Societal Suicide: Loneliness, Social Media, and the Great Mental Health Crisis
“All through the day
I me mine, I me mine, I me mine
All through the night
I me mine, I me mine, I me mine”— The Beatles, I Me Mine
Social media is a valuable mess.
It is currently being used as a scapegoat for a larger assortment of problems. Teens are committing suicide at higher rates than ever before in modern history, and while social media is a factor, there is something larger at play. Many somethings.
Put simply, here is social media:
The Good
Connecting with people who were previously unreachable. Support groups. Easier interactions for some. Inciteful tidbits of information from experts. Additional viewpoints on any topic.
The Bad
Increased feelings of insecurity. Cyberbullying. Groupthink. Increased rumination. Misinformation. Comparisons to people’s highlight reels, resulting in a decreased perception of moment-to-moment well-being. Distorted perception of body image.
The Ugly
Suicide, possibly.
Let’s talk about this.
Depressing Data
Mental Health America wrote about their 2022 key findings.
Put simply, here are those findings:
Adults
In 2019, 50 million (19.86%) experienced mental illness.
27 million are untreated.
4.58% report serious thoughts of suicide.
Youth
15% experienced a major depressive episode in the past year.
10.6% have severe major depression. For multiracial youth, this number is 14.5%.
60% with major depression do not receive treatment.
Overall
11.1% of the untreated are uninsured.
Substance abuse rates are increasing.
A tangible feeling of hope is gone.
A Larger Problem
“If happiness is determined by expectations, then two pillars of our society –mass media and the advertising industry — may unwittingly be depleting the globe’s reservoirs of contentment. If you were an eighteen-year-old youth in a small village 5,000 years ago you’d probably think you were good-looking because there were only fifty other men in your village and most of them were either old, scarred and wrinkled, or still little kids. But if you are a teenager today you are a lot more likely to feel inadequate. Even if the other guys at school are an ugly lot, you don’t measure yourself against them but against the movie stars, athletes and supermodels you see all day on television, Facebook and giant billboards.”
— Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens
Harari’s main theme in Sapiens (one of the greatest books you can read) is that humans have gotten to where we are because of our ability to connect in large numbers.
Humans have historically neglected the vulnerable. There was a time when those with mental illness were killed for being witches. Climate Change leaves those in third-world countries left to deal with the turmoil of crop losses. We pretend the homeless don’t exist when we drive past them (or assume panhandlers don’t actually need the money). However, with social media we are not only neglecting the vulnerable but are actively preying upon them.
The youth, specifically young women, are dealing with this the most.
Our core feature as humans is our ability to connect with one another. That feature has rotten out and needs an update. We are focused on individualism more than community: “I, Me, Mine.”
A Specific Problem
“So it turns out that social isolation doesn’t just create a collection of sick individuals, but also a sick society… Social media, now pervasive, exploits our relationships for commercial gain, sows division, and distracts us. Our ability to understand each other, talk to each other, and work together seems dangerously degraded.”
— Neal Gorenflo (2019)
Dopamine. It’s that simple.
It brings us pleasure. So we chase it.
There is a theory that dopamine gave us an evolutionary edge. Andrei Tapalaga writes in his article Dopamine: The Secret to Human Evolution:
“Due to higher levels of dopamine which make us laugh and be happy, fewer conflicts took place which allowed for more cooperation, therefore allowing for the process of evolution to happen at a much quicker pace on the evolutionary tree.”
What once gave us an edge that led us to where we are now has been fully exploited.
Technology has found out how to exploit the human psyche for its personal gain, and it is through social media. We are no longer taking the occasional pleasure to stay informed and entertained, we are fully indulging, and the biology of our human nature is backfiring.
When discussing Instagram’s feature to hide the number of likes on a post, Navneet Alang wrote in an article Facebook doesn’t care about your mental health:
“Yet, it’s important to note that Instagram didn’t hide the number of likes from posters, only from viewers. As such, that metric’s effects remained: Users still equated higher likes with success. Dopamine rush achieved.”
We are not mindful.
We have lost a larger sense of purpose and are reducing ourselves to a modernly primative habit of receiving small dopamine bursts that reward us with some short-lived value.
