[HN Gopher] Most Canadians believe Facebook harms their mental h... ___________________________________________________________________ Most Canadians believe Facebook harms their mental health Author : elorant Score : 523 points Date : 2021-10-15 15:43 UTC (7 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.theglobeandmail.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.theglobeandmail.com) | azangru wrote: | Why don't they quit then? | quadrangle wrote: | You can ask that for every single behavior that anyone claims | goes against their deeper values like good health. Why do | people keep smoking or eating junk food or staying up too late | or yelling at family and friends when they lose their temper? | | It's true that deeds speak louder than words. But it's also | true that habits are hard to break, and there's the thinking- | fast-and-slow ideas that our judgments, actions, and values are | different when we are in the immediate flow of emotion vs | considering the big picture with detachment. | | If you ask "why" in a sincere curious way, there's a ton of | interesting things to investigate. I hope that was the attitude | you meant as opposed to the anti-curious condescending "why" | that amounts to just being a doubter. | azangru wrote: | > If you ask "why" in a sincere curious way | | No, I was asking why in a frustrated rhetorical way. I get | annoyed by the frequency with which people complain about | social media, which is usually followed by requests for a | government intervention or for a stricter moderation by the | network owners. Just quit, I want to say. The internet is | huge. Find yourself another hobby. A better network. Or, if | you think you are addicted, as you may be to alcohol or | drugs, seek help. It should be your responsibility, don't put | it on others. | passivate wrote: | >You can ask that for every single behavior that anyone | claims goes against their deeper values like good health. Why | do people keep smoking or eating junk food or staying up too | late or yelling at family and friends when they lose their | temper? | | Okay, but who other than that individual person is to blame | for their behavior? If we blame external agents for all of | societies ills, that completely devalues personal | responsibility. I don't buy the "facebook made me do it" | defense. | remir wrote: | Social media, ultimately, is information. There is no point in | polarizing Facebook as good or bad. It is access to certain types | of information and one must learn to discern if it can serve them | or not. | r00fus wrote: | Rootkits are information, too. Why do we have anti-malware | functionality built into our systems/networks? | | Yes, I am am making the analogy that large parts of FB are | equivalent to malware. | white-flame wrote: | Facebook (and most other businesses in the space) is a system | of manipulating and editorializing individuals' social | communication in order to extract engagement-related profit. | | This is not a common carrier, but an active distorter. | stemlord wrote: | Wrong, facebook is a politically involved corporate entity. | Additionally they've proven relentlessly over the past decade | plus to give zero fucks about improving their scorched earth | method of making money. | mensetmanusman wrote: | So social media turns out to be like alcohol. Possible to use in | moderation, but abused to negative health detriments by most | partakers. | vadfa wrote: | If it's over 50% then it's no problem, they can just quit it | without fearing network effects. There will be enough users in | the new platform. | zepto wrote: | What new platform? Why won't the new platform be just as bad? | | Switching brand of cigarettes doesn't protect your lungs. | vadfa wrote: | It will be just as bad, I'm just mocking this stupid survey. | zepto wrote: | Fair comment! | jszymborski wrote: | I think that's a fair point, but I wonder if I can probe HNs | brain on what a "healthy" online social network would look | like. | | Here are some thoughts I have: | | 1) The platform does not have a user-engagement incentive. | | 2) Personal network sizes are restricted. You can't be | "friends" with everyone. Adding friends perhaps comes at some | cost or is just strictly capped. | | 3) Sharing outside your friends network from the platform is | not possible. This platform is for sharing with your friends, | not the world. | | 4) Trust in the platform and how it shares your data. The | easiest way to trust the server is if everything is E2EE, but | we all know that's not trivial. Perhaps the limits in scaling | E2EE can work synergistically with (2) and (3) | | (1) seems to be the hardest thing here in my mind. | | Anybody have thoughts on what could make a social network | "healthy"? | hungryhobo wrote: | heh funny enough, wechat satisfies 1-3. So maybe someone | just need to clone that. | pzo wrote: | some good points. I would add also: | | 5) limit how many posts / pictures / content you can share | per day to avoid information overload. This should make | people double thing what they are writing and hopefully | more higher quality content. | | 6) automatically limit time spend for everyone on social | media for e.g. 30-60 min per person per day. | | 7) Different business model than ads. | bena wrote: | 5 & 6 just means multiple accounts per person. | | 7 means some sort of paywall. You either collect from the | users themselves, or collect from people who want access | to those users. | pzo wrote: | I just only added features that IMO would make a | healthier social network. It's different problem how to | implement in a way to avoid people try to game it. Maybe | it's not even possible and only utopia. | bena wrote: | The only problem is how to implement it in a way to avoid | people gaming it. | | You didn't "add features", you made a wish list. | | What's your "solution" for online advertising? Ads that | are noticeable but unobtrusive? Now all we got to do is | get the nerds down in R&D to make it happen. It's a | miracle no one has thought of this before. | soylentcola wrote: | > Anybody have thoughts on what could make a social network | "healthy"? | | Personally? I was thinking about this the other day and how | I wish it was more like email - use whatever provider you | want or host your own - either way you can post and share | with other users. | | That's at least one criteria after seeing how so much of | the network effects are created by the need to use _one | platform_ in order to communicate on that platform. | | Then I started thinking about how this would work. | Subscribing to the feeds of people you care about, being | able to browse and search updates, etc. and in the end I | realized I was basically describing RSS with easy | publishing tools. | | Host your stuff on whatever platform/host/provider you | prefer and see fit, but have some common format "calling | card" or address that you can use to share your | subscription address. | | Competition would come in the form of hosting options, | reader features, etc. but the conflict would likely result | from some providers "innovating" features that only work on | their platforms, devices, etc. Sort of like how I can | message with anyone with full functionality...unless | they're on an iPhone and default to iMessage. Then I'm | downgraded to SMS/MMS. | | That said, I would still prefer a nonFacebook that still | allowed me to follow/converse with people on Facebook, even | if it stuck me with the shitty interface when dealing with | non-standardized platform "features". | bena wrote: | > The platform does not have a user-engagement incentive. | | Then you lose to a platform that does. There does need to | be a level of incentive for user-engagement. Either that or | users will invent one. | | > Personal network sizes are restricted. You can't be | "friends" with everyone. Adding friends perhaps comes at | some cost or is just strictly capped. | | Facebook is capped at 5000 connections where a connection | is defined as a friend or page like. You can argue whether | or not this should be a smaller number, but technically | Facebook does have this. | | > Sharing outside your friends network from the platform is | not possible. This platform is for sharing with your | friends, not the world. | | What about Friend-of-a-friends? How do two people find out | they're both on the platform? _Some_ information has to be | publicly available. I think if you stop making "public" an | option, users will just find some way to make things more | public. Like sharing images via avatar image. Or taking | screenshots and passing those among their friends (and | their friends share with their friends, etc). | | > Trust in the platform and how it shares your data. The | easiest way to trust the server is if everything is E2EE, | but we all know that's not trivial. Perhaps the limits in | scaling E2EE can work synergistically with (2) and (3) | | Eh. End to end encryption only matters for information you | want to be kept private. And the information isn't being | shared between you and me, it's being shared between | Facebook and me, then Facebook and you. The problem is that | Facebook is the one selling the data. It's the fact that | they're the hub. | | It's a hard problem all over because in a lot of places, | you're fighting human nature. | | Maybe a P2P/torrent style system, where all the information | is encrypted and your data exists as a hash. To contribute | to that hash, you need the private key, to read that hash, | you need the public key. Connections are made by swapping | public keys with people. You'd need a way to get your own | private key from some source if you want to use multiple | platforms. But if the private key was stored in some | central hub, but encrypted, you could request the encrypted | private key and then use your password/phrase to decrypt it | on your device. | | Just spitballing. | lovecg wrote: | From an evolutionary perspective, the thing that grows and | is used is the thing that wins. If you take away the growth | incentive you can't compete by definition unless you change | the rules of the game (worldwide government regulation?). | rightbyte wrote: | > Switching brand of cigarettes doesn't protect your lungs. | | Atleast get one with filters? | zepto wrote: | Filters make cigarettes mildly worse. | | https://www.quora.com/Is-smoking-unfiltered-cigarettes- | signi... | dylan604 wrote: | Don't worry, we've switched to clean coal because it's better | for the environment | dymk wrote: | How do you figure 50%? It's not like groups of friends are | going to put it