The corrupting force that is social media
Art by Florence Fraser-Macduff
In the summer after seventh grade, my social media-hating parents allowed me to download one social platform, Twitter. Both of my older siblings had done the same and encountered very few problems. My parents’ idea was that Twitter would not do any harm to my self-esteem, as Instagram or TikTok would, because the platform was not engineered to make young people feel bad about themselves and spend money. And they were right. Despite wasting a lot of time on Twitter and becoming a somewhat judgmental cynic at 13 years old, my time on the platform didn’t actually damage my confidence, so, ultimately, my parents succeeded in their goal to protect my pre-teen self-esteem.
The only problem with this plan was that the fall in confidence my parents worried about was misguided. It didn’t take long before I became hateful–consuming disinformation and gaining a deluded view of the world. I believed that what I saw on Twitter was the strict reality of life. Lies spread on the platform out of pure malice or depravity did not seem like lies to me. I had not yet been able to grasp that some people weren’t entirely good-natured and fabricated information either for personal gain or, incomprehensibly, purely for amusement. The case for 13-year-old me wasn’t that I didn’t know what to believe, I had never learned that there was information not to believe.
Despite my parents’ advice, my presence on social media only grew. I would waste hours, blindly scrolling through thousands of Instagram reels, letting them strip me of my self-respect and individuality. I had no way to filter the truth, and so my self-confidence dipped to an all-time low; every other video I saw seemed to be “if you do these 10 things, we can’t be friends,” or “how to get rid of your hip dips.” I couldn’t get enough of the woman in the screen telling me how to fix myself. The worst part was, I did all of it. I ate iceberg lettuce because some ‘board-certified dietician-dermatologist’ told me it would get rid of my chest acne. I stopped listening to artists I liked because I saw a slideshow depicting “the most annoying girl you know” showing my favorite albums. And all of these insecurities could come from one session of scrolling.
Over time, I discovered something wrong with my face, my voice, my personality, my family life, my music taste, my sense of style and my brain. I didn’t have an angel on my shoulder to tell me that they were lying or that that was their opinion (probably because she was too busy doomscrolling).
It happens to everybody, no matter how "media literate” they are. When you see a picture of your friend on the beach at sunset, you feel a pang of jealousy. It’s only human. You know you’re not watching the sunset at the beach right now. Two weeks later, you post a picture at a concert to prove that you, too, are having fun. But a concert is nothing when your other friend can post pictures of their skiing trip to Big Bear. But does a skiing trip to Big Bear really sound that fun when your other friend met Michael Cera in a hot air balloon? But who cares about Michael Cera when Steve Harvey DJed your sister's Bat Mitzvah? This cycle continues until everybody is exhausted by trying to paint their life as more exciting than it is, and are left to enviously observe the extravagant lives of frauds on the internet, whose lives are nothing like they claim to be, forcing 14 year old me and every other young person to compare their lives to one that doesn’t exist.
Was I just another teenager who fell for it? My parents had warned me about the dangers of social media time and time again, because they, as teachers, had seen first-hand the devastating effects of these social platforms on teenagers and children as they watched their classrooms turn from hubs of engagement and love to silent rooms of disconnect. I was raised in a household where social media was frowned upon above all else. Despite all of this, I was still able to develop an addiction. After all, there is no disclaimer on Instagram that says “We’re here to make money, and we’ll do whatever it takes.” Moreover, there is no reason that a young person should have to consider whether or not what they're seeing is a distortion of reality, or an outright lie. Unsurprisingly, nobody is immune to propaganda, but the lack of understanding for the child-targeting scheme that is social media is alarming.
Once I realized social media was the root cause of my problems, I deleted everything, going cold turkey. But even without social media on my phone, it still controls aspects of my life. While hanging out with me, my friends will Snap their other friends a picture of the wall, despite the fact that I am right there, readily willing to interact. My peers will set up events just to take pictures of themselves to post on Instagram. It seems they don’t want to enjoy things anymore, they only want to convince other people they do. The objective has changed.
These problems aren’t just for girls, boys are equally susceptible to the pull of social media. One student, Phineaus Pitts (’27), who battled social media addiction, describes his rock bottom.
“There was a point where I used to scroll on [Instagram Reels] in the shower,” admits Pitts. As a formerly addicted Instagram user, track prodigy Pitts details his past experience being dependent on Instagram reels, and seeing the short videos affect his closest friends. “I remember [alpha male videos], in seventh grade, [my friends] thinking that they had to buy some guy’s online course to escape some Matrix,” Pitts recalls seeing his friends fall into traps set for young men, to make them think materialistically, and buy their “life-changing online course for a discounted price!”
Along with many others their age, Pitts’ middle school friends lacked the skeptical brain that adults might have to question online information. With the awareness of their ability to deceive children, tens of thousands of influencers are able to trick young kids into buying their product, which is usually the final goal for an influencer. The easiest way to sell to children is to have the solution to their insecurities.
I know I’m lucky to have realized the dangers of social media after my long and confusing journey on these platforms. I have renounced social media and started a Luddite club at my school. Sadly, I have encountered very few other teenagers who don’t have social media, or are against falling into the vortex of this large-scale lie. These platforms are not for you to connect with your friends or find new hobbies. Social media is not about you, it never was. If you’re not careful, you will fall into the trap that has been tailored to your desires, they will keep you there until you decide to wake up. And there’s only one way to wake up… DM me for a link to my online course!