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The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

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Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#431

Post by tivert »

dahart wrote: post #395
mrweasel wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is something I've been think about, what if social media wasn't designed to be addictive? There shouldn't be anything inherently wrong in keeping in contact with your high school buddies on Facebook, so what if all the doom scrolling, likes, and corporate profiles where removed from Facebook? Would it be safer? I think there's are huge risk that we are about to realize that either social media cannot be made saf…

> There shouldn't be anything inherently wrong in keeping in contact with your high school buddies on Facebook I’m curious, what if there is something inherently wrong with having too many superficial connections? What if it’s replacing all deep connections, and part of the reason people are feeling unfulfilled?

> I’m curious, what if there is something inherently wrong with having too many superficial connections? What if it’s replacing all deep connections, and part of the reason people are feeling unfulfilled?

Or maybe there's also a problem with social media removing friction. E.g. I want to find out what my old high-school buddy is up to, but instead of meeting up of having a phone call, his updates are pushed to my feed, removing the impetus for real social contact.

Software engineers can be weird people (e.g. hyper-introverted) who are averse to thinking through the impacts of the technology they're building. Then there are entrepreneurs whose search for successful products effectively turns them into psychopaths. These are the people who are architecting our society.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#432

Post by carlosjobim »

throwaway2037 wrote: post #414
ta8645 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Do Danes, Norweigans, Swedes, and Finns agree with you? I doubt it.

Danes, Norwegians*, Swedes, and Finns will have the opinions that their governments tell them to have. Pretty much everywhere in the world and at any year of history, the average citizen will say that his government/president/king/warlord/chairman/pope is the best that has ever been. So "popular opinion" doesn't mean much.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#433

Post by aceofspades19 »

mrweasel wrote: post #329
johnchristopher wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think there's are huge risk that we are about to realize that either social media cannot be made safe, at all, or that it has been made dangerous in order to make a profit. People have been screaming that at the top of their lungs for years.

But what do we do with that information? Un-invent social media, ban it? How would such a ban work and what should it cover? At this point I feel like we should pick a time in history, say the late 1930s or 1940s, somewhere around there, and use that as a frame of reference. Any new technology would be assessed based on the value added to average persons life, vs. the overall cost to society and the planet. Only if i…

But who gets to decide this? How do you prevent people from making new unapproved technology and using it?

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#434

Post by gspencley »

mrweasel wrote: post #329
johnchristopher wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think there's are huge risk that we are about to realize that either social media cannot be made safe, at all, or that it has been made dangerous in order to make a profit. People have been screaming that at the top of their lungs for years.

But what do we do with that information? Un-invent social media, ban it? How would such a ban work and what should it cover? At this point I feel like we should pick a time in history, say the late 1930s or 1940s, somewhere around there, and use that as a frame of reference. Any new technology would be assessed based on the value added to average persons life, vs. the overall cost to society and the planet. Only if i…

> assessed based on the value added to average persons life, vs. the overall cost to society and the planet.

Cost presupposes value. If I'm the buyer in a transaction, I am trading value in exchange for value. The 'cost' is value that I am parting with.

I'm making this pedantic argument to say "cost to society or the planet" is the same as saying that "society" and "the planet" value things, and that those values are at odds with what the individual values.

The concept of "value" presupposes the question "of value to whom and for what?" Only individual people can value things. "Society" is just an arbitrarily defined group of individuals, each with their own values. So at best, what "society" values is what the majority of the individuals within that group value. And "the planet" is a rock. It values nothing.

While I don't think it's your intent, this word game (what "society values") is often used as a sneaky way of justifying transferring value from certain individuals to other individuals. Whoever gets to "represent society" gets to place their values first and claim that it's OK to target the individuals that are "costing society."

The way to approach the issue of social media causing damage is to demonstrate that it is providing a dis-value to all individuals and that each and every individual has healthier alternatives that they can choose that present a greater net value. In some extreme cases, if there is no healthy alternative, and the majority of individuals decide that the dis-value is great enough, they may vote to pass legislation to make the "thing" in question either more expensive or illegal ... such as with the case of tobacco for example.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#435

Post by ajmurmann »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #383
ajmurmann wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have the related theory that the whole Santa Clause and Easter Bunny lie thing makes children more likely to believe in conspiracy theories. If all adults, including the weatherman conspire to lie to me for no actual gain, why wouldn't politicians and media personalities conspire to lie to me about the earth being flat or climate change if there is profit or power to be had?