to a vote and say "Let's go use this other | thing". And even if they did, alternatives to Facebook simply | don't exist for people to switch to (I'd be happy for somebody | to give me an example of a comparable service to what Facebook | offers in terms of features and ease of use). | | And even if one does exist, most groups of people aren't going | to abandon the <50% of those who do want to stay on the | platform. | | From the article: | | > However, more than three in four believe the social network | helps them stay connected to their loved ones, with just over | 50 per cent saying it is key to sharing information and | positive for free expression. | iamdbtoo wrote: | The "they can just quit it" part is directly at odds with the | "harms their mental health" part. Not being able to quit | something that is harming you is at the core of addiction. | filoleg wrote: | We don't ban alcohol, videogames, twitter, tv shows, or | buying excessive amounts of food, despite a giant number of | people in the US suffering from addiction to those. War on | drugs was a failure. | | At some point, you have to draw a line at where you take | personal responsibility. The utility to those who can use | those things I listed above responsibly outweighs the | potential danger and plies of those who use "addiction" as | their primary argument for bans (aka I have no self-control, | so you should not be able to use those things responsibly | either). | | I am not saying "let's make heroin recreationally legal, just | use it responsibly", since both utility and danger are | gradients, and for heroin they are of very dubious value. But | for something that has no physical addiction component at | all, like videogames or facebook, I am sorry, it is on you. | | And please, no pedantry with "I get hits of dopamine when I | browse my FB feed, so it is a physical addiction too!". This | is not what physical addiction means in the context. | iamdbtoo wrote: | I never suggested banning anything. I was merely pointing | out that those two points are contradictory. | | The way you talk about addiction, however, makes me think | you don't really understand how it works and seemingly view | any addiction that isn't physical as invalid and that is | not how it works. | filoleg wrote: | >The way you talk about addiction, however, makes me | think you don't really understand how it works and | seemingly view any addiction that isn't physical as | invalid and that is not how it works. | | Poor assumption. Psychological addictions are just as | valid as physical, and I've never claimed otherwise. I | just believe that you cannot legislate the sources of | psychological addictions like you can with sources of | physical ones. Primarily because literally anything can | be a source of psychological addiction, depending on the | flavor of the month. | | Cannabis has a strong psychological addiction component, | and yet people tend to conveniently forget about it when | it comes to legalizing it recreationally (I am in full | support of the legalization btw). | | Why? I think we know why, it is because people decided | that it is the responsibility of an individual to not | abuse something that doesn't have a physical addiction | component. But if they end up getting psychologically | addicted and need help, then sure, I am all in favor of | supporting those people and helping them to get out of | the addiction rut they are in. | nafix wrote: | Exactly. How is this even an argument point? If you support | banning Facebook because of addictive potential, then add | about 50 other things to the list to ban as well. If it's | to regulate Facebook more, what exact kind of regulation | would make it OK again? Age limit, as in 18+ to use? Don't | porn sites use that and children still have no issues | logging onto those sites. | iamdbtoo wrote: | I never said anything about banning anything. | [deleted] | designertop wrote: | I've been hearing this for over 5 years now, but social media is | still booming, and most people are still on Facebook, and similar | apps, and spending more time than ever. | | It feels weird as if everyone agrees, and knows that smoking | kills but continue to smokes more and more. | Applejinx wrote: | Almost as if there are exploitable addictive properties that | can be analyzed, maximized, monetized. | | To KNOW is not gonna change anything much. It's the nature of | the beast. | ahevia wrote: | I've asked this question to a few non-tech friends. They | definitely know and recognize the harms of using social media, | but for many them just struggle to quit. They don't even know | how to put their addictions into words. | | There were a few who also used it because it's easy to keep up | with family or friends who might live far away (which is a | really valid use case!) and have no problem quitting it or | never checking. | | These products are designed to be addicting. My hypothesis is | that folks might recognize the harm but since the downside is | reducing the quality of your mental state (FB doesn't increase | your risk of cancer ala smoking). It's just not a priority to | fix the addiction. | smegger001 wrote: | Alcoholics know they are destroying their liver buy still | drink, heavy caffeine addicts know their sleep cycle is being | disrupted but still drink coffee. Thing is, there is a socially | acceptable amount that not significantly destructive. I can | drink a coffee at 8 am and still get to sleep, I can have a | beer at the monthly game night and still have a functional | healthy liver. How much social media can I consume and not fall | in depression, compulsive behavior or be polarized in a fringe | ideology? | | Well for me I have mostly quit Facebook (other than messenger | and using it for event scheduling for game night.) I don't do | TikTok, Twitter, or Instagram. I only use Reddit for niche | interest/hobbies and deleted all the default subs. I only use | Snapchat to talk to a couple of people because its the best way | to get ahold of them, and then there a couple of forums like | hackernews i lurk and occasionaly post in and that enough for | me. | | Used in moderation social media is fine. Just like a beer every | month or so or a coffee in the morning | causalmodels wrote: | Self reporting is a notoriously bad measure. It would be nice if | we had actual, measurable data to go on. | greenail wrote: | The knee jerk reaction to this is likely one to push for | regulation but I don't think that is the solution. We should keep | in mind that we still have choice, we can choose not to use | Facebook. That choice is likely to have a powerful effect on the | direction Facebook (or any other platform) takes. My fear is that | government control of social media is such a tempting power it | would be hard for politicians not abuse it. It strikes me that | this is more of an issue with our culture than anything. That | begs the question: can we choose to self moderate social media? | The pandemic sure isn't helping. | SavantIdiot wrote: | > we can choose not to use Facebook | | You're looking at this from a western perspective. Some non- | western countries are entirely linked by Facebook products. | When Facebook went down last week, some people couldn't access | their _BANKS_. You OK with that? | | That's what Facebook wants: to become something you simply MUST | use to survive. | | It goes deeper in the US as well but not as deep: some | restaurants and small shops don't have websites, they have | facebook/instragram pages, which means I cannot access them. | | We need legislation to stop Facebook creep, because that | "creep" eventually makes it mandatory. | greenail wrote: | > You're looking at this from a western perspective. Some | non-western countries are entirely linked by Facebook | products. When Facebook went down last week, some people | couldn't access their BANKS. You OK with that? | | I'm not ok with that at all however I would guess that those | decisions are being reevaluated as we speak! | | >That's what Facebook wants: to become something you simply | MUST use to survive. | | But if you choose not to use the platform they will never | have the power to make that happen. Anyone in power would be | tempted to make themselves indispensable. It is a very human | thing and let's not forget how flawed we all are. | | >We need legislation to stop Facebook creep, because that | "creep" eventually makes it mandatory. | | You just move the power from Facebook to the government, it | doesn't solve the core problem. | SavantIdiot wrote: | > But if you choose not to use the platform they will never | have the power | | It is far too late for that. Facebook is too big. | | I'm guessing you don't know that there are countries in the | world where Facebook is the only internet, am I right? Free | Basic is a service that they offered with free internet in | poor countries, but Facebook is the only internet. It has | changed a little as governments have realized this is a | problem but it is still the dominant form of internet in | some places. | | There are 2.8 billion monthly users, but only 200 million | are from the US, yet it is a US company. [1] | | > You just move the power from Facebook to the government, | it doesn't solve the core problem. | | You are assuming Facebook and the government are the same | thing. (US I presume.) They are not the same. A government | isn't a corporation. This is a totally different | discussion. | | [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/268136/top-15-count | ries-... | greenail wrote: | >You are assuming Facebook and the government are the | same thing. (US I presume.) They are not the same. A | government isn't a corporation. This is a totally | different discussion. | | I'm saying that social media is a form of power. If you | take control from Facebook and regulate it (give the | power to the government) you are simply just shift the | power from one potential abuser to another. | SavantIdiot wrote: | Anyone can abuse power. A government can be changed by | the people. Like I said, this is a different discussion. | If you're coming to the discussion that cynical about | government already, there's not much I can say. | Minor49er wrote: | > You're looking at this from a western perspective. Some | non-western countries are entirely linked by Facebook | products. When Facebook went down last week, some people | couldn't access their BANKS. You OK with that? | | Wasn't this because DNS servers were effectively DDoS'd when | applications overwhelmed them with requests looking for | Facebook without caching the response? Or