Comment by goldcd | Hacker News Reader

Comment by goldcd | Hacker News Reader

I've no love for Facebook and the rest of social media - I can't help but hear this latest warning as just the current "think of the children".

We've had Elvis's hips, communists, hippies, satanic rock, video-nasties, murder-simulating computer games, raves and have worked our way through at least 3 waves of 'internet panic' My guess is we'll rank this discussion in retrospect the same way as those previous 'issues'

When I read a story about "the Republican congresswoman from Washington confronted Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg" I can almost hear the mantra instilled in Mark's head "Don't say nobody under 30 is using Facebook, say anything, admit anything, just appear relevant"

Now I'm definitely not saying social media is blameless - but it's not invented aspirational capitalism or bullying. It existed, will always exist, and just uses the conduits available.

If we consider the message, not the messenger, I actually think "the youth of today" is far better adjusted than I was at their age.

But we're not allowed to say that are we? There's never been a generation than looks at the new one, and collectively says they're better than us.

I don't think everyone sees it as just a "children" issue - it's not like the topic doesn't come up when it's about adults. But children is the angle laws can hit the easiest, and it does hit an extra "think of the children" emotional spot. And mental health among adults is more of a taboo topic politically. So I think it is a mix.

To disagree, I don't think the topic does come up when discussing (voting) adults.

Does your politican campaign on a policy that specifically sets out reduces self-harm or suicide in their adult electorate?

"Let me be judged if I don't reduce suicides by 5% in my term!"

No. Because that's not what we want to hear. We want to be left alone with our guns and alcohol, but by all means help me with my teenager listening to "rap music" or being upset as her bullying classmate was unkind to her on tiktok.

The U.S. did ban alcohol once. It didn't go over well.

and I believe it did reduce suicide rates.

I think if I had to summarize, voters will vote to give themselves choices (however harmful) - whilst patting themselves on the back for voting to restrict others for their own protection.

I completely agree.

There's an additional aspect, though. Voters will vote against new restrictions for themselves, but will vote to keep existing restrictions that have been around a long time.

A fun example (quoted from https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/01/11/self-serving-bias):

> Oregon is one of two US states that bans self-service gas stations. Recently, they passed a law relaxing this restriction – self-service is permissible in some rural counties during odd hours of the night. Outraged Oregonians took to social media to protest that self-service was unsafe, that it would destroy jobs, that breathing in gas fumes would kill people, that gas pumping had to be performed by properly credentialed experts – seemingly unaware that most of the rest of the country and the world does it without a second thought.

So maybe we like freedoms that we're used to, but also like the benefits (or perceived benefits in the above example) of restrictions that we're used to.

(I don't know if disapproval of allowing self-service was widespread or was just a small number of people posting on social media, but it makes a good story.)

The data being used to back this is very much a "children" issue, a adolescent female issue to be exact. The rate of depression stated to skyrocket in 2012 for this specific group.

This also seems to be an obvious counter to the implied hypothesis that "rate of depression increases linearly with facebook usage" since they launched in like 2005 or so, grew steadily from at least 2007, and also have most likely seen a significant decline in usage among adolescents in the recent years.

You could arguably better correlate that with teenagers gaining access to personal image sharing devices .. i.e. camera phones, and publishing platforms i.e. they can share photos/videos ... systemically the issue is self worth being largely wrapped up in how pretty you are perceived to be, which is a social/cultural problem.

Watching a happy and polite teenage daughter become horrifically depressed and nasty when on social media is a gut punch.

Several years of off of it for multiple months. Very happy.

On it for a couple of months. Depressed and nasty. Every single time. We were always the bad guys for restricting.

She’s moved out and married now. Now talks about how depressed she gets on it.

Yes. It must be social media. Teenagers were previously well known for being bundles of joy. And for thanking their parents for imposing rules. Still, good to know that you were right and she knows this now.

fwiw, this comment also isn't really in the spirit of the "open discussion" you miss.

The point was not made in a generous way, but it's worth considering that adolescence is famously - and in Western culture universally - viewed as a time of great emotional distress, raging hormones, rapid physical change, rebellion, and so on. And the OP's point was specifically that every generation seems to blame the "new thing" for this exact phenomenon, to the point where it is now obvious that it is not the "new thing" but instead maybe something less ephemeral.

It wasn't - and I made it more personal than I'd have liked now I re-read it (but I wrote it, so I'm leaving it up).

I like your post.

Agreed - I was being a dick.

Well, effect size is effect size, but this is non generalizable. Still, it looks like you have a clear intervention in the n=1 case which is great!

As my opinion appears less popular than I'd expected.

I'd be humbly interested to know what populist historical saving of youth policy (specifically when you were a youth), you think was worthwile.

After posting I did realize I'd omitted the "parental advisory" sticker on CDs.. I still think this is my favourite.

Oh the ESRB definitely. I hated it but in retrospect, there's no telling what sort of maniac I'd be if I'd grown up marinated in ultra violent video games.

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