[primitur]

The elephant in the room is not Facebook.

Its the generations of people who have, over the last 10 years, grown up to assume that their personal lives are of interest to others, and wish therefore to capitalize/profit on exposing their life to strangers.

This is going to be a much more difficult precipice to step back from than, say, the rampant piracy of things like Napster, and so on. We'll definitely have to push technology harder and further to establish better ways for these addicts to come down from their highs and return to a more normal level of social interaction - but then again, maybe its too late.

(Upvote me if you agree.)

Seriously though, I believe we have to appeal to one demographic that gets ignored through all of this, thick and thin: parents. Its truly the only way to adjust this cultural liability for future generations - we simply must insist on parental controls over social media from now on.

And, in addition, we have to establish that parents should regulate their kids' use of online/social media tools in such a way that we reduce the devolutionary effect on human interaction that is occurring now.

Perhaps its truly time for a revolutionary new service: FamilyBook. You can only gain access with a birth certificate .. mmm ...

[efdee]

No, the elephant is definitely Facebook and friends.

"Its the generations of people who have, over the last 10 years, grown up to assume that their personal lives are of interest to others, and wish therefore to capitalize/profit on exposing their life to strangers." - Say what? Most people aren't looking to capitalize/profit on anything, they just want to share bits of their life with others that they count as their friends.

Most people are definitely not aware of what happens behind the curtains. The fact that there's a big gorilla in the room watching everything they post and profiting of that is the problem.

And that gorilla is Facebook.

[primitur]

Facebook wouldn't be such a bully if it didn't have so many willing victims, throwing themselves at its maw. There is a market for industrialized narcissism/solipsism .. but what came first - Facebook, or the narcissist? I believe its the latter, but I'm willing to concede that Facebook - as well as others - have definitely fomented this market.

Right now, we have to deal with the Facebook dystopia. But, it won't go away if we just shut down Facebook. We need to work on the reasons for the cultural and social proclivity towards allowing the usurpation of our basic human rights. Do most of us even know what our human rights are?

[TAForObvReasons]

There are "honest" ways to run a social network, which don't involve taking every ethically-dubious money-making opportunity. It should never have been appropriate to collaborate with a political campaign beyond the standard corporate arrangements.

This isn't a problem with Facebook as it is a problem with Zuckerberg and the executives of Facebook, who think these behaviors are acceptable in the first place.

[watwut]

> This isn't a problem with Facebook as it is a problem with Zuckerberg and the executives of Facebook, who think these behaviors are acceptable in the first place.

The issue is not so much that this particular group of people think about what is acceptable. It is that people who don't think that behavior like this is acceptable are significantly less likely to amass as much power. Not just that, but they are also less likely to be listened to, because they are not successful enough.

Being ethical is competitive disadvantage and we live in world that values winning over competition and having financial success way more then it values being ethical.

[primitur]

If our culture didn't promote narcissistic/solipsism as much as it does, above all others, perhaps these execs wouldn't be so inclined.

Yes, its an ethics issue. I don't disagree that Facebook have stepped over the line. But we have to face the truth of the matter, which is that our society encouraged them to do so - and allowed it to happen - and is continuing the slide down the slippery slope towards totalitarian oblivion. Facebook isn't going to fix that for us, nor would it be fixed if we nuked the Facebook campus from orbit, to be sure.

Which is why I think there has to be an ethical, and technological means perhaps, by which we can enact the social change required to bring us out of this conundrum. Just the way that social change was brought about by culture revolution, itself the product of some small incident perhaps, we have to find that means. I don't know what it is, but I start now to think of what a 'decent' social network would be like .. don't you?

[Eric_WVGG]

The notion that parents are always or even usually wise and responsible, that seems like a very shaky foundation upon which to repair a culture. Homer Simpson “beat” Dr. Huxtable, after all, quite handily...

[primitur]

They don't have to be wise or responsible. They do have to have a desire to raise their kids with future-proof values. These are not necessarily the same thing.

And .. Homer Simpson? Fiction, yo.

[TheSpiceIsLife]

The future is notoriously hard to predict.

How are we to know what future-proof values are, and how are we to go about instilling those values in our children?

One problem with children, despite our best intentions, is they tend to go on to create things like Facebook.

[Eric_WVGG]

What makes you think most have a desire to raise their kids with future-proof values? What makes you think that most have a desire to raise their kids? These are absurd and (I hate to use this word) privileged assumptions.

And I attest that the Simpson/Huxtable thing is valid. Huxtable (and Ward Cleaver and etc) were a fiction that our culture accepted as truth. Homer is an obvious fiction whose message is "that thing we accepted as truth was a lie." In that respect, Homer Simpson is much more real than Dr. Huxtable or Ward Cleaver or any myth that parents are simply by virtue of having functional reproductive organs competent.

