Stegeman1

Sam Stegeman

Professor Waggoner

English 1201

26 March 2021

Social Media; Where Likes Determine Happiness

Social media are apps that enable users to create and share content with other people.

Technology and social media have evolved over the years making it so easy to share and talk

about your public and private life. The most popular platforms are Facebook, YouTube,

WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and Snapchat. Most users of social media are between

the ages of 15 and 25. The big argument that everyone is talking about involves the privacy and

safety of the user. When you sign up for the app, you will have to first create a username and

password. Then you are directed to a page of terms and conditions. Most people do not read a

single word and just scroll to the bottom to move on. Terms and conditions allow the site to

govern how they use your content for their own site and others. For example, ads. When you

look up a product on Amazon but don’t buy it, chances are you will see an ad on Facebook of

that same product. Not only is privacy a bad thing, but also the safety of the user. Whenever

there is some sort of a trend, social media is the first to know. In 2019, there was a trend going

around called the “choking challenge” (aka “fainting game”). This was a game where you

intentionally cut off oxygen to the brain, causing the person to pass out. Most people did this

challenge out of curiosity and popularity. Until a teenager named Mason Bogard died while

attempting the challenge along with 35 others (Palmer). It is really worth doing the choking

challenge, Tide Pod challenge, or blue whale challenge just to be popular? Is it worth giving your
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privacy away just to gain fake friends? Kids and teenagers should never experience this when

growing up. They should not use social media because it shares their personal identity, creates

mental and social problems, and exposure to horrific content that should not be seen at that age.

Social media has become more and more addictive to the younger generations. Around

92 percent of teenagers go online daily and 24 percent are said to be online constantly

(Flannery). With these percentages, it is so easy for people to express their views with just one

click of a button. Having a big followship grants you a lot of power. Allowing this power to get

in the wrong hands are sadly a normal. In Ohio, an 18-year-old live streamed the raping of a 17-

year-old girl on the Periscope app. Additionally, three teenagers were charged with raping a 15-

year-old girl and posting it to Snapchat thanks to the inspiration from the earlier stream

(Duncan). Imagine if you are a parent and you came across your teen looking at those videos on

Snapchat. Wouldn't you be worried if these videos escalated to anything worse? Well, they do.

With violence occurring in other countries like terrorism, children can be exposed to ISIS

tortures, beheadings, and rape (Flannery).

ISIS and other terrorist groups have constructed a media platform that they heavily invest

in. On YouTube and Twitter, they show “recruitment videos” that allow people all over the

world to come and join them. For example, three schoolgirls left their wonderful life in London

to move to Syria to join the organization (Pandith). Gen Zers, who makes up 32 percent of the

world population, are described as digital natives because they have not experienced life before

the internet (Pandith). 80 percent of Gen Zers get their news from social media; allowing them to

be easily influenced by what they see (Pandith). Not only is this bad for the user, but it is bad for

the social media platform. Them allowing this content is creating problems for the younger

crowd as they are doing nothing to stop it. Another example of this is the storming of the US
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Capitol Building. People on Facebook all gathered and set up this tragic event through social

media. Obviously, Facebook did not see this as a threat and it turned out to be one of the biggest

events in US history. Awareness and guidance are what these platforms need. Taking down not

only this group but all groups that relate into violence is a key factor to the safety of people.

Exposure to inappropriate, upsetting, or adult-themed content are all accessible through

these platforms (Deveraux). One in four teens are receiving sexually explicit texts and emails,

and one in seven are sending sexts without consent (Deveraux). Again, in the perspective of

parents, you think that your child is just looking at pictures of their friends or cool vacation

spots, but in reality, they are seeing things that are inappropriate and learn bad habits. These

platforms also control cyberbullying, trolls, toxic comparisons, sleep deprivation, and less face-

to-face interaction (Hurley).

In the past, there was no such thing as technology. If you wanted to gather information

for a school paper, you would go to an encyclopedia. If you wanted to drive to Florida, then you

would have to use a paper map. But most importantly, if you wanted to talk to someone, then

you would have to do it face-to-face. Talking to someone in person is uncommon today, leaving

countless teenagers “socially awkward”. 74 percent of teens prefer to talk digitally (Homingos).

With this, teens and kids can barely hold a normal conversation. Employers are having a hard

time finding people with some sort of communication skills. People are more worried about

growing their fake followship rather than experiencing meaningful relationships. The whole

importance of being social is to understand body language, verbal skills, facial expressions,

empathy and sympathy with other people (Homingos). So why is it called social media if it’s not

really social? It should be called electronic media that has cyberbullying, addictive behavior,

explicit content and the ability to see your friend's dog. That’s pretty fair.
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Not only are there social problems present, but there are also mental problems all tied

together. One of the most common mental problems is FOMO-Fear of missing out. If everyone

around you is using social media, are you are not, then missing that experience can create anxiety

and depression (Sperling). The most important factor of life and restoration is sleep, especially

with teens. Not having that time to restore your body can cause a lot of physical and mental issues.