are there actually | banks out there that require Facebook to log in? | pzo wrote: | So many people these days instead of creating separate | account to some websites (login/password) the use instead | integrated Login via Facebook button. I tried to educate | friends and family not to use this feature even for the | reason that if their FB account will be blocked they will | loose access to many other websites. However many people | give up because it's not so convenient as to just clicking | one FB button. | greenail wrote: | I agree that single sign on takes advantage of people not | understanding what they give up when they choose | FB/Google for SSO. What government policy could fix that? | The fallback seems to be that people just re-use their | email address in all their accounts. | smegger001 wrote: | which probably brings them back to a google or microsoft | email account. back in the early twenty teens facebook | even tried running a email service but killed it latter. | if this were to happen it would probably make a comeback. | Minor49er wrote: | I have accounts with a couple of banks and can't say I've | ever seen them using OAuth. But if they did, I'd consider | other banking options. | smegger001 wrote: | how is using OAuth any different from using your email | for a password reset. | glonq wrote: | It's true, but TBH so do the Leafs. | flycaliguy wrote: | Yeah, I mean, this is among Canadians willing to fill out a | survey online. Frankly it feels like another push in the media | world to shift blame to FB. | | As far as specifically Canadian factors, maybe don't survey us in | October when the days are getting noticeably shorter? I feel like | we are all a little melancholy right now preparing for our | lightless morning commutes. | keewee7 wrote: | What I don't understand is the selective outrage against | Facebook/Instagram. | | Why not Twitter, YouTube, reddit and TikTok? | LanceH wrote: | The real crime is perpetrated by those choosing Twitter to | tell a long story broken into individual tweets. | na85 wrote: | Twitter, Youtube, Reddit, and TikTok don't have megalomaniac | CEOs who got rich selling out their users to advertisers | while spending that money on PR messages like "privacy is | dead" and then turning around to buy all the mansions around | theirs so that they can protect their privacy. | | Also there's that little itty bitty issue where Facebook was | purposely manipulating people's timeline feeds to see if they | could produce depression-like symptoms, without informed | consent. | rndmind wrote: | Don't forget the hostile attempts at monopolizing | information access in India and 3rd world countries with | INTERNET.org that was so nefarious I was very scared, | fortunately india thwarted facebook, inc's malicious plan | and rejected it... but internet.org still went on to poison | other 3rd world countries like the philippines and | indonesia, before their nescient tech industry even had a | chance to stop it. | | In addition, the nefarious bribery of brazilian telcoms to | allow whatsapp to have unlimited and free network | bandwidth, so as to out-muscle any competitors. | | Indeed, fb did push out PR messages like privacy is dead, | although I'd love to cite some source on that... all I want | to say is, Privacy isn't dead facebook, you're dead! | [deleted] | golemiprague wrote: | Because facebook give a place for not so lefty people to | express their mind. Twitter and reddit are lefty so they are | protected, Tiktok is Chinese so no political points gains | attacking it since they don't care about some American | opinion. Youtube people actually have to invest time and | effort to make an engaging content so people at least have | some basic appreciation for it. | Tiktaalik wrote: | Or traditional media? Are we pretending that fashion | magazines have never pushed toxic body image messages onto | young people? lol | monkeynotes wrote: | I don't think YT or Reddit are any where near as insidious as | FB, Twitter, and TikTok. | | YouTube's feed basically shows me what I am subscribed to | which is interesting shit I am legit interested in. I don't | see any of my friends talking about their amazing lives, or | any political BS, at all. The comments section is a 3rd class | citizen in much of their UI and less toxic than friends all | piling in and arguing about crap. | | Reddit is global conversations, the topics and comments can | be toxic but it's not an echochamber by design. I will say | though, Reddit does make me sad sometimes so I have to work | at it to use it in a healthy way. | | Twitter, Tiktok, and unfortunately more and more Instagram | are also sludge pools IMO. | keewee7 wrote: | >Reddit is global conversations, the topics and comments | can be toxic but it's not an echochamber by design. | | Reddit is a de facto echo chamber. The two biggest news | subreddits are heavily censored. | dr-detroit wrote: | If you love being exploited by the ultra rich why dont you just | move to Russia and let the rest of us at least try to avoid the | social media brainscramble. | munk-a wrote: | I am actively disappointed that this organization chose to use | such a weak survey to prove their point. It feels pretty darn | accurate as a Canadian on the ground so paying out for a phone | survey could have dodged all this doubt. | AzzieElbab wrote: | what do most canadians think about the globe and mail? | version_five wrote: | Yeah that was the first thing that went through my mind too. | There are few traditional news outlets that don't try and | incite rage driven attention. The globe and mail is not a | tabloid (last I checked, I'm 10 years into a boycott) but it | still tries to bait people into viewing its stories in a way | that's tailored to its readership. | AzzieElbab wrote: | realized it's been that way forever. | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYMXyzOaaU8 | uptownfunk wrote: | Anyone ever think about getting rid of their smart phone and | going back to a flip phone? Honestly, I'm tempted to try this | experiment. | starik36 wrote: | It would be interesting to see whether people think news networks | also harm their mental health. | Applejinx wrote: | Once Facebook's got through with them, I'm sure people do think | that. | | Quite aside from the deterioration of that medium, there's been | good money in helping nefarious actors poison that well. | mlang23 wrote: | Apparently, canadians are a smart bunch! | cortexio wrote: | What i dont understand is that i always see these negative | articles about "facebook". What about twitter or instagram??? It | almost feels like propaganda, even though i agree with those | canadians to some extend. | mensetmanusman wrote: | It's interesting comparing this to internet pornography, which is | bigger than FB as a whole, and which (according to youth self | surveys) harms mental health (according to ~60% in some surveys). | yodsanklai wrote: | Getting a bit tired of the Facebook bashing. Everyday some posts | make the front page and don't provide any new or interesting | information. | subliminalpanda wrote: | https://archive.is/St4NG | pmlnr wrote: | ... and so they stopped using it. | | Oh, right. That's never what follows. | renewiltord wrote: | I actually used to use Instagram quite a lot because it brought | me quite a bit of happiness seeing what my friends were up to and | IG had defensive measures to protect me: | | - The "you're all caught up" screen that stops me from scrolling | | - The fact that stories signify whether they're watched | | - The fact that my posts feed only contained followed stuff plus | ads | | So there was the sense of "I'm caught up with my friends' lives". | Anyway, they've changed it: | | - They now place random stuff below the list of my friends' posts | | - They place people I don't follow into the ad slots for stories | | Anyway, I use it much less now and we just end up sharing photos | in group chats. | | Does anyone know of what a true IG replacement is? Like something | for your friends and you. | kebman wrote: | I make a conscious effort to not get sucked into Facebook. One | rule I have is to never browse past the first ad unless I've got | the day off. That minimizes a lot of the time I spend there. | Unfortunately I am involved in a few special interest groups in | there, but at least the information we share serves a purpose. | For everything else, I simply use the standalone Messenger app. | That way I can still keep in touch with my friends, without | having to scroll through mostly pointless Fb posts and ads. | macksd wrote: | As a side note, I'm a little saddened when I see friends | apologize for their posts. There's such a reaction to "influencer | culture" that people feel like foodgrams and humblebrags are a | terrible thing, and in excess they certainly can be, but I think | from most people it's a billion times better than strawman | political arguments and manipulative media that is far worse for | our mental health than just comparing ourselves to someone's good | day. | | I had a friend post a picture of food made from ingredients they | had made in their own garden, and it made them feel so good to | eat it because they had had a rough year and it was a good | personal win, so they apologetically posted a photo of it. | | Forget the rest of the trash on Facebook - seeing a friend I | haven't seen in a while experience something good and being able | to share that with them is something we need more of in the | world. I'd trade away all the "only geniuses can remember the | order of operations for this future scam page" or "you won't | believe how this person misrepresents their opponents views and | tears that misrepresentation apart!" and keep stuff like this. | LegitShady wrote: | The only reasons there is value in facebook (to me) | | 1) To get updates on friends or family I don't talk to | regularly, including their garden food pictures. | | 2) To use facebook marketplace, because in my region its | basically taken over the online classifieds and if I want to | buy or sell something facebook is the way to go currently. | noizejoy wrote: | > ... I see friends apologize for their posts. | | Canadians? | [deleted] | wesapien wrote: | Facebook was good when it was just about adding your people and | then seeing posts of your Facebook friends and messaging with | them. It turned harmful when they forced the news feed content | on everyone. | | I'd like to share the most coherent conversation regarding the | harms of Facebook (to a certain extent big tech | algorithms/ML/AI). This is with Tristan Harris, Daniel | Schmachtenberger and Frank Luntz. I didn't find any dull moment | so please watch the whole thing. | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPAOzlqcGIQ | [deleted] | tmp_anon_22 wrote: | A lot of social media posts come down to bragging under the | guise of "celebrating life". People will go on a vacation and | then meter out the pictures from it over months to appear like | they're on perpetual vacations. I don't mind people apologizing | for those. | | To say nothing of edited photos. | whimsicalism wrote: | > People will go on a vacation and then meter out the | pictures from it over months to appear like they're on | perpetual vacations. I don't mind people apologizing for | those. | | I've noticed this increasingly. It's sorta bizarre? | macksd wrote: | Yeah that's fair, and I've seen that. I think the key is | authenticity. As others have mentioned sometimes it's just a | firehose of good things happening to other people. I've also | seen a friend speak candidly about their struggle with mental | health and suicide - again great to see everyone rally around | them, and be aware of it. Probably a good way for them to get | more support, and make other people aware that (a) current | mental health resources kinda suck, (b) other people might be | struggling just like you, and (c) everyone realize that their | friend needs help. | | But yeah - being vulnerable and open like that is hard and | not for everyone. And it can also be faked for attention. | Ultimately I don't know what a platform is supposed to do if | everyone starts optimizing for the algorithm or is constantly | consuming the very content that is bad for them but doesn't | want censorship. There's no win - social media would be | amazing if everyone was kind, honest and authentic. But I | realize that's asking the impossible on a global scale. | johnchristopher wrote: | I really do believe there's a solution for that. | | We need whatsapp/telegram/signal to display a feed based on | user's status and nothing more. It's almost free, frictionless | and free from ads (for now). But sharing without the widest | audience (just to the social graph of your contacts). | | It could bring back Google+'s circles so you don't share the | same stuff with colleagues and friends and family, but your | feed page would display it all the same. | | Decentralized micro blogging without the huge tech cost and | barrier of entry of mastodon. | | People could choose how people are allowed to react to their | status: limited in time, to the latest status update, limited | to emoji/thumbs up reactions, allows starting new chat with | that status as a topic, etc. | | It also reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pownce | which I thought had some great ideas at the time. | | There's no money in it though, so maybe bring back the old | whatsapp model ? 1EUR for 6 months or something ? | | Or maybe just tell people to start a group chat in which they | post updates ? Facebook/Twitter/Instagram got that easy to | post/single tunnel thing simplified to the max, I don't think | you can do better without being centralized. | monkeybutton wrote: | I find group chats with different groups of friends and | family has filled this niche. There's no ads. There's no | technical barrier to entry. No need to even sign up for a | service. The stakes are low, messages can just be a meme or | some nice photos from a day trip. The only downside is the | ephemeral nature of texting. Even then, my MIL figured out | how to save pictures to her phone and they occasionally show | up in the calendars she makes as Christmas gifts. | mattbk1 wrote: | What do you see as the "huge tech cost and barrier of entry | of mastodon"? | Pxtl wrote: | Imho, the big toxic thing on Facebook wasn't the "news", it | was "your friend liked this" and "your friend commented on | this". That's where we get inundated with awfulness. My | friends don't post/share terrible stuff, but they do | occasionally _interact_ with terrible stuff. | BikiniPrince wrote: | Well if you learn to live your life and enjoy time with | your friends you will be much happier. | | I don't care what my friends are doing outside of our | interactions. Maybe if they started to murder puppies in | their spare time. | 5faulker wrote: | Only years will tell whether FB will evolve to become a | humanity+ or a humanity- company. | white-flame wrote: | > Forget the rest of the trash on Facebook | | The thing is, Facebook actively pushes the trash at you, | because trash content monetizes the best. | | The only effective avoidance mechanism is to not use it (unless | there's some facebook-specific browser plugin that strips it | all out). | megaman821 wrote: | Claims like these hurt your case against Facebook. For most | people Facebook shows completely innocuous stuff. I have | absolutely nothing political timeline, and the only political | thing I have seen in 5 years was by an Aunt (who I muted). | For those who love heated political debates and conspiracy | theories, Facebook will serve up that content (trash). Other | people hear about all the awful stuff on Facebook, check | their feed, see pictures of their grand-babies, and wonder | what the heck everyone is talking about. | pesfandiar wrote: | It may be easier for adults to see those highlight reels for | what they are, and minimize the feelings of inadequacy and | envy. At this point though, it's pretty much established that | they do harm young adults and teenagers. | tombert wrote: | While I don't really follow any food social media, I've | certainly sent pictures of strange food I've bought or made to | my wife or parents. Food is literally one of the most universal | things on earth, so it can be interesting if I go to a country | and try a dish I've never had before, and to send pictures in | the process. | | I never really understood shitting on people posting food pics. | How exactly is it hurting anyone? | Pxtl wrote: | Right? My pandemic hobby was cocktails. Never even tried | drinking anything more complicated than a screwdriver before, | but fell down the cocktail youtube rabbit hole because of "how | to drink". | | So, over the course of a year I made a hundred different | cocktails and blogged my experiences on my blog, twitter, and | Facebook. Most of the cocktails were simple 3-ingredient things | based on what I had available, but a few were elaborate messes | like eggnog or a Ramos gin fizz. | | I had my neighbors coming over to me when I was outside | thanking me for the cocktail blogging and saying it was one of | their favourite things to see on Facebook, and asked me to keep | posting them. | | Social media doesn't have to be terrible. | wesapien wrote: | Agreed. Personal responsibility is always a factor. Some | people game the system by raising the victim flag which makes | them a protected class and the idea that they had a hand in | the situation is not talked about cuz victim blaming. | chickenfries wrote: | I agree with you that I wish social media was full of more | posts like this, but foodgrams and humble brags as you put it | are also one of the reasons I avoid social media these days. | Seeing a feed of the best moments of other peoples lives leaves | me feeling depressed. "Comparison is the thief of joy." I'm | happy for my friends, but seeing it all collected in one place | makes my own life feel inadequate. I'm much happier when I | avoid social media. | darkerside wrote: | It's strange... I thought we were wired as a species to live | vicariously, to feel joy when others are blessed, and feel | pain when they suffer. You're not the only one that doesn't | get that out of Facebook... Why? Is it the quantity? The | format? What turns it into a place of covetousness and | bitterness? | dclowd9901 wrote: | It's the bias. You _only_ see the best moments out of the | lives of others. When watching TV or movies, we used to | become depressed about comparing ourselves to celebrities | and their silly TV lives, until some of the sheen of | Hollywood has been torn down to reveal how utterly awful | achieving and keeping a 6-pack of abs can be. Or how 6 | broke idiots could never actually afford a huge flat in | NYC. Now I think people see it for what it is, and it | doesn't depress them anymore. | | But seeing people who are your peers, who have mostly | followed the same paths as you being far happier and living | much full and rich lives (by appearance), and _only_ seeing | that, I think, becomes a subtle reminder of your own | failings. | | We just need to see some of that sheen taken down. If, | somehow, we saw _all_ of the shit people go through in | their lives, and not just the good, maybe social media | would be way different. | | Personally, I find it incredibly shallow to post about food | you're eating or places you're visiting. That's just money, | and you might as well just take a picture of the money | you're spending. I prefer to see things people make in my | feed (art, woodworking, metalworking, electronics, etc.). | It impresses and inspires me to see people out there making | the world better with their minds and bodies, not just | consuming. | lapetitejort wrote: | Because people only share happy moments on Facebook. When | you're catching up with someone, you're probably in a | "normal" state of mind. They'll share a happy moment and | the mood will spike up, then drop to baseline. Then you'll | share a sad moment and the mood will spike down, return to | baseline, etc. Facebook is always happy, never normal, | never sad (unless it's in some way a humblebrag. "Ugh had | to put in 20 hours of overtime at my killer job"). Imagine | living in the crest of a manic depressive's life, forever. | That's Facebook. | pmontra wrote: | Maybe the distance and the volume? I belong to some | whatsapp and Telegram groups with people I know and I meet | with at least every few months. We share stuff, even | foodgrams. It's ok to hear from them. I can't just cope | with all the stuff posted by some people I know but I | didn't meet with for years. There are too many of them. I | need time to live my life so I gave up Facebook, downsized | my network and do things with people I meet. | Unklejoe wrote: | > feel joy when others are blessed, and feel pain when they | suffer. | | Most people will probably acknowledge that it's more | complicated than that. I think it might have to do with how | easily comparable the other person's life is to our own. | | I can't explain it well, but here's an example: | | I saw a video of a child surprising their step-dad with | paperwork for the official name change (kid accepting the | Dad's last name). The Dad cried out of joy. | | The video made me feel good. | | On the other hand, seeing someone that I graduated | highschool with getting promoted and being more successful | than me makes me jealous. | | Why? Because he has something and I don't, but would be | within the realm of possibility to achieve. This behavior | can also be observed in monkeys, so I don't question it too | much. | notsureaboutpg wrote: | Why would we be hardwired for that? People for milennia | have understood human beings are hardwired to "sin" and to | be covetous and deceitful and it was through exercise | (spiritual, mental, whatever you call it) and discipline | and fear of being held accountable for our actions in this | life that we would overcome our base (called base for a | reason) desires. | pasquinelli wrote: | that's a very simplistic idea of humanity. yes, people can | feel joy when others are blessed, but they can feel | anything else they can feel also. surely you're familiar | with envy at least. | 6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: | It's one thing to feel joy when others do. But when | everything's joy, then it's just normalcy. But when you | know it isn't _really_ the case that everything 's joy, | then the appearance of it comes off as fake. Because it is | fake. Then you feel jaded. But we also can't help but have | a part of us that thinks "no, this _is_ normal. " | | There's also the asynchronous nature. If you're out with | friends and hear about their engagement after the fact | (among other catching up), that's one thing. But when | you're sitting on the couch lonely and see photos from | moments after the engagement (and nothing else), it's just | that much more of a gap. | | Then throw in everyone's highlights with their outrage and | some random shared clickbait (fwd:fwd:fwd:fwd:You won't | believe what this evil politician did!), and it's just | toxic. | mumblemumble wrote: | Facebook isn't doing anything new. This sort of phenomenon | is something of a universal human experience. For example, | "Keeping up with the Joneses" is a phrase that's been in | the English language for at least a century. All social | media does is crank its input gain as high as it will go. | chickenfries wrote: | It's definitely the format and the quantity for me. Seeing | an old friend in person and having them tell me about their | life and accomplishments, even showing me pictures, does | not make me feel the same way. I think it's also the fact | that I turn to social media when I'm feeling lonely, so | seeing a feed of people at their best moments, on vacation | with friends, getting married, having children, etc... | makes me feel even more lonely and isolated. Also, social | media is full of people that I have lost touch with, who | never check in with me or reach out to see how I'm doing. | I've found that I feel much more connected by reaching out | to old friends one on one and catching up with them via | texting or phone calls. Likes and comments just don't cut | it. | bjornlouser wrote: | "having them tell me ... does not make me feel the same | way... " | | You don't get the warm fuzzies when someone tries to | harvest intimacy across hundreds of their relationships | simultaneously with a post? Weird. | allenu wrote: | I feel the same way, and to me it's all about the | authenticity. The context of social media takes away from | the authenticity of the post. Someone may genuinely | _just_ want to share some dish that they just created, | but in the context of social media, you can never be sure | if they 're posting it because of that, or posting it for | the easy likes or easy engagement. Social media has | commodified human interaction. | | I forget where I read it, but it's similar to the idea | that if someone you love makes a meal for you, at the end | of it, you don't ask "how much do I owe you?" and break | out your wallet. It's distasteful. Likewise, you don't do | someone for a loved one or friend and afterwards say, | "well that will be $X". | | Posting on social media has a reward of sharing and | liking, and as a result, to me, it turns human | interaction into an exchange. (And I will admit that | there is an element to that already, in terms of owing | people favors etc., but the "bookkeeping" that we do is | generally in our heads and is hard to quantify, which | makes it a bit fuzzier and less commodified.) | nabajour wrote: | I think also that the format is different, the link | between people is not the same on social media posts. | There is a difference between seeing something | interesting, thinking of a friend who might be interested | and sending it to him with a personal message like "check | this out, it made me think of you, you might like it" and | just putting something on display for people to see it, | and add like to it to give you some small pride and some | endorphin reinforcement of the posting behaviour. | | It seems to me that the direction of the thinking goes | the other way: in one, you think of a friend and contact | him, in the other, you think of yourself, show yourself | to the world and people send you likes. | | When I thought of this, it seemed to me that social media | is often some sort of "narcissistic exposure of oneself" | and encourages this type of behaviour from me and I | didn't like it. This plus the fact that I didn't like | Facebook's behaviour with it's user's data made me delete | my account, and I didn't miss it since. If I think of | friends, I have other means of contacting them that have | a more personal feel. | notatoad wrote: | For me, it's the dishonesty of facebook and instagram. The | whole culture seems to be based around lying about | misrepresenting how good your life is. | | I love seeing a post about something that made a friend | happy, but so much of the content on facebook is so | obviously _not_ an honest post about something that made | somebody happy, but rather something they felt should have | made them happy, or something that somebody else would be | jealous of, or worst of all a brand trying to co-opt the | "something that made me happy" style of posting, that it's | ruined the few honest moments of joy. | pasquinelli wrote: | i also avoid social media, but for the opposite reason. i'm | not bothered seeing everyone else's greatest hits, but | curating my life and thoughts to present to an audience was | wearing me down, and when i finally realized that's what i | was doing, i got off it. | | presumably there are some personality types that social media | works well for, as opposed to personality types that work | well for social media, of which there are clearly a lot. | mikepurvis wrote: | Maybe it's not the healthiest thing, but I kind of enjoy | having that as a secondary motivation, especially for | projects I'm on the edge for-- things like bread baking, | kombucha making, small electronics repair, etc. If I know I | can take a few pictures and tell a fun story around it, | then it can be the motivation to get something started or | power it through. | | I guess the one boundary is that I don't generally mine my | interactions with my kids for internet kudos-- I don't want | my camera in their faces when we're at the park or reading | a book, making them feel like I'm only there spending time | with them to score internet kudos later. | mikepurvis wrote: | How do you suppose Tiktok fits into all this? On the one | hand, it's still a glamorous best-of reel, but it's also a | lot more silliness, with sketch comedy and various remix | formats (lipsync, duet, etc) being a big thing, not to | mention significant subcommunities posting earnestly about | topics like self esteem, mental health, etc (and with the | needed community-management tools to enable the resulting | discussion to not just become a Twitter-style free for all). | | I'm not a super active user, but as an observer, I do wonder | if much of it is pushing those same buttons but in a perhaps | more subtle way-- like a lot of "wellness" creators who | cultivate an apparently authentic persona from which to | deliver a never ending stream of motivational you're-worth-it | type content meant to encourage and uplift, but that | ultimately rings a bit hollow. | bentcorner wrote: | I think community plays a huge part. I'm not a tiktok user | but I get the impression that a lot of the early tiktok | users were heavily creative users. It's like a flywheel. | | As these sites/services gain more popularity communities | tend to splinter and it's up to the service to keep things | going in whatever direction they want to via things like | the fyp algorithm. | sysadm1n wrote: | Stick to messenger apps. It's tough, I know, because of network | effects, but I managed to _convert_ about 20 friends of mine to | use Signal. I deliberately avoid Facebook Messenger and | Whatsapp since they can be intercepted easily, and if you 're | caught making a joke about ISIS, the Whatsapp police can | unencrypt your messages which kinda sucks. | | Instant messages are more personal and you're not broadcasting | your life to 5000 randos, who could potentially weaponize that | data if they wanted (potential employer saw your meme about | binge drinking & alcohol consumption? Too bad). | cameronperot wrote: | > if you're caught making a joke about ISIS, the Whatsapp | police can unencrypt your messages | | Would you please clarify this? I know that messages flagged | by the recipient can be read by moderators [1], but I'm not | exactly sure what you're getting at here. | | I'm not defending WhatsApp (I've advocated for Signal since | the days of TextSecure), but AFAIK the messages are encrypted | using the Signal protocol, so I'm not sure how the "WhatsApp | police" would be able to determine if you said something | specific without the recipient reporting it. | | [1] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/09/whatsapp-end-to- | end-... | sysadm1n wrote: | Yes I was referring to this when I meant the `Whatsapp | police`. I actually tried to dig up the article to backup | my claims, but was at a loss, since I didn't bookmark it. | | So in this case we have Whatsapp users essentially | _snitching_ on each other and getting posts flagged for the | purposes of law enforcement, and having those message | unencrypted. Whilst this is largely helpful, there is the | potential for false positives (e.g a meme about ISIS | getting flagged as 'extremist' and 'violent') | | It's a tricky one, because although the feature may help | save lives and such, I am just uncomfortable with it, since | the