That burst of value doesn’t equate to a larger sense of happiness in life. We are using likes and online reactions as a form of life-support for our lack of purpose.
Groupthink Brain Rot
Every morning there is another meaningless story followed by a million meaningless conversations throughout the world. What did this celebrity say? What did this person do? Did you hear this [insert some story that has no impact on your life]?
We receive articles from friends and don’t get past the headline, because we know reading the fuller article won’t give the same satisfaction as that initial hit.
We talk about large issues… and that’s where it stops. With talking. We don’t do anything more. Social media has forced us into being observers, rather than people who try to affect the change we want to see.
Once every four years during elections we see some action. People protest. Discussions are had in greater form. A real effort for change feels like it is being made. But then someone gets elected, and we go back to where we were.
We Need Solutions, Now More Than Ever.
How many times have you seen a sentence finished with the phrase, “now more than ever?” The phrase has been repeated time and time again. We are programmed nowadays to feel like our hope has just about depleted.
In Computer Science, it is said an algorithm’s output is only as good as its input. As a society, we are all trapped in an algorithm that has been fed so much nonsense that the output is a bunch of people who feel depleted.
Will this ever change? And if it does, who will lead the cause? Companies? Government? People?
All the above, perhaps.
Companies need more transparency with the data they are hoarding and hiding regarding their users’ mental health.
Government needs measures for caring about the wellbeing of their people. Healthcare for all is an endless debate. What about just therapy for some?
People need to realize that their own wellbeing has a web effect.
“If you want to change the world, start with yourself.” — Gandhi
For Social Media Users:
- Stay Informed, Not Obsessed — Block, delete, and unfollow anything that spikes anxiety and provides no benefit. Set timers. Track bad habits.
- Ignorance is Bliss — Check specific settings on social media to see if you can hide likes and reactions. If these settings are unavailable, research third-party apps and plugins. Or… disconnect entirely. You will feel free.
- Recognize When You Are Posting For Validation — You shouldn’t need to consume likes and comments as if it’s food that energizes your self-esteem. You have worth, no matter what.
- Recognize When You Are Not Posting At All — Being a part of an online community and not actively creating content may be a sign you are ruminating more than connecting.
- Create an Action Plan When Overwhelmed — If you feel your control slipping, have some plan you can follow. Call a friend. Listen to the Harry Potter soundtrack. Wash your face. Make a simple list of things you love and read it over. Paint. Write. Watch a playlist of funny videos. At all costs do something.
- Read More Than Headlines — If you are going to spend some duration of time thinking or discussing something you read, read the article fully.
- Have Empathy — Everyone has a reason for believing what they do, even if their beliefs are harmful. Lead conversations with empathy and leave conversations when it is no longer worth your time.
For Social Media Employees:
- Write About Suicide Carefully — If you are in a position where you must write about suicide, read these guidelines. Not doing your diligence here can result in the suicide of vulnerable individuals. For more on that, read NAMI’s post on why suicide reporting guidelines matter.
- Follow Accessibility Guidelines — Don’t cause additional stress on users. Research inclusive UX and designing for Anxiety & Depression. Here’s something to get you started.
- Check Up On Users — People with depression have a distinct way of writing. With all the data social media collects, it can be used for good. Facebook, for example, uses machine learning to identify possible suicidal content and intervene when necessary.
Closing Remarks
It’s not any one thing. It’s not billionaires. It’s not who holds office. It’s not companies and their malicious practices. It’s not the news cycle or social media. It’s not secularism. It’s not that headlines are more interesting than the content of their articles, or that journalism is seemingly dead… It’s everything happening at once.
But the best of times may follow the worst of times, as is often the case for depressed individuals. Moments like this make way for the greatest change.
Social media as a technology is a reflection of ourselves. Just like it may force us to think about individuality instead of community when used improperly, we must focus on ourselves and the change we can make as individuals to make change in our community.
Think about the part you want to play in the world. The role we play individually may be the most we can do to prevent the mental drain we are experiencing.
Be kind.
Be empathetic.
Question everything.
And for the love of all that is good take care of yourself and make a plan.
Have something else worth sharing? Write a comment.
Let’s talk about it :)
