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Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

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Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#861

Post by fire_lake »

gwervc wrote: post #703
amplex1337 wrote: post #646

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You certainly can just throw things out there, but if you are obsessed with making every single person satisfied with your thoughts, you are going to have a bad time. The world is full of people who disagree with you, but you need to learn more than ever to recognize and filter out what you don't care about. I don't even view replies to posts any longer, 98% of the time because I am not seeking validation sharing my…

> You certainly can just throw things out there On 4chan sure, on Reddit absolutely hecking no. On the main subs in French wrongthink comments get deleted super fast, and on one English-speaking about a hobby it's an immediate ban.

Part of this is ok if the sub has specific purpose and bringing all sorts of identity politics (from any perspective) is a distraction from the topic at hand. Similar to how blocking spam is not a free speech issue. The problem is when there are no avenues for controversial discussion left, which would be the case if the tech megacorps controlled every platform (as they nearly do)

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#862

Post by OkayPhysicist »

throwaway2037 wrote: post #358
edg5000 wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting point you bring up. With e-commerce, I am surprised that malls can work at all. There is a brand new, massive and beautifully designed mall in The Netherlands called Westfield Mall of the Netherlands. I went there once to quickly grab something and I got hopelessly lost, even while my phone navigation actually was able to display and navigate the layout of the mall, due to the sheer size I underestimated…

I had to Google about that mall. There is a separate Wiki page! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westfield_Mall_of_the_Netherla... > Total retail floor area 117,000 m2 (1,260,000 sq ft) > Parking 4,000 That retail floor area is enormous ! And, LOL: If this was US, parking would be 10x! FYI: Westfield is a huge global mall developer. Before 9/11, they ran the mall under NYC World Trade Center. It was one of the highest g…

That's not really enormous. It's big compared to most buildings, but ~1million sq ft of retail space is just about the minimum viable mall today. People aren't going to the mall to fulfill a specific need, they're going for the variety. It's hard to cram enough variety into much less space than that.

For context, Valley Fair, Westfield's mall in San Jose, has 2.2million sq ft, and looking through their list of holdings, it doesn't look like they operate any malls smaller than a million sq ft in North America.

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#863

Post by fire_lake »

ryandrake wrote: post #39

If parents really want to set a good example, they ought to also quit their smartphones and Social Media--or at least hide it better. Kids are really good at identifying hypocrisy. When they see their parents glued to their phones and scrolling Instagram all day, after being told "Oh, don't do that, it's not good for you" they know their parents are full of shit. And, the trouble is: Most of these adults are addicted…

Maybe when you get home, smartphones go into a box by the door. Like how you take off shoes. Then you pick it up again to go out. Maybe leave the ring tone on loud in case anything urgent is needed.

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#864

Post by zigman1 »

brushfoot wrote: post #791
zigman1 wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Its like an entire generation has re-discovered the mall again and its refreshing to see... Sometimes I feel like I'm in a dream I am really really sorry to go off-topic here, but as an European this is... So strange and slightly hilarious to me. We went to a park. Or local river/lake.

So did I, as an American. Locale, culture, and parents' values probably have more influence on this than continent. That said, I don't think there's anything particularly strange/hilarious about people congregating in spaces built for congregation or feeling nostalgia for those spaces and experiences as they've begun to fade away. Memories can be made anywhere, and not everyone has access to the green spaces that you…

> I don't think there's anything particularly strange/hilarious about people congregating in spaces built for congregation or feeling nostalgia for those spaces and experiences as they've begun to fade away.

You are right about that, and I admit I didn't thought of that perspective when I was writing my comment. The reason it evokes those feeling of me, is my immediate view of malls as purely consumer space, where everything is aimed at you to spend your money and this is their primary function. My knowledge of malls is limited either to their depiction in movies or experience of shopping malls in my country, where they are probably a bit different and not the most pleasant hanging out space I could imagine. But again, you are completely right about that and thanks for pointing that out!

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#865

Post by avensec »

evilduck wrote: post #645
avensec wrote: post #606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are lots of replies; I'll add my theory. Threads aren't conducive to conversations that build psychological safety and trust. A natural conversation of curiosity/questions, in 1:1 or small group settings, doesn't exist. This leads to talking *at* each other instead of with each other. The reduction in empathy follows. Thanks for asking the question and spawning the conversation threads!