E2E encryption is slightly broken because of this | mechanism in place. | neogodless wrote: | In essence, the algorithms created to give each user the feed | _they_ want has, in fact, given every user the feed the | _masses_ want. | | That is to say, some people want real, individual, original and | ultimately personal content. But the overwhelming activity and | reactions to content has driven that out, and left us only with | "mass appeal" - the things that get reactions and shares. | cronix wrote: | I'm getting kind of tired of the narrative that "x is | evil/bad/harmful, but I'm too weak (we won't admit addiction) to | not use x. Everyone I know uses x. Government needs to regulate x | (so I don't have to change my ways)." | | I deleted my account over a year ago now, because I _do_ view | them as evil and _do_ cause overall societal harm. It 's not life | ending. You'll adjust and then wonder why you didn't do it | sooner. I made the choice for myself. The only people you'll lose | touch with were superficial relationships to begin with. Do you | honestly care what that dude you went to gradeschool with but | haven't seen for 30 years does? Real relationships don't depend | on x platform. All they require is you, and the other person. | heavyset_go wrote: | These are trillion dollar operations that hire teams of | behavioral scientists to design user experiences that "increase | engagement" by exploiting psychology in all the same ways | exploitative industries like the gambling and advertising | industries do. It might even be worse as interactive computer | services are not regulated in the same ways that gambling, | advertising, or alcohol companies are regulated. | | This is like complaining that people who can't stop smoking | cigarettes are just whining unless they quit themselves. | Billion dollar industries spent decades formulating cigarettes | to be as maximally addictive as they could possibly make them, | and cigarettes are the #1 cause of preventable mortality, and | kill about 500,000 people in the US each year. Despite those | obvious, clear and unavoidable consequences, millions of people | still struggle to stop smoking. | klyrs wrote: | Good for you, and, I quit too. But the reason I joined is that | I miss out on a lot of in-person interactions, because friends | of mine use fb to invite folks to events. What you're | describing as a "superficial relationship" was actually | "membership of a few small groups." Interacting with those | people was a positive in my life, and I miss them. It's not | just okay, but actually healthy, to have relationships that | aren't lifelong and deep. | | I bemoan the loss of "church community" despite never having | been a churchgoer. It's nice to show up, blend in, make time | with a few familiar faces, and leave. Non-intense social | interactions are good. People who only have intense social | interactions tend to have bad social anxiety, because their | brain isn't accustomed to anything between zero and 100. The | good part about fb is that it can be used to facilitate that. | I'd happily have a profile on the Facebook Events platform, if | it existed as a separate product. But since it necessarily | comes with all the other baggage, it's healthier for me to miss | out. | bjt2n3904 wrote: | Slight nitpick. | | The argument isn't, "so I don't have to change my behaviors." | | The argument is, _OTHER_ people are too weak to change their | behaviors, so we need to have the government regulate _THEIR_ | behavior. (The greater good.) | | It's bad enough to be lazy and want someone else to fix your | problems. It's almost worse to decide you know what other | people's problems are, and decide what needs to happen for | them. (Or phrased differently... What needs to happen _to_ | them.) | munk-a wrote: | No - since this is a social network this isn't all about | personal responsibility. People hate-use facebook because | everyone hate-uses facebook. There is no sane alternative | because everyone needs to hate-use the same platform to be on | it with everyone else. | osigurdson wrote: | What is insane about making a phone call or sending an | email? FB is not the only way to communicate. | mistermann wrote: | I think it is plausible that a different kind of social | media could be created that does not involve hate (at least | not in the same quantities), that some people would find to | be preferable to the current toxic ones everyone is one. It | wouldn't happen overnight, but if no one ever builds | anything, we may be stuck on these forever, or until we | tear society part. | 6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: | I'd take that further. When I felt lonely sometimes, I'd boot | up social media and see what people are up to. Now, without | social media, when I feel lonely I'll text friends. | Unsurprisingly, it's more healthy. And when I reach out more, | they reach out more. And instead of getting a button click | invitation, people will text or call with an invitation and | we'll actually talk a bit too. Turns out them telling me a | thing and me telling them I like it is more fulfilling than | facebook telling me they did a thing, and me clicking a like | button. | uptownfunk wrote: | such an under-rated comment!! | CJefferson wrote: | Isn't "x is evil/bad/harmful. Government needs to regulate x." | basically the entire purpose of society? | | I enjoy living in a society, and not having to worry about if | every food I eat might poison me, or every bridge I walk over | might fall down. If we decide, as a society, it would be better | to ban Facebook, why shouldn't we? | themacguffinman wrote: | If we decide as a society that certain races are | evil/bad/harmful and should have fewer rights, would that | make it okay? | | Just because a lot of people agree on something doesn't make | it right or good. I'm not sure where you get the idea that | society is just a platform for banning unpopular things. A | lot of modern civics was designed specifically to counter | that actually, things like constitutional laws, | representative democracy, high courts, political parties; | they all serve to counterbalance and moderate the pure | majority opinion on how to run society. | | You know, I also enjoy living in a society and not having to | worry if any media I want to use or any business I ran might | be banned because someone somewhere didn't like it. | heavyset_go wrote: | People can't choose their race, and one's race doesn't | impact other people negatively. People can and do choose to | engage in exploitative business practices for profit, | despite any negative externalities those practices have on | other people. | | We, as a society, have tomes of legislation and case law | that regulate business practices and their negative impacts | on individuals or society as whole. | passivate wrote: | Banning things is a bit short-sighted and misses the point. | IMHO, Its better to think about types of long-term incentive | structures that we can create so that more companies will be | incentivized to do the right thing - or at least behave in a | way that we agree as a society. | standardUser wrote: | "The only people you'll lose touch with were superficial | relationships to begin with" | | That's extraordinarily presumptuous to assume you understand | the contours of a billion strangers human connections. | munk-a wrote: | The issue is primarily that some folks have moved all of their | online connections onto facebook - they've put all of their | eggs in that basket. If you want to keep up with them at all | you need to at least have the bearest presence on the platform. | | This is less about that dude from highschool and more about | your cousin. | archsurface wrote: | You want to keep in touch with the cousin who won't bother | with you if you leave facebook? | cronix wrote: | > If you want to keep up with them at all you need to at | least have the bearest presence on the platform. | | So, if you texted "Hey cousin, it's been awhile, how's it | going?" you wouldn't get a reply? | munk-a wrote: | To what number? The one they have now or the one they | switch to without telling anyone in a few months? | dexterdog wrote: | People don't change numbers very often. Most people never | do. | heavyset_go wrote: | I think this is a class and age thing. A lot of less | wealthy and young people use prepaid wireless carriers | because of cost, and end up just getting new phone | numbers when they buy a new shitty phone or switch to a | plan that's a better deal for them. | | It costs money to port numbers between carriers, and it's | a pain to set up when you can just pop in a SIM card and | start making calls/texts right away with your new number. | stemlord wrote: | People don't change numbers that often. Unless your | cousin is a drug dealer in which case you were only on | their burner phone, meaning you must have just been a | customer to them, and not even an important one. | wang_li wrote: | This sounds like a you and your cousin problem. It seems | pretty strange that it would be suggested that the | government step in to regulate a third party because you | and your cousin can't manage to stay in touch. | kansface wrote: | > Real relationships don't depend on x platform. All they | require is you, and the other person. | | Hear Hear! | | > Most Canadians believe Facebook harms their mental health | | Then don't use it! | colinmhayes wrote: | The problem is that you can't stop other people from using X | and their choices affect you. | stemlord wrote: | I agree, most people are just weak, full stop. | [deleted] | cm2187 wrote: | In fact I don't know anyone in my close or more distant friend | circles who haven't abbandonned facebook in one way or another. | I am puzzled by facebook still being the centre of attention | (for this, control of news, influence on elections, influence | on vaccination). | whimsicalism wrote: | and Instagram? | | I find this "I don't know anyone who uses FB anymore" line to | often be disingenuous when it's uttered by someone in their | 20s or early 30s. | osigurdson wrote: | Completely agree. If you don't like a service, stop using it. | [deleted] | arduinomancer wrote: | I dunno | | On one hand I get it because having a global centralized media | source running bleeding edge optimization algorithms against | humans is highly unprecedented till recently. | | But at the same time I don't like the trend in recent years to | completely "minimize individual responsibility" | | It makes sense why these narratives are popular too. | | It means I don't have to admit my lack of