[rockskon]

Statistical anomalies exist, sure. But if there was any meaningful negative impact at scale, you'd think it would've shown up over the decades in trending therapy topics, to people bringing up traumatic memories of the old Internet, to....to something at scale.

[pegasus]

Knowing what she's seen at that age, I'm pretty sure I'd have flashbacks as well. This wasn't the old internet, and it's not like the new internet is free of such content. I really don't think that we have a way to quantify this, but, as one sibling comment said, expecting no influence seems unrealistic – as is expecting that influence to be easily detectable. I'm sure my ex is not the only one bringing up such experiences in therapy and I bet if you ask experienced therapists they will have similar stories.

[noduerme]

Here's an anomaly:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/22/business/facebook-content-mod...

[ChoGGi]

I recall an article back in 2016 or '18 about workers in the Philippines experiencing the same. May not have been Facebook, Google maybe?

[47282847]

Even if it were reported at scale to each and every therapist, they rarely share even anonymized stories with others. Anecdata: I’ve talked to a bunch, and processed some of that shit, but nobody else hears.

[only-one1701]

Just because it can’t be easily measured doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

[rockskon]

No, but there's rough heuristic that are generally reliable. Psychologists talk. If a problem is recurring - they talk a lot amongst each other regarding the prevalence of the problem.

I don't recall there ever being a trending issue among psychologists - child or otherwise - dealing with clients who have been traumatized about the minimally restricted Internet of the 90's and 00's.

But if you don't trust this heuristic, then tell me - what distinguishes the belief that seeing horrible content on the Internet in the 90's and 00's led to a large number of traumatized individuals vs the belief that the ready availability of horrible content hurt a statistically negligible number of people and that it was a significant net benefit?

Actions and policies should be based on something more than intuition and belief alone.