AIBU to think we need an anti-social media movement?

[Santacrazy]

So this is a controversial topic with strong feelings on both sides. My position is that I hear a lot of young people (20s) look back on their teens and talk about the terrible impact social media had on their lives and particularly their mental health.

Obviously there are some positives about social media, but there is also a hell of a lot of negative: constant comparison, body image issues, social contagion of issues like eating disorders, political echo chambers, self-harm, images of porn, bullying, grooming etc etc etc.

Many parents I know don't like it, but feel that they can't really limit or stop SM because it would leave their kid socially isolated. Personally, it doesn't seem to me like that would be worse than the current situation, BUT if there was a grassroots movement of parents who said: no social media until a specific age (16?), that would solve the problem. If half the other kids at school weren't allowed it either, your kid wouldn't be left out. It's just you need a critical mass of parents to do it.

So: YABU = social media is on balance a force for good OR no-one would agree to this.

YANBU = sign me up!

My children are early 20's. Social media didn't really take off until my eldest was at upper school (14+) because phone contracts were expensive, very limited data and slow.

Dd2 had it younger but again didn't have a smart phone so it wasn't in her pocket until 14.

We had guidelines and discussed things clearly with them but no bans, no curfew - this collaborative approach worked for us but not sure it would have if they were only 10 or 11

My kids are all early 20s and they don't feel this way. I didn't allow SM until they were 13 and had boundaries around phone use, i.e. no devices in rooms after bedtime and the adults adhered to this also. It worked well, and it has to be said that the bullying my DC experienced was all in person, not online. I'm not convinced that your idea has a great deal of merit - you will just get incredibly tech savvy DC using SM and other things without any dialogue with their parents because it's forbidden. I think it will erode trust and dialogue between parents and their children.

Ok interesting! But it sounds like maybe it’s a good idea in principle but maybe it needs to be a younger age. 13? 14?

But honestly I think there needs to be a discussion about actually maybe no one needs SM. Maybe it is not a force for good in our society.

Many things are not needed. We don't need board games, chocolate or music - but we want them because we take pleasure in them. If we only allowed things that were a 'force for good' we would live horrible, austere lives.

Speaking for myself, social media allows me to stay in touch easily and affordably with my family who are scattered across the world. If I want to share a photo of the cats making stupid faces with my kids, I don't have to take the photo, print out multiple copies, put them in envelopes and then send them. Because that would be stupid.

So where do we draw the line? Is email allowed, in which case the cat photo scenario would actually be OK? Or, given that it is possible to use email to bully and hurt people, do we ban that too?

It's a giant can of worms.

In these conversations influencers always come up as being the cause of poor mental health. Personally, I never followed or was interested in influencers.

What did my mental health a lot more damage was constantly seeing how my actual peers, ( college/ university colleagues/ work colleagues etc), always seemed to be going out more, having a much better time etc than I was.

My dd is 16. She doesn’t go on SM except Discord.

I know lots of families who don't do the whole social media thing. When you're online, it does seem like everyone is on it but there are many who aren't.
Mental health is much better without it.
You have to have your beliefs and go with it. To be honest I find this non social media way if life more amongst religious people.

Yet here you are op, posting on social media.

Isn't that the rule on most if not all SM anyway? It's not SM issue parents are not parenting tbh. Everything has parental controls.
It's not sm itself, it's how people use it and who is using it when they shouldn't.

As pp it helps me keep in touch with friends and family far away. I also follow number of lovely profiles including artists, photograpers, museums etc.

If anything though, it shouldn't be sm overall, but specific type of posting which should be probably targetted

And then what? They turn 16 and they’re too old to be supervised fully and taught slowly and safely how to use it?

and at 16 it doesn’t effect them anymore?

Sounds awful. We live in the digital age.

I am sure there will be some tic tok ‘influencer’ who documents their life without using social media and later uploads the video #socialmediacleanse

Others will jump on the The ‘No social September’

Companies will market it. #have a break from your phone, have some chocolate, Or some soap company….

Depressing.

The only hope is that one generation doesn’t generally see the previous one as cool. Who thinks their parents are cool really.

Not really.
Being away from social media doesn't mean not using the internet at all.
Most people I hear talk about how social media ruins their mental health but they have to use it to promote their business (eg art classes for kids online).

You can use the good bits without getting the bad bits

eg I only use FB on a computer and only for hobby groups and marketplace.

No politics, no attention seeking rubbish posted by someone I went to school with years ago, etc etc

@ILoveeCakes I agree with you. Most things are not inherently good or evil, it's all about how we choose to use them. Life isn't simple.

No politics, no attention seeking rubbish posted by someone I went to school with years ago, etc etc

The secret is alao to ignore friend requests unless you genuinely like the nonannoying person😁

Social media is a fact of life now, and times have changed as they always have. Given that the horse has bolted surely it’s about management, rather than trying, and failing, to erase it.

I agree. I grew up on social media and shudder at the thought of my future children doing the same. I want to delay my children using social media for as long as possible.

There are many people who don't use addictive social media apps but are still perfectly tech savvy, can browse the Internet and post on forums like I'm doing now. My children know the dangers to their mental and emotional health of things like tiktok and Snapchat - I work in a secondary school and deal with self harm and suicidal ideation every day. I don't want my kids to use these apps and I tell them why. If they choose to use them secretly, well that's their choice and they will have to accept that there may be a negative impact, much like me smoking in secret when I was 14.

I don’t do other social media apart from MN because I don’t want the anxiety and comparison and stress of it. I can’t even imagine how kids and teenagers can manage that healthily. I love smartphones and texting but the rating and commenting and constantly sharing ‘social’ side seems completely grim. The fact that basically everything has to be photographed and shared and then rated seems completely maddening.

@Santacrazy

social média illégal if not the age of majority
ban it

also internet gambling too for all

You will prise mumsnet out of my cold dead hands 😂

We certainly need more restrictions on it, that's for sure. I also thing that we need to start broaching the subject in schools in the form of classes, like we used to do with things like home ec. Lessons might look like something like only adding friends you know from school to your lists, when to switch off for studying and bedtimes, combatting excessive usage, how to recognise groomer behaviour from people you don't know, homework and family time first, anti bullying etc, no sending photos of videos under any circumstances unless parental consent is established, stuff like that.

I tell you what though, Facebook and tiktok are the worst, and I wish they didn't exist at all. I was twenty years old before I got online, and I miss the days where we had forum boards like this, newsgroups etc. It was social but it wasn't so invasive and second to second updating. If that makes any sense.

But what about bingo! Won't somebody think of bingo😱