discipline. | throwawaybchr wrote: | Most Canadians can stop using it then | | This entire topic is very silly. Parents are free to forbid their | kids from using it. Adults can make their own decisions. | | What it is starting to become is that people want _other people_ | to stop using it because they want _them_ to consume the content | that they see fit. | distortedsignal wrote: | Most important paragraph, IMO: | | > Conducted Oct. 8 to 10, the online poll surveyed 1,545 | Canadians and cannot be assigned a margin of error because | internet-based polls are not considered random samples. | | It's a pretty good sample-size, but we don't get error bars. I | don't remember if there was anything FB-critical happening that | week (when did the study about teen mental health come out?), but | the timeframe could also affect the survey. | not-elite wrote: | The formula for error bars under the traditional Binomial | assumption is: +/- sqrt(p * (1-p) / N) | | So the errors are around +/- 1% for most values of p in this | article. The article (rightly) points out that the binomial | assumption is not reasonable given the survey method. | | https://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/29641/standard-err... | klyrs wrote: | The traditional binomial assumption assumes independence of | the samples, as the accepted answer states. The authors are | acknowledging that this assumption does not hold. | notafraudster wrote: | It's an odd disclaimer. If it's a quota-based sample then | the performance in terms of nominal coverage is going to | look similar to a probabilistic sample (especially given | the current environment for probabilistic samples, which is | quite poor). Probabilistic samples don't report design | effects or adjust MOEs to reflect them either, the norm is | just to report a classical normal approximate binomial | confidence interval (e.g. +/- 1/sqrt(n)) even when a real | design effect exists. | | My guess is the reason for this disclaimer is that it's not | a quota sample, it's just literally a completely undirected | opt-in survey and there's no reason to believe this is | anything resembling a representative sample, probabilistic | or not. | cblconfederate wrote: | it 's not just missing error bars, this is not a sample, | period. so it's not something reliable. | xdavidliu wrote: | it _is_ a sample. It 's just not an _unbiased_ sample [1]. | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sample_(statistics)#Kinds_o | f_s... | hcrisp wrote: | Very unbiased. Only sampled people who were online and | ostensibly only those who used Facebook. Since maybe ~60% | of people use Facebook, I don't think the results speak for | _all_ Canadians. If it did that's saying a lot for | secondhand effects of social media platforms. | karmanyaahm wrote: | Not totally sure, but aren't people with extreme feelings | more likely to answer a survey? Voluntary or nonresponse | biases | itsoktocry wrote: | > _Not totally sure, but..._ | | This kind of discourse is annoying. | | You don't get "points" for making some hypothetical | claim. If you think there is something wrong with an | analysis, demonstrate it. Isn't that what "pro-science" | people do? | passivate wrote: | Its this sort of sensational/half-true reporting that makes | people lose faith in media brands. | unglaublich wrote: | prisoner's dilemma: gain income while lying or let others | drain your income by lying? | itsoktocry wrote: | > _Its this sort of sensational /half-true reporting that | makes people lose faith in media brands._ | | If you think not reporting error bars is what makes people | "lose faith in media brands", you are so far away from | reality I'm not sure what to tell you. | | But how about you put aside the statistical nuance of this | for 10 seconds and acknowledge the fact that real people, | when asked, actually consider Facebook -- a piece of | software-- harmful. They are _saying_ that. What does that | mean? | sigstoat wrote: | > But how about you put aside the statistical nuance of | this for 10 seconds and acknowledge the fact that real | people, when asked, actually consider Facebook -- a piece | of software-- harmful. They are saying that. What does that | mean? | | we can probably find 1,545 people who think everything you | love and hold dear is ruining the world. | | what does that mean? | passivate wrote: | >If you think not reporting error bars is what makes people | "lose faith in media brands", you are so far away from | reality I'm not sure what to tell you. | | "If you think.." - Why not ask me what I think instead of | assuming and putting up a strawman? | | >when asked, actually consider Facebook -- a piece of | software-- harmful. They are saying that. What does that | mean? | | I don't consider opinion polls as pathways to truths. | They're interesting data points, but not some kind of | absolute truth. Human opinions change, perspectives change, | often multiple times when provided new/different data. | Opinions can also be in conflict with each other. We're not | automations or pinnacles of logical consistency. You can | hand-wave it away as "nuance", but it isn't. Its | fundamental. It's messy. | kyleblarson wrote: | I'd say most sane people don't only believe that social media in | general is unhealthy, they know it. Some might push for | regulation but I would just suggest these people quit it all. I | did so a few years ago (well I guess with the exception of HN) | and haven't looked back. Sure I might not learn about a high | school acquaintance's new baby or the like but the people I truly | care about know how to get in touch with me and vice versa. | passivate wrote: | I use it to promote my hobbies (digital art, photography). I | don't believe it is unhealthy in general. Calling people who | don't agree with you insane is not really a great way to have a | healthy conversation. | rtoway wrote: | Last I checked, studies on the issue of social media and mental | health are pretty mixed and inconclusive. But it is a popular | belief regardless | dylan604 wrote: | It's easy to click the button for the response you think people | want to hear. Polls mean nothing except for the people being | paid to run them. | newaccount2021 wrote: | as someone born and educated in Canada, I must say that as a | nation they are some of the most feeble-minded people on Earth | | "being Canadian" has devolved down to a pathetic fake-smugness | predicated on cherry-picked comparisons with the US. there is | NOTHING else to being a Canadian in 2021. | | Canada is already the worst choice for businesses in the age of | NAFTA. Zuck should just pull FB out of Canada entirely and leave | Canadians with the CBC...the net impact on profits will be | negligible at best, and long term it will benefit FB to be rid of | these crybabies | | as for everyone else, if you don't have the willpower to log out | of FB, you're just pathetic on so many levels and you deserve | degraded mental health | trapatsas wrote: | What mental health? | kazinator wrote: | The title is falsified within a few sentences of the story, where | it becomes clear that: | | Most Canadians believe that Facebook harms the mental health of | _others_ ; their _own_ use of Facebook is healthy and fine. | | Facebook issues are everyone else's problem, not mine, believes | the average Facebook user. | 999900000999 wrote: | I'm so happy to see awareness around the negative mental health | effects of social media. You also don't get all that much from | it, back when I was heavy into social media I was miserable, | online dating never brought me a worthwhile person. The rare | times I'd actually meet a real person, it was almost certain to | be someone who was 30 plus and not interested in working. | | Deleted all my online dating profiles, limited my social media | usage and I was making fantastic friends and meeting amazing | girls in real life. This was very good for my mental health, | during some of my really dark moments I'd spend hours per day on | Reddit and Facebook arguing with other angry people. We don't | need to be angry, you don't need to argue. | | You don't need to give the Match group $60 a month to chat with | bots. You can still wave at someone at a concert and ask if they | want drinks after the show. | Unklejoe wrote: | It always seemed pretty obvious to me. | | Everyone is fake on social media, but it's not always apparent | that it's fake (it it was, then it would defeat the purpose). | | What happens when it seems like literally everyone is living a | better life than you? You feel like shit. | uptownfunk wrote: | Repeat after me: | | "I _can_ be happy and thrive without social media. " | | Here is how you become a billionaire today- | | Step 1: Create some thing people want to indulge in, whether or | not it is healthy or good for them (as long as it's legal). | | Step 2: Convince them that it _is_ good for them. | | Step 3: Acquire anyone else who tries to do the same or squash | them out aggressively. | | Rinse and repeat. | palidanx wrote: | What I've realized about Facebook is that there is no way I can | convey a really convey anything really meaningful in such a short | post. | | What I started doing is writing a quarterly e-mail newsletter to | about 80 of my closest friends and family about details thoughts | I've had about life, travel, and personal experiences. | | Some friends have told me I should write a blog and put all my | thoughts out there on the Internet, but I think this kind of | defeats the whole purpose to share something intimate to a | smaller crowd that the general Internet will never see. | karmanyaahm wrote: | Maybe voluntary response bias? | secondcoming wrote: | Twitter is worse | intrasight wrote: | FB happens to be the platform by which people share. In an | alternative universe where "ShareBook" was the dominant micro- | blobbing platform, that would have been the target of these | critiques. Depressed people says something about those people and | about our culture in general. | RealityVoid wrote: | I used to think, untill recently, that Facebook was just a tool | and all this hatred was overblown. After all, I modulated my use | of it just fine. My usage is sparse, and I use messenger to talk | with people I know, it kept us together. I can see how community | and bringing old friends together is precious. | | But, recently, I realized someone I used to be very close has | mental problems. Undiagnosed, but there is no other way I can | explain his behaviour to myself. Obsessive behaviour, can only | talk about his conspiratorial obsession, erratic, spends most of | his