Social media has caused teens to lack sleep due to the radioactive lights and rays that come off

phones. Having less sleep causes memory issues, depression, and poor academic performance

(Sperling). Gender comes in to play with mental health. While males tend to express aggression

physically, females do so by excluding others and sharing hurtful comments (Sperling). With that

being said, social media increases the opportunity for such harm (Sperling). In the digital world,

there is a thing called filtering. Filtering allows someone to make them look better without

physically doing anything in real life. For example, there is a filter where you can whiten your
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teeth, or even make you look like a supermodel. Having this present for teens makes it hard for

them to see what is right and what is wrong.

Covid-19 has really impacted people's mental health. Whether it was not going to work or

school, or not seeing other people for a long period of time. A lot of people were stuck inside and

had nothing to do. With social media being so accessible, that is what most people did. The media

now and days can be a lot to take in. The misinformation overload from social media and news

caused a huge spike in mental health problems along with the pandemic (Gao). A social

psychology concept called self-discrepancy theory can be applied to social media users. This

theory states that individuals compare their “actual” selves to their “ideal” selves causing immense

discomfort within the individual (Hanif). This is active today because many teens want to be

perfect with what the things they post, but when in reality, they know they can never be like that.

For example, some social influencers seem that they are having a great life, but actually they are

struggling and don’t want that to hurt their social status. Another big factor is self-esteem. If you

have ever seen a political or controversy post and then looked at the comments, then you will now

that people are so hurtful and dangerous in what they comment. When there is a post of you online.

There is always that one group of haters that try to destroy you with mean comment. When a teen

see’s something bad about them, they believe it. This all creates low self-esteem, which then turns

into anxiety, depression, or even suicide.

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FIGURE 1 Interaction effects of social media use and the COVID‐19 stressor on depression. Note: Error bars indicate 95% confidence

intervals.

When you make a new social media account, you have to make a username and password.

Often need to supply an email as well. Without suppling all this personal information, you will not

be able to use any platforms. The lack of privacy these companies have for the users is absurd.

Privacy is defined as personal information kept secret to the user, yet Facebook and amazon know

what you are looking at on different apps to then use ads on their platforms of the same things. In

2019, Facebook had a data leak exposing the phone numbers linked to 419 million user accounts

(Winder). These accounts were found unprotected by any password. This meant that anyone

looking for such things could find and access those databases (Winder). Not only is Facebook like

this, but almost every big tech company has this horrible magnitude of unprotected servers that

leak not only passwords and phone numbers, but location and credit cards.
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Since social media is such a big deal, some people think differently. Some people believe

that social media creates virtual supported communities, knowledge of world events, connection

with family members, and to learn new things. For example, “Building a positive digital footprint

using social media is a great way for students to shine online, show their unique personality, and

have ownership over their search results” (Ochs). Another example is “Teens use social media to

connect with family, share photos, and videos with them” (Wright). However, this argument is

incorrect. Social media platforms do in fact have virtual communities, but are not supportive to

users especially teens. Each platform has groups who have the same interests. For example, if you

like politics, then you are going to communicate with people who like politics and etc. But the

main problem with this is that if you disagree with the majority of people, then you will receive

hate and feel like trash just because you had a different view. Which ultimately goes back to

cyberbullying and depression. Being online in general allows you to learn new things and see what

is happening around the world. Having this ability allows for the users to become addicted and

being exposed to things around the world that are not pleasant and/or related. With all of these

reasoning being said, this argument is not convincing.

In conclusion, teens and kids should not use social media because it shares their personal

identity that will affect them in the future, it creates mental health issues including depression and

anxiety, it affects their social interactions and communicational skills due to being “glued” to the

screens, and lastly it exposes them to horrific explicit content that should never be seen at that age.

With all that being said, hopefully this paper made you think about the other side of the “perfect”

and normal social media.

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Work Cited

Article by: Katie Hurley. “Social Media and Teens: How Does Social Media Affect Mental

Health?” Psycom.net - Mental Health Treatment Resource Since 1996, 17 Nov. 2020,

www.psycom.net/social-media-teen-mental-health.

Duncan, Jericka. “Teens on Social Media Go from Dumb to Dangerous.” CBS News, CBS

Interactive, 28 Apr. 2016, www.cbsnews.com/news/teens-on-social-media-from-dumb-to-

dangerous/.

Flannery, Daniel J. "Here's how witnessing violence harms children's mental health." Gale

Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2021. Gale In Context: Opposing

Viewpoints,

link.gale.com/apps/doc/EHOFED471150506/OVIC?u=dayt30401&sid=OVIC&xid=cdbe6

06b. Accessed 7 Mar. 2021. Originally published as "Here's how witnessing violence

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drnachonline.com/social-media-killing-social-skills/.
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Hanif, Fariha, and Fariha Hanif. Exploring the Effects of Social Media on Mental Health during

COVID, 27 Nov. 2020, socialcovid.commons.gc.cuny.edu/the-role-of-social-media-in-

covid-19/.

“How Heavy Use of Social Media Is Linked to Mental Illness.” The Economist, The Economist

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Palmer, Ewan. “Mother Warns against ‘Stupid’ Choking Challenge She Blames for Death of

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Pandith, Farah, et al. “Teen Terrorism Inspired by Social Media Is on the Rise. Here's What We

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Winder, Davey. “Unsecured Facebook Databases Leak Data Of 419 Million Users.” Forbes,

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iaap-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/aphw.12226.