse than Snapchat and Tik-Tok for the psyche's of their users. They seem to be taking steps to try and rectify that, but they seem very small, in proportion to the damage that they are inflicting.

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#536

Post by ryanisnan »

standardUser wrote: post #449

It used to be that if you were queer - in any sense of the word - and lived in one of the countless small, conservative, traditional communities in this country, you were shit out of luck. Now, thanks to the internet, there exists inclusive and positive communities for people of every type of background and experience. This simply did not exist for most people just a few decades ago, but now it's accessible to almost…

Is Facebook/Instagram this medium? I find this really hard to believe, especially in 2021.

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#537

Post by uniqueid »

SavantIdiot wrote: post #480
uniqueid wrote: post #459

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It used to be that if you were queer - in any sense of the word - and lived in one of the countless small, conservative, traditional communities in this country, you were shit out of luck. As bad as that was, in the past you could move to another of the 380,000 towns on this planet. Today, if your social media trail renders you unemployable (or the target of persecution) there's no longer any corner of the planet to…

> As bad as that was, in the past you could move to another of the 380,000 towns on this planet. 1. That assumes you have the money to move, can land in a new city and find housing, and then find a job. Pre-internet this was absolutely nontrivial. 2. It's not 380,000 towns on this planet, in the 80's/90's it was just a handful of cities that were more evolved, like San Francisco or P Town. There's a reason those citi…

I'm 'yes, but...' on both those points.

(1) is true, but I was thinking more about the persecution aspect than the community aspect. If being gay made life unbearable in a particular town, it was at least physically possible, if expensive, for a person to cross state-lines and start life fresh. Today people leave a trail that follows them globally and for a lifetime.

In terms of community, (2) is a little more bleak than the reality. I'm guessing in the 1980s, most college towns had at least a gay bar (or cafe, bookshop, whatever), and community formed around it.

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#538

Post by sbierwagen »

wussboy wrote: post #200
andrewingram wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I often think of Facebook/Zuckerberg as the perfect example of why having a mission statement (something something connecting all the people) that seems perfectly non-controversial in a vacuum, often leads to a willing delusion that this must mean it's always a good thing and justifies any means. They reach a point where they're fundamentally unable to honestly ask themselves whether their "good thing" is actually go…

This is a very interesting point. As someone who wants to start an organization with a very strong mission statement, it brings a sense of caution. Is it the mission statement itself which is dangerous? Or is it possible to come up with a "good" one?

A mission statement doesn't encode all of human ethics in it, it's just a single sentence. Any mission statement could be bad if taken to the extreme. A super-Facebook that told you the thoughts of every person in real time, a super-Google that could fetch any knowledge, including credit card numbers, etc etc. https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/4ARaTpNX62uaL86j6/the-hidden...

Have a mission statement, just don't go crazy with it.

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#539

Post by ipaddr »

standardUser wrote: post #507
geebee wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People you care about will regularly experience this, if it hasn't happened already. You'll be shocked and depressed when you discover who is doling out the shame and abuse, you will not recognize who you thought they were, and you will discover that if you stand up for them, you will also become a target. I find it bewildering and worrisome, the way people think that this little monster won't grow and will stay on t…

I find it confusing that people fail to to see the obvious switcharoo. It used to be unacceptable to be queer, non-white, non-Christian, non-male and it was OK to mock people for those traits. Now, it's all backwards, and it's OK to be queer, non-white, non-Christian etc. What is no longer OK is mocking people for these traits. So, now the people who are getting the pointy end of the stick are the people who used to…

People do mock other people for being Christian or for a political belief. Nothing has changed but the bullies are now using the power of social media and the press to amply that bullying. The bullying continues to employers or schools, groups, friends.

Same as it ever was.

Re: Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show

#540

Post by laumars »

standardUser wrote: post #449

It used to be that if you were queer - in any sense of the word - and lived in one of the countless small, conservative, traditional communities in this country, you were shit out of luck. Now, thanks to the internet, there exists inclusive and positive communities for people of every type of background and experience. This simply did not exist for most people just a few decades ago, but now it's accessible to almost…

I think the fact that we are discussing this on a social platform served over the internet, the good parts haven’t been overlooked.
Post reply on HN