Technology

The science suggests that some features of social media function can harm some young people’s mental health. These include, but are not limited to, algorithmically driven distortions of reality exacerbating harmful content and disinformation, the distraction away from time that can otherwise be used in more healthy ways, and the creation of opportunities where youth can be abused or exploited. However, there are also several ways in which social media improve the lives of youth, including the creation of opportunities for community among more marginalized youth, and the opportunity for fun and joy for the vast majority of users.

• Social Media and Adolescent Health (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK603435/)

Every generation parents engage in a moral panic to ban something because it is destroying the youth. You lot are doing the same and contributing to a movement that will harm everyone and eventually lead to the destruction of platforms like Lemmy.

Think twice before joining the like of those who, in past generations, wanted to ban videogames, pagers, comic books and even novels for young people. Did the harm ever materialise? Or are we just as fucked up as every generation before us.

Is it social media or is it the looming exiction event before us and the politicians that gleefully line their pockets with the profits of genocide and ecocide?

Please, I beg you, THINK before feuling a moral panic.