[primitur]

>What makes you think most have a desire to raise their kids with future-proof values?

History.

>What makes you think that most have a desire to raise their kids?

Statistics.

> privileged assumptions

I think you've got a bit of hatred for this subject.

>Simpson/Huxtable thing is valid.

Fiction is merely an analog for the truth; in this case, a very minor, small part of the reality of parenting. No, Homer is not a good parent model. His character is more of an allegory for cynical irony than the reality, which is that a vast majority of parents - fathers - care very deeply for their children and want to see them survive whatever the future brings.

Anything less is the very apathetic, solipsism, we've been discussing.

[Eric_WVGG]

"history" "statistics" oh bravo you just said a pair of words. Here, I'll do the same thing: "History. Statistics." Now who's right?

"hatred for this subject"? Sure. I know a lot of people who had shitty parents. I know a pair of brothers who committed suicide because their father molested them. Many of my friends hate their folks. My own are terrific, incidentally. When I say those are privileged assumptions, that's because I have been reminded numerous times that I had a privileged upbringing.

Which, by the way, entailed parents whose life philosophy was hands-off, which further points out how vapid the notion that "parental controls would fix social media" is.

[primitur]

History: you only need to look beyond your own sphere to see that historically, yes, a majority of all parents, ever, have cared for their kids and wish for them to have a better future.

Statistics: if it were not so, we wouldn't have survived as a species, let alone been to the moon and been given the 'privilege' of iPhones, et al.

Privilege: oh look, you used a word.

[na85]

You lost the argument as soon as you tried to play the privilege card.

[pjc50]

> assume that their personal lives are of interest to others

Celebrities and self-promoters have existed forever. As have gossips. Generally people are interested in others' personal lives.

> parental control

This is going to be an endless battle, and will come with ludicrous comparisons to the various ages of personal responsibility. You can as easily end underage internet chatting as you can end underage drinking.

[primitur]

I'm not calling for its end. I'm calling for its control. And there is no better entity in all society than the family unit when it comes to social control. You can't effect change without control...

[pjc50]

> And there is no better entity in all society than the family unit when it comes to social control

You say that like it's a good thing, when a lot of people believe that the final frontier of liberation is within the family - from domestic violence to the dismantling of anti-LGBT attitudes.

And, just to return to the original topic, the original article does not actually mention children. Even if we constrained social networks to those over 18 (they're currently supposed to be constrained to over-13), it wouldn't put much of a dent in the big problems. It's not (just) kids that are sharing antisemitic memes or fake news about immigrants. The dysfunctional politics of social media is an adult problem.

[primitur]

>The dysfunctional politics of social media is an adult problem.

It wouldn't be so drastic if the family unit were not under attack by social movements hell bent on removing the last bastion against their attempts to introduce social upheaval. the family unit is a real and functioning means of social survival. Attacking the family unit because it is "the final frontier of liberation" is a highly contentious argument - it also happens to be the last bastion of true civilization. Once the family unit is deconstructed, civilization fails. This is demonstrated throughout the historical record.

[kerkeslager]

Putting the focus on parents is a distraction. Obviously it's the responsibility of parents to monitor and regulate their childrens' internet usage. But that doesn't take any of the responsibility off of the social media companies for their attacks on attention and privacy.

Social media companies can't just prey on people and then say, "It's not our fault--their parents should have protected them from us!"

[mmjaa]

I don't think the OP is saying that - its more that the solution to the real problem starts in the home. The problem is described as self-absorption and addiction to social validation - a product of modern family life, perhaps?

Either way, as a parent I do believe I have a responsibility to raise my children to understand the need to balance the desire for social validation, with actual contribution to the social order. Facebook et al., don't appear to be too interested in promoting externalisation of these issues, and have demonstrated a strong willingness to do whatever they can to keep people - kids and adults alike - glued to their landing pages .. whereas if parents were raising kids to understand this trap, it wouldn't be so easy.

But, as it is, more often than not when met with the statement "I don't let my kids use Facebook", too many times other peers/parents respond with "well you're not letting your kids keep up with the times, you are damaging them by not letting them have free access to the things that 'everyone else has'" .. and here, I think, is the crux of the social dilemma. In this aspect, I agree with primitur that parenting is the solution.

Parents need to raise the next generation of humans to be wise to the ways of the wicked mind-control cults. Facebook just happens to be the contemporary version.

[kerkeslager]

> Parents need to raise the next generation of humans to be wise to the ways of the wicked mind-control cults.

This is exactly what I'm disagreeing with. If you're putting the focus on parents needing to do something, you're creating an intractable problem. It's hard enough to get parents to do basic stuff like feed and supervise their children. At best, changing views on parenting changes the behavior of the parents who listen to modern views on parenting. There parents are likely not even the ones whose children are most affected. Approaching parents about this is only going to be preaching to the choir.

