Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show • Hacker News Board

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

#541

Post by bongoman37 » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:15 PM UTC

smithza wrote: post #283

wussboy wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a personal grudge against anyone saying "Why don't the parents take some responsibility to combat a multi-billion dollar company who puts the resources of small countries in to making their children behave in detrimental ways." But I'll not get in to that. :) Facebook and Instagram are drug dealers. Sure, they're not physically distributing a substance, but the social interactions they provide are every bit as…

I will say emphatically that parents of teens are the most influential people in their lives, whether acknowledged or no. It is likely the case that parents will forever be the most influential people in someone's life and the positions you take, the behaviors you engage in, and what you teach will stick with them for their whole lives. Take a stance and teach them. They may rebel, they may not, but years down the ro…

Have you ever been a teen? When I was a teenager when my parents told me to stay away from something, I would absolutely check it out.

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

#542

Post by monocasa » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:16 PM UTC

uniqueid wrote: post #537

SavantIdiot wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

I don't know about your (2) argument. There's a lot of college towns even today that don't have gay bars. I've lived in Boulder, CO (CU Boulder) and Athens, GA (UGA) and neither really have a gay bar.

In the 1980s? Only the major metros really.

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

#543

Post by atonalfreerider » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:17 PM UTC

Animats wrote: post #464

atonalfreerider wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ditto for online pornography. And unlike chemical drugs that have to be transported and administered, these images and videos fly through the wires into childrens' bedrooms. I know, because like most children, I was exposed to online porn at a young age and was addicted to it well into my adult life. These companies need regulation, because they are bad actors.

Ditto for online pornography. Nah. That's been studied heavily. Here's an overview from the National Institutes of Health.[1] Wikipedia has an overview.[2] The overall conclusion is that most of the research is of terrible quality and there's no big measurable effect. [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6352245/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_pornography

Here is strong evidence to the contrary from the NIH:

>The proposed DSM-5, slated to publish in May of 2014, contains in this new addition the diagnosis of Hypersexual Disorder, which includes problematic, compulsive pornography use. Bostwick and Bucci, in their report out of the Mayo Clinic on treating Internet pornography addiction with naltrexone, wrote “…cellular adaptations in the (pornography) addict’s PFC result in increased salience of drug-associated stimuli, decreased salience of non-drug stimuli, and decreased interest in pursuing goal-directed activities central to survival.”

Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3050060/

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

#544

Post by sbierwagen » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:20 PM UTC

aerosmile wrote: post #396

blakesterz wrote: post #2

https://archive.is/egPlc “The research that we’ve seen is that using social apps to connect with other people can have positive mental-health benefits,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said at a congressional hearing... “We make body image issues worse for one in three teen girls,” said one slide from 2019, summarizing research about teen girls who experience the issues. “Teens blame Instagram for increases in the rate of anxiet…

Sorry for hijacking this thread, but whoever posted this information in an internal message board was keen on finding a method to force the company to act on this. Was it the right thing to do? Yes. Was it meant to be leaked? 100%. Running a company in today's environment feels very different than 20 years ago, and to make it clear - it's better for the world this way. Any employee - no matter how low or high ranking…

>I would be surprised if we don't experience some type of a push back from the companies.

One thing could be to hire fewer people. Oddly large software companies is an evergreen topic on HN. Every middle manager wants to empire-build, but if each new hire is a potential leak, then that could be a brake on Google's relentless goal of hitting 1M employees by 2030: https://image.cnbcfm.com/api/v1/image/106318886-157800431271...

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

#545

Post by lhorie » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:21 PM UTC

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…

> there exists inclusive and positive communities for people of every type of background and experience

I mean, sure, but this also goes for flat earthers, incels, fatphobia activists, dreamsexuals, etc. In other words, it normalized selfish individualism over collective conformism. Looking at it in aggregate, I'm not sure I can agree on whether that was a good thing or not. Personally, it strikes me as the pendulum shifting too far to the other side.

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

#546

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:21 PM UTC

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…

"Now, thanks to the internet, ..."

This seems to be a common misdirection seen with defending Facebook. (Not to mention other Big Tech companies.)

   Facebook == "the internet"

Facebook proponents, including public statements from the company, attribute the benefits we enjoy from the internet to Facebook.

    Criticism of Facebook == criticism of "the internet"

It follows that any threat to Facebook is a threat to the internet.

     Threat to Facebook == threat to "the internet"

Its quite sneaky.

EDIT: One insidious implication is to create or reinforce a false belief that we cant derive any benefits from the internet unless we support Big Tech and their mass-scale, popularity-driven, advertising-based "business model". This helps Big Tech to stifle competition and new and/or different ideas not under their control.

The internet isnt the web, nor is the web a small collection of popular websites, or a small collection of popular web browsers.

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

#547

Post by remarkEon » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:22 PM UTC

zepto wrote: post #441

remarkEon wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is your claim that only in the United States is it that girls are mean to each other when they are in primary and secondary school? This seems like a much more extreme claim than mine. You have to argue that there’s something unique about the not_the_United_States schools such that there’s something nullifying intrafemale competition. It’s a claim so extreme that … I’d like to see some data to back it up.

> You have to argue that there’s something unique about the not_the_United_States schools such that there’s something nullifying intrafemale competition. Why do you think this? You only have your school experience to go on. You have nothing to base this claim on. I think it’s entirely possible that the conditions of school create much of the competition you are observing, and that US schools are more extreme than oth…

I honestly think you must be trolling at this point. You’re taking this pedantic, academic view about the behavior of children and taking it to such an extreme (US school structure and its problems explain all malevolent minor female behavior) that I can’t believe you’re arguing in good faith.

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

#548

Post by dillondoyle » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:23 PM UTC

Darmody wrote: post #524

dillondoyle wrote: post #521

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But queer people don't always have families, especially back in the day. So many were kicked out, ostracized, cut off. RuPaul is correct when she says queer people create their own family. Even today.

I was purely talking about moving to another place.

you specifically said 'hoping they'll be able to call their family once they get somewhere.'

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

#549

Post by cto_of_antifa » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:24 PM UTC

tommymachine wrote: post #518

foldr wrote: post #508

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I thought the sarcasm would be obvious. I’m not irritated by my straight colleagues talking about their families. You, however, seem to have a problem with your gay colleagues talking about theirs. As a side note, quite a lot of straight people are irritated by the fact that straight sex can mean more than just erotic pleasure (hence the popularity of contraception).

In most workplaces, sexual eroticism of any kind is an inappropriate topic. I don't have any gay colleagues. To your last point, I would also point out the popularity of "abortion", and say that degeneracy takes many forms.

your use of the word degeneracy is kinda saying the quiet part out loud

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

#550

Post by freewilly1040 » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 8:26 PM UTC

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…

It's discouraging that the top comment is in effect sticking up for the billionaire caught red handed in a lie (think of the good things FB has done for us!).

I'm sure people smoking cigarettes throughout the years have had very nice conversations and maybe even made friends. That doesn't absolve the manufacturers from responsibility for knowingly selling poison.

The same is true here.