> There are lots of replies; I'll add my theory. Part of the problem lies here, and I'm doing it right now too. In online public spaces we never have a conversation with another person, and rarely even then within a small group like enthusiast forums of yesteryear, we comment to the lynch mob. We reply to someone's statement with our own thoughts but it is not judged by the original poster if it was a good or insight…

One differentiation I find is that, I typically respond to questions or ask a question. In that way, I don't believe it was part of the problem, but demonstrated a pattern of improvement, I'd love to see (I responded to a direct question). More questions and dialog! :)

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#867

Post by Faark »

pelagicAustral wrote: post #491
skilled wrote: post #337

I'm no saint when it comes to addiction and being on my phone for more than I should be, but I have a sister who is in her mid 20s right now, and for the last couple of years she has slowly isolated herself from life and her family, she spends most of her time in her room on the phone and does weird things like get cosmetic surgeries, ordering cosmetics, etc. It's bizarre. She does this and all the while never leaves…

My brother is essentially the male version of this, just swap the cosmetics for video game DLCs. He's early 20's, no job, no interest in work, no interest in getting out of the house, no interest on anything... talking to him is the most frustrating experience ever, nothing comes out of him, no emotion... I talked so many times, tried to get an idea of what might drive him: travelling, learning, walking around in the…

Having wasted more than a decade doing pretty much nothing than playing pc...

a) The drive to change has to come from inside. I've seen quite a few people being sent to the online/gaming addiction group. Usually, they only come once.

b) Changing one self is hard generally. But here we got quite a bit of... idk, lets call it "damage". So many missing skills, confidence. So many bad, deeply ingrained habits. So many thoughts to avoid & distract from. And still no idea what will make me content.

c) I'm wondering quite often if not starting that journey would have been the better choice. If i could have found a way to stay happy. One motivator for me was the disdain for what i'd become, so no way back now. Now it'd be great to only disdain that past me ...

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#868

Post by randomdata »

darby_eight wrote: post #800
randomdata wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She doesn't share her actual thoughts That's where social media has been most damaging. You can't share your thoughts anymore. The 'Redditization' of the world means that sharing thoughts is met with hostility. No longer can you just throw something out there, no matter how stupid. These days you have carry an entire encyclopedia with you in order to back up every last thing you say and if you utter anything that i…

> That's where social media has been most damaging. You can't share your thoughts anymore. The 'Redditization' of the world means that sharing thoughts is met with hostility. No longer can you just throw something out there, no matter how stupid. These days you have carry an entire encyclopedia with you in order to back up every last thing you say and if you utter anything that isn't deemed 100% perfect by those list…

Nobody fears posting on Reddit. That's silly. What would there be to worry about? It's just software. It doesn't even recognize that you exist.

The problem is that the real world is increasingly not understanding that the internet and the world are not the same place, and they are treating software and people the same way. It turns out that people are not software. This leads to problems. Those who confuse you with software don't apply the compassion that people would otherwise normally receive, and, as a result, will be quite happy to put you in a bad place.

You know, the 'Redditaization' of the world. Its funny that even here we see the internet and the world being seen as the same thing; emblematic of the exact same confusion that the comment is about.

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#869

Post by BriggyDwiggs42 »

yieldcrv wrote: post #31
pfisch wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is too far, but you should have to be 18 to post on social media, except chat rooms like discord. Frankly, social media should maybe be highly regulated like prescription drugs. A lot of people can't handle social media and it is tearing democracy apart.

we could regulate feedback loops, "the algorithm"

Wait yeah that sounds like the solution. The actual behavior of companies is easy to regulate and requires no great firewall. Just stop them from doing the most addictive stuff and it’ll almost certainly help a ton of people.

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#870

Post by SirMaster »

y-c-o-m-b wrote: post #852
SirMaster wrote: post #848

As a 36 year old, I still don't understand what people find so compelling or addicting about social media. OK you can argue that HN is social media, and so I understand the reason why I like to participate in this site. However, I am just a username and comments. I don't understand the (bigger?) social media where you post all the details and photos of your life online like facebook, instagram, and twitter, etc. I ne…

Did you attend high school in the US? It's basically the online version of high school. They've brought all the popularity contest, show-boating "look at the nice things I do, have, etc", and gossip from high school onto social media. Many people don't grow out of that mindset.

Yes, I did go to high school in the US.

I didn't really care what people thought of me and my stuff then and so I guess I still don't now.

I guess it's not so much that I don't understand why what you are describing would be addictive and compelling if one cared about those things like being popular.

It's more of, I don't understand why so many people care so much about being popular haha. I guess I am really that abnormal and just have to accept that I will never understand it.

I guess the best I can do is to think of things that I do like and do desire and do care about, and imagine replacing them with the concepts of wanting to be popular or wanting to show off.

Or like thinking of the things that make me happy, and imagining instead that if the things on social media were what made me happy. But does social media really make people happy?

One of the things that makes me happy for instance is hiking and backpacking. Now I certainly understand that there are plenty of people who have no interest in that and if I had to explain to them why I like it so much, it would probably be hard to get them to truly understand why from my perspective.

I mean what really determines our individual interests? I guess I am just always surprised that so many people find social media interesting.

Watching sports is another one. I like playing sports, but I don't understand why so many people find sports so interesting to watch.

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