The solution as a society isn't getting parents to behave differently, it's not tolerating wicked mind-control cults.

[harryf]

> And, in addition, we have to establish that parents should regulate their kids' use of online/social media tools in such a way that we reduce the devolutionary effect on human interaction that is occurring now.

Basically: yes! But with lots of caveats.

- Parents shouldn't be able to play Big Brother in their children's lives - it's important for all kinds of reasons, especially sexual development, that children and teenagers get to have a safe degree of privacy e.g. son who's gay vs father who's homophobic

- "I blame the parents" needs to be eliminated from the conversation. Parenting today is full of bad compromises e.g. give your kids access to social media and expose them to a random stream of cultural influences vs. isolate them and risk social exclusion. And most parents anyway have little extra time / energy for keeping tabs on whether your child's use of a VR headset or whatever latest consumer tech found its way into your household is harmful or not.

- we need to exercise collective wisdom on what social media does to children. Seeing my daughter using musical.ly for example really makes we wonder if we're training a generation of narcissists.

...and that's just three off the top of my head

[Zak]

> we need to exercise collective wisdom on what social media does to children

You seem to be suggesting some sort of regulation. Since you weren't concrete and specific, I can't respond to that directly, but I urge you to keep in mind:

* Many things that are valuable to adults may be dangerous to children. Consider a kitchen knife, power tools or cleaning chemicals.

* With all the privacy concerns that are in the public eye lately, age verification, which is probably difficult to separate from identity verification, seems fairly unappealing.

[watwut]

Kids able to read and write enough for Facebook are remarkably safe around kitchen knife and cleaning chemicals. Teenagera are fully able to operate power tools.

[Zak]

Many, perhaps most are indeed. I think most teenagers are also able to use social media in ways that aren't harmful to them.

[watwut]

One difference is that while your safety around knife or tool depends only on you, your safety on social media can easily be ended by other people.

You don't have full control over social media you do have around cleaning and knives.

[primitur]

>we're training a generation of narcissists

This is an age-old conundrum, and I don't think we'll ever be rid of it. However, I do believe we need to refine the current situation such that it doesn't become the #1 dominating factor in social discourse.

It would be nice to see a social network arise that rewards altruism and empathy, for example, while demoting narcissism and solipsism... Perhaps that will come, somehow. In some ways I believe we already have these platforms in some forms (github comes to mind) ..

[verylittlemeat]

>Its the generations of people who have, over the last 10 years, grown up to assume that their personal lives are of interest to others, and wish therefore to capitalize/profit on exposing their life to strangers.

What do you mean "assume?" Obviously many people are interested in people who are exposed on social media. As a result there is massive opportunity to capitalize and profit. I'm not even just talking about the Kardashians of the world...Jane has 10 followers on instagram and Joe who is attracted to her wants to see what she's up to.

Parental controls aren't going to remove the human instinct to figure out where one stands in the social hierarchy. That's why the genie isn't going back into the bottle.

[SllX]

There's too many parents that shouldn't be parents for that to really catch on and simultaneously net the results you would like to see, assuming a kid even has a parent or active adult figure in their life.

[dalbasal]

I disagree, sort of.

I can see your argument and I agree with most of it, but I don't think it's the main thing. Look at where this is becoming a functional call to action (arms?)... It's politics. Not addiction, narcissism, the TV-but-worse elements and their side effects, not data security, privacy.. politics.

FB & social media generally, have already yielded a handful of full blown revolutions. Certainly a few attempts, and most anything that works by way of public election.

Elon Musk quit FB, on twitter. You know who can't quit FB, politicians. It'd be ill-advised. This has by definition become a political question.

[eksemplar]

When I was a child I snuck up in the middle of the night to watch aliens on mute with a blanket over the tv to hide the lights, even though my parents had forbidden it. When I was a teenager my parents had no control at all.

Controlling your children is probably a nice thought for scared parents, but not only doesn’t it work, there is a long scientific record of it being abusive and ruining children.

I think YouTube is a terrible rolemodel for our children too, but mostly for the zombies watching it, at least the kids that are selling out, are actually content producers who are doing something with their lives. Even if that something is retarded.

[itakedrugs]

I think that parental controls can be abused by the people implementing them and avoided by the kids "using" them so it is probably better to teach the kids what is right and wrong.

[shanev]

There was a social network like this called Famspam, but it pivoted to something called Github.

[daveid]

>The elephant in the room is not Facebook.

Can you really say "elephant in the room" in a thread about social media and not mention Mastodon[1]? That's a facebook rival that's not staying mum...

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPSbNdBmWKE

[sattoshi]

Literally nobody mentioned it to me except on HN. Nobody I know uses it.

[AndrewKemendo]

This is a great point. Social Media democratized the ability to be a celebrity.

Celebrity is something that everyone wants - except for those who have achieved it.