time "learning" about a specific conspiracy. And I see how | Facebook is exacerbating this. I see how these things are | poisoning his mind, fantasies weaved by other mentally ill | people. It's just sad, when I thought about it and dawned on me | most of those _wild_ conspiracy theories are people that need | help feeding each other's sickness. | | And then I look on my dad's wall, and saw the same hatred and | resentment growing, and it scared me, the possibility he might | drift even more this way. | | Now I changed my mind. I think it is harmful and it does induce | bad states in people that would otherwise be better, or at | least... Surrounded by better support systems. But I still think | it's not _just_ Facebook. It's a confluence of factors. | whimsicalism wrote: | I think FB is probably bad, but I've also noticed that people | have a tendency to blame delusional mental illnesses on | whatever a person was going through/up to at the time it onset | when it is often more like a timer went off. | RealityVoid wrote: | Yes, most likely the ilness would be there even without | Facebook. But the platform enables some destructive behavior | while in the real life, I hope, more productive support | structures could exist. | | While mental illness is something you might be biologically | predisposed, the outcome can vary wildly with or without | support structures and good help. And I think on this end | Facebook is profoundly destructive. | retrac wrote: | A person's mental illness can have drastically different | outcomes depending on who they are surrounded by. Even before | Facebook there were plenty of cases where people exploited | the emotionally and socially naive or unstable, for their own | gain or amusement. I worry social media can enable something | similar. | mensetmanusman wrote: | This happened to a family member, they had undiagnosed | schizophrenia and started posting craaaaaazy stuff on YouTube, | got a following of fellow like-minded folk that only made | things worse until it all exploded into a huge melt down / | insane asylum situation. Crazy times. | legitster wrote: | I know Facebook is the great evil, but we really need to start | looking at the mental health impacts of _all_ social media. The | unhappiest people I know are not on Facebook - they are | religiously devoted to Twitter and Reddit. Heck, I 'd like to | know what sort of damage this post right here is doing to me. | | This is our generation's smoking but everyone only wants to know | how harmful Marlboros are. | | _Edit:_ Please upvote this more. I need to feel like my views | are validated. | ferdowsi wrote: | Reddit is an interesting one. Since it's an anonymous | experience, I guess it'd be the same issues with any internet | community. It can be stressful to see seemingly abhorrent | viewpoints in such concentrated numbers. And it can be | stressful when you feel a community is turning against you, | even if your connections to that community are extremely | tendentious. | legitster wrote: | I think Reddit is uniquely harmful to its users in several | ways, maybe even moreso than Facebook: | | - Users get an intense, one-sided parasocial relationship but | with no upside of even communicating directly with each other | | - The hivemind effect is very real, and using Reddit often | gives people a very false sense of superiority of their | knowledge on any given topics | | - Misinformation is rife. Even outside of the conspiracy | hubs. It's amazing how many of the "front page" posts are | often misleading or slanted | | - Astroturfing and content farming is even more prevalent but | with less moderation. | uDontKnowMe wrote: | It's interesting you call relationships on Reddit para- | social, I don't know if that quite fits the word because | Reddit is more of a two-way reciprocal relationship between | commenters. Perhaps Twitter fits that description better | since you get a lot of power users like Trump and other | celebrities which broadcast out to their followers but | don't typically respond to normies. | United857 wrote: | Nextdoor is another example. At least with FB or Twitter, it's | a opt-in model -- you have to friend or follow someone to see | their posts. With Nextdoor anyone can post to their neighbors, | so (at least where I live) many people use it as a soapbox to | air any trivial complaint/grump/vendetta to hundreds or | thousands of neighbors; I see a lot of toxic flamewars on | there. | | Ultimately I think social media is an amplifier, taking | whatever individual or collective insecurities that were | latent, and just projecting them for better or worse. | | Disclosure: FB employee but only speaking for myself | [deleted] | croes wrote: | As long as hackernews hasn't a news feed to keep you invested, | as long the damage is negligible. | wellthisishn wrote: | We could start by calling it what it is -- antisocial. Spending | time on media content aggregators is an antisocial activity. | Not that spending some time on an antisocial activity is | inherently bad... studying and research are also antisocial | activities. But let's not call something "social" when it is | the antithesis of anything that could be considered as such. I | think this could be a decent start! | Fordec wrote: | Antisocial - "when a person consistently shows no regard for | right and wrong and ignores the rights and feelings of | others". | | I don't think antisocial fits as a descriptor, at all. When I | think of antisocial behavior I think of graffiti or arson and | other property damage without regard for the owners or the | public sphere. | | I think the word you're looking for is asocial. | legitster wrote: | I think it would be one thing if they were just aggregators. | It's the community aspect that's harmful - it's clearly | addicting and gives people the feeling of being social with | fewer of the benefits. | white-flame wrote: | What do you define "social media" as? If it's communication | kept within circles of family, friends, colleagues, and | enthusiast/interest groups, I really don't see much problem | with it, just as forums/blogs/etc before it. | | The two big problems poisoning this well are: | | 1) monetization usually reaches for manipulating people's | personal socialization stream, and | | 2) public broadcast of personal content to the feeds of | strangers, usually the most inflammatory subset because of | point 1. | heurisko wrote: | I think twitter is the most toxic. | | I have been uncomfortable on twitter to find enclaves where | people are mentally ill, and have found others to exacerbate | their behaviour and thinking. | Joeri wrote: | I see toxicity not as twitter's problem, but as its feature. | I go to twitter to find out people's gut reactions to current | events, and in that role it is a uniquely capable and | succinct resource. | | What you will not find there is rational and reasonable | debate, but imho that's not what twitter is for. | whimsicalism wrote: | This also exists on FB. If anything, the only reason people | are aware of it on twitter is because it's not as much of an | enclave as it is on FB. | | See, for instance, "cryptic pregnancy" communities on FB, | which are definitely hotbeds of mental illness. | munk-a wrote: | Twitter, at least, is utterly worthless and entirely | voluntary. Nobody uses the platform to announce or coordinate | family events or to reach out to loved ones when they need | help. I have a mostly inactive facebook account in case | family messages me on there and I need to help out - I don't | have a twitter account because I don't find brigading to be a | worthwhile activity. I'd say with a moderate level of | confidence that nothing that's announced on twitter has ever | been vital to know - if Whirlpool is forced to recall a | certain dishwasher brand they'll send out emails and | potentially physical letters - no government agent is going | to watch them tweet and say "Yup - you just informed the | public in a responsible manner". | whimsicalism wrote: | I completely disagree. There are entire fields of academia | where effectively the only discussion being held outside of | papers is on twitter. | | Twitter, by a large magnitude, has been the most | professionally useful social network to me as a knowledge | worker/researcher. | munk-a wrote: | Isn't twitter an extremely inefficient way to convey | technical information? Why hasn't your specialty broken | out a self-hosted forum or even, I guess, a heavily | moderated subreddit? | | In my, admittedly very brief, experience with twitter, I | found it nearly impossible to actually grasp whole | conversations. Little snippets and snipes get RT'd to the | sky while the main discussion thread gets forced ever | downward in the interest sorted feed. | marricks wrote: | While I hate FB I also hate headlines like this, why poll the | public on something the media affects? Just report what findings | are and the effects. | | It's like a couple months ago having headlines saying "more | American's (USA) are afraid of crime rising than any time in the | past 20 years!" and crime only rose slightly... it's the cart | leading the horse. | amatecha wrote: | "the online poll surveyed 1,545 Canadians" | | Sorry, but 0.00004% [0] of Canadians can't remotely be described | as "most". | | Unfortunately, the qualifying words "survey suggests" was chopped | off the end of the article title, making it seem far more of an | authoritative assertion than it really is. :( | | [0] 1545 / 38246108 estimated population as per | https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210929/dq210... | hk1337 wrote: | Facebook certainly has a good amount of blame but you also have | to take some responsibility yourself if you keep logging on every | day. | FpUser wrote: | I think in this particular case the problem is not FB but people | themselves. | | I am Canadian and it does not harm my mental health for a simple | reason that I simply do not use FB or other "social media". I | really do not give a hoot about somebody else's lifestyle and | what they had for dinner. | angelzen wrote: | https://www.facebook.com/help/224562897555674 | | > How do I permanently delete my Facebook account? | reliablity wrote: | I stopped using Facebook for over 3 years now and I have been | happier. I am still connected to friends, family and community | over whatsapp. WhatsApp is much better because you are only | connected with your friends, groups and not the whole world. | hansoolo wrote: | Do you actually have not stopped using Facebook? ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-10-15 23:00 UTC)