> If all adults, including the weatherman conspire to lie to me for no actual gain Some adults enjoy playing pretend with kids, and some kids enjoy playing pretend with adults too. I would not characterize it as a no gain situation.

So the learning then is that adults might conspire to make me believe the world is round instead of flat for no reason other than fun?

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#436

Post by CalRobert »

ben_w wrote: post #397
CalRobert wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was very worried about climate change as a kid, and still am.

I was worried when I was a kid, now I'm much less worried. Plenty of other things to worry about, and there's still a non-zero risk, but I think there's enough money to be made fixing that particular issue that we'll probably be OK.

I hope you're right!

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#437

Post by nox101 »

Tainnor wrote: post #312
elzbardico wrote: post #39

People blame social media, but they never ask why social media is like that. I think that the cultural changes that lead to that have been running for far more time than people give credit for, and that social media is just the proverbial canary on the mine that made things explicit. Those changes are multi-generational changes, and more probably there are a multitude of factors behind it. Family structure, economy f…

Social media is of course not responsible for all our problems, but I do blame specifically social media for making people (including myself) who are materially well off and live a comfortable life irrationally angry about things outside of their control and think that everything is going to get worse and worse (which is a reinforcement loop because then some of these people start exhibiting destructive behaviour whi…

I know the various social media companies supposedly optimize for engagement and angry posts supposedly do best as that ...

I can't imagine an entirely neutral social media platform would be any different.

people are going to follow whoever engages them the most. the inventives, regardless of the algorithms used, are exactly the same. no manipulation by the social media companies required. all that's needed is a public voice and followers

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#438

Post by AndrewKemendo »

HideousKojima wrote: post #377
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>We will probably won't find a culprit It's capitalism. That's the answer you're looking for

So long as we're making sweeping claims without any attempt at supporting them, you're wrong, this is all downstream from the Protestant Reformation.

Capitalism (an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit) was invented prior to written history so the reformation only exists in the context of private property being a core assumption of society. That assumption is NEW in the history of humanity, the concept of "property" has only existed for about 50,000 years

The protestant reformation then was an attempt to wrest property away from the catholic organization and distribute it. The goal being to eliminate the primary economic organization and "democratize" it.

The concept of hoarding property flowed from scarcity anxieties that are only socially maintained and hoarding property is the root issue

You can read my proof here: https://kemendo.com/Myth-of-Scarcity.html

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#439

Post by fullshark »

elzbardico wrote: post #39

People blame social media, but they never ask why social media is like that. I think that the cultural changes that lead to that have been running for far more time than people give credit for, and that social media is just the proverbial canary on the mine that made things explicit. Those changes are multi-generational changes, and more probably there are a multitude of factors behind it. Family structure, economy f…

It truly incredible how every bad thing is caused by the politicians and leaders I hate. What a coincidence.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international (2023)

#440

Post by kredd »

j4yav wrote: post #125
latentcall wrote: post #57

Not just social media, but always online mentality. Spending all your time online gives you a skewed perception of the world and I believe being online always is a major negative. Spending time outside is good for you. Socializing with real people in front of you is good also. Not sure if we can ever go back to that without some major catastrophe.

I feel like there must be some generation coming that feels like being highly online is weird and embarassing, having grown up and seen the way their parents and other adults behave, and use the internet more as a utility rather than a place to try to primarily live. What makes this hard I think is how addictive it is for children, so by the time they might realize how embarassing it is they have already been addicte…

Looking at my nephews, it’s highly unlikely to happen. From what they’ve told me, if you’re not online and at least aware of the “latest trends”, you become an outcast in school. Their way of trying to be less cringe and protesting is just being on “less mainstream apps”. Which yields the same results but with different colors. Not having any social media is also pretty awful as you’ll just be an outsider again. I wish there was some sort of a national effort where parents would unite and not let their children be on social media.
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