Is Social Media Ruining our Generation? (FULL ARTICLE)

I'm sure you have heard it before. "You guys spend too much time on screens!" " Why do you keep taking pictures of yourself?" Those are typically elders, and let's face it we don't really listen to their comments. They don't know anything about social media, they don't understand, right? I'm not going to voice my opinion, I'm just here to open you up to things you might not have known before. Then you can make a decision for yourself.

Social media is found in many different forms. The most common ones, and the ones I will be talking about, are instagram, twitter, and youtube. Let's start with the obvious, social media connects people. These platforms connect people from all over the world, country, state, county, anywhere. It lets you find people who share common intrests, or a bussiness that you like, or your friends and family. You can see what people are doing, what bussiness are promoting, or see pictures of places around the world you might never get to visit. Social media also allows people to promote things. If can be a person promoting a fashion company, someone promoting a book they worked hard on, or a bussiness promoting their new product. Social media gets whatever message you want out into the world. There are millions of people sending millions of messages that are avaiable a million places that can be acces within a millionth of a second. With the bright side of social media, comes problems though.

Social media is not always what it seems. You can't see the person who is running the acount. You can't know what is real and what is not. I'll use the most popular example, the selfie. You could take a selfie and then edit it like crazy. You can make your nose smaller, you skin tanner, your teeth whiter, your eyes bigger, you can change anything and everything. That isn't what the person really looks like, it's fake. Then that leads to people who see that fake picture and feel bad about themselves. They feel that they should look as good as that picture, but they don't know that it's fake. There is some people who aren't authentic, then there is self validation. These are people who posts pictures of themselves in order to get told they look good. They will focus on the number of like and think that the more likes or followers they get, they are better. Whether this be looks, personality, or something else. Social media can consume people. They will spend hours and hours in a 2d world instead of the real world. Some people become obsessed and start to use social media for a different purpose than sharing a message or connection.

Here is a list of things that might mean you are consumed by social media/a 2d world:

-If you spend more time on a group chat than in real life group hang outs

-If you spend more time looking at screen than interacting with real people each day

-If you go straight to a social media app the second you are 'bored' or 'have a free moment'

-If you scroll, view and read someone else's life the first thing when you wake up and the last thing you do before you go to bed

-If you spend over a month looking at a screen a year (2+ hours a day)

-If you find yourself comparing and feeling down because your edited life isn't as good as someone else's edited life

Obviously there is a lot to be said on this topic and a lot of different components that aren't mentioned. Again, I'm not writing this to share my opinion. I'm writing this to talk about something that is widely used by people our age and at this school. I know that their are many people who feel differently about this topic and we would love to hear your thoughts. Please send us an email through our contact page on this website. Social media have ups and downs and so many different uses. Everybody's experience on social media is different. Everybody's opinion on social media is different. Remember to be open minded and accepting of other people's opnions. I hope this article helped you find out if social media is ruining our generation.