Over the years, social media (mostly Facebook) has become a platform of toxicity. Facebook created the new generation of social media which has lead to the creation of Twitter, Instagram, etc. As time has gone on, things have gotten worse and worse in terms of the impact is has on our society. With that said, I have come up with a few examples as to why it is harming our society.
- Social Media has become more of a marketplace. Facebook is a prime example of a social network that has become more about quantity and commercialization rather than a place to connect with friends and family. While the platform’s actual viewership has slowed considerably in recent years, its ad revenue actually jumped by 42% in early 2018, demonstrating the company’s aptitude for making money over its aptitude to forge connections. Facebook has been acquiring other popular social networks only to see their founders quit shortly thereafter. An example: The co-founder of WhatsApp left over data privacy clashes, after Facebook pushed it to change its terms of service to give the larger social network access to WhatsApp users’ phone numbers and to look into advertising.
2. Social media has become detrimental to mental health
A bunch of research has proven that the psychological results of likes, feedback and shares are proving detrimental to the psychological well being of the majority of the population. One examine reported within the American Journal of Epidemiology discovered that liking extra posts was tied to worse psychological and bodily well being and “decreased life satisfaction,” whereas extra research by the College of Copenhagen discovered that many individuals undergo from “Facebook envy,” the idea of being envious of friends’ actions on social media. The design of Facebook particularly has brought on what researchers possess known as a context collapse, the place customers are locked right into a single persona by the platform. This happens in spite of sociologists’ settlement that we have now, and shows completely different facets of our identities counting on what contextual state of affairs we’re in — when we’re at work versus at a bar. The only persona we create on Facebook has led us to “self-edit” what we share, to create the proper model of that public persona, which is another factor that leads to the Facebook envy, and a large reason why people tend to buy followers on social media platforms.
3. Personal information is being bought and sold
Third-party data brokers, or companies that buy and sell information on customers, have become massively influential in the era of big data. For social media platforms, which capture large amounts of data, these transactions present an enormous new stream of revenue. Most social media users don’t understand the value of their personal data, and it’s become more common to accidentally expose themselves to malicious activity. Facebook users, in particular, were outraged when the third-party data firm Cambridge Analytica got its hands on personal data for as many as 87 million Facebook users — without their permission. While that breach was the most publicized one, there have been additional breaches since then. However, even these security breaches haven’t changed much about how users participate in social networks. According to a Chicago Tribune writer, experts have said “that “many users are either ambivalent toward data privacy or don’t understand what they’ve given up by agreeing to the terms of service in order to create an account.
4. Users are forced into a sensationalized environment
Today’s social publishing atmosphere rewards sensationalized content material, thereby damaging wholesome relationships online. These platforms reward “engagement” by highlighting extremely preferred posts extra prominently in newsfeeds, customizing social media customers to make an attempt to publish that sensationalized content material themselves. This attention-seeking habit has left folks at risk of harmful propaganda and affecting campaigns. Persist a period of 365 days, youngsters infamously filmed themselves ingesting Tide Pods in makes an attempt to realize extra consideration and followers, whereas, extra critically, Russian authorities operatives posted political propaganda on Fb that reached 126 million Individuals earlier than the 2016 election. The platform can be being taken to activity for permitting dislike speech from extremist politicians in Myanmar, which later contributed to the genocide of the Rohingya people. What was as soon as a apparently innocent platform, then, has now advanced into a robust machine that, because of complicated hate speech from extreme politicians in Myanmar, which later contributed to the genocide of the Rohingya people.
Facebook has been a villain for a lot of causes, numerous well-deserved. A large reason why it is so looked down on is its position in disseminating misinformation and propaganda round elections within the US and elsewhere. Or due to its invasions of privateness distributing out consumer privacy to third parties throughout the globe.
Moving forward, I collected data myself by walking around the hill. I asked a number of questions to 20 different kids, and here are the questions :
- Do you use social media (Facebook)? – 20/20 people said yes
- Do you have a problem with the amount of time spent on social media? – 8/20 people said yes
- Do you believe the media manipulates you? – 6/2o people said yes
- Do you agree that our society is controlled by the media? – 12/20 people said yes
- How do you believe we can fix this problem of manipulation and use media to our benefit? – A number of answers were given, mostly revolving around protection rights and fake news
Another form of data collection I used was by creating polls on Instagram. These were the questions :
- What form of social media do you use the most? – 90% responded Instagram
- Do you ever use Facebook anymore? – 80% responded yes
- For those who said yes, why? – The options were 1. Other forms of social media and 2. Just a lack of interest – 95% responded other forms of social media
When looking at these results, it is clear that our community within Boulder is rather naive on the topic of mass media and it’s manipulation on our society. This is very likely to translate to a majority of communities across the US. I chose to focus on Facebook as it is the site that created all of these other forms of social media and is commonly viewed as the big dog. Hence the fact that everyone stopped using Facebook for other forms of social media, while Facebook was the one who started this movement. Moving forward, we must start to inform our society and integrate it into our education as it plays a huge role in how our world functions today. A lack of knowledge on the subject correlates to large scale manipulation and small scale mental health issues, as many people don’t even know to look for these issues. To all of my readers, I strongly suggest watching “The Social Dilemma” as it goes into depth on the algorithms that were created to allow for such manipulation. As a teen in todays society, I am aiming to grasp the attention of my fellow peers and those younger than me. The more we continue to allow children and clueless kids to use the internet/social media, the deeper of a hole we are digging for the future.
Sources :
Brogunier, Tobin. “Social Media Toxicity.” Entrepreneur, 22 Feb. 2019, www.entrepreneur.com/article/328749.
Ozbourne, S.A. “Why Social Media Is so Toxic.” Medium, Thoughts And Ideas, 24 Sept. 2020, medium.com/indian-thoughts/why-social-media-is-so-toxic-49341bd4afe1.
Tassi, Paul. “Facebook Is Terrible Not Because It’s Evil, But Because It’s Terrible.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 18 Jan. 2019, www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2019/01/18/facebook-is-terrible-not-because-its-evil-but-because-its-terrible/?sh=192b05ff305a.
