Social Media is for Idiots… Maybe Not

Let’s forget about the queen and the royal family, the true ruler of the world right now contains two words and four syllables: social media.

With most of the population owning smartphones and having social media accounts, it’s not a surprise that the first thing an individual checks when they wake up is either Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or all of them, as well as other unknown social media platforms hidden under our noses.

As of 2017, the most popular social media site was Facebook with 2.47 billion users, but other sites weren’t far off from overthrowing Facebook’s reign. YouTube attained second place with its 1.5 billion users while Pinterest (175 million users) and LinkedIn (106 million users) took the role of bottom two¹. However, those numbers are still a significant amount, which makes you wonder if there are