[closeparen]

Social media is one of dozens of social changes in the last N years. You can line any one of them up next to any bad outcome. This is not generally being done from a place of epistemic humility or interest in establishing causation. It’s just “thing I already don’t like lines up with bad outcome, see how right I am not to like it!”

If that’s not what you’re doing, I don’t mean it as an attack on you. I just think we’re systematically abusing miserable kids as confirmation of our priors (about all kinds of things, social media is just one). We owe them curiosity about how to actually help.

[GhettoComputers]

Thank you for the clarification. It is a multi dimensional problem, and I have found very negative effects from social media for myself and people around me.

I do not think that social media is overall good for mental health, it has been shown to be harmful in statistics especially for women and also there is no shortage of n=1 articles on benefits of quitting it. I think it is a serious issue when the teenage suicide rates are higher in the US (pre corona) when it is a wealthy country. If you can clarify, what is the problem you have with my post? I am posting it not only from personal experience but also with data to substantiate my claims.

[cmoscoso]

What other social changes have taken place in the last years?

[tomlin]

A lot of data counters what you're trying to put out here. I wish it weren't true, but if you would like, I can point you to studies where you can see how teen suicide in girls and the launch of Instagram, then Snapchat, then TikTok - as well, final thoughts and letters by a large amount of these young girls vary from saying that social media WAS the reason for their suicide, to saying that actions made by others (via social media) were a factor in others. I do sincerely think social media is a force for harm for everyone - as it raises division among people at rates that are hard to build responses to. Psychologists also largely agree that the effects of social media are causing a new kind of concern outside of what we've so far dealt with.

I do sort of think you might have an agenda here, for at this point you are suggesting that the thoughts and feelings of the girls who committed suicide should hold almost no weight. Maybe you're not saying that outright, but if you haven't looked into the lives of these girls before suggesting their plight is "just another generational grievance", well, yeah, we are fucked.