What is social media?
What is social media? Social media is a place where you can connect and socialize with people through texts, pictures, voice messages, emojis and much more! Users can also text or reply to people’s creations across the world 24/7 too! Although this sounds like a great way to connect and bond with people, it’s not always rainbows and sunshine.
What are the effects of social media?
Social media caused 15% of teens to say they were the target of online cruelty. 41% of teens had a negative experience as a result of using a social networking site. 22% of teens lost their friendship with someone due to actions on social media sites. 13% had experienced a problem with their parents because of social media sites according to guardchild.com. It also caused people to commit suicide and other harmful actions.
I personally think children using YouTube is ok, but children shouldn’t be using TikTok and YT Shorts. Why let children use Youtube but not YT shorts? It’s because YT Shorts are basically TikTok or Instagram Reels in disguise And most of them still give the same harm due to most people re-uploading them from TikTok.
Social media also causes users to be impatient, less attention span and depression/ anxiety. Depression is actually another reason why people harm themselves. Another reason people will get depressed and harm themselves is because they get jealous of “why I didn’t do that/ why didn’t I go there” and etc. I think only children below 16 shouldn’t use social media. Almost every high schooler uses social media, it’s like their lives depend on it.
Is it possible to stop the harm and still use social media?
Yes, it is possible to stop the harm and still use social media, but it requires some strictness according to 1. smartsocial.com 2. greatergood.berkeley.edu 3.unicef.org 4. education.uw.edu 5. youthfirstinc.org
- When you use social media, and feel depressed or anxious, STOP using social media immediately!
- Use social media for a purpose, not just to spend time. Use social media to communicate with friends & family, not to chat with people who you don’t even know. Use social media as a way to learn a new hobby or skill. Or just search on how to do that.
- Be respectful online. Please be nice everywhere, not just online. When you’re nice, some people will learn to be nice just from you. If you’re mean, other people will learn from you and they’ll be mean to their friends. When they’re mean to their friends, either 2 things can happen; They’ll start to be mean or break their friendship as well.
- Be strict with yourself. Set up a limit on screen time specifically for social media. To stop the temptation of Social Media, you can just give your phone to your guardians / parents or you can simply install GoGuardian or any other blocker apps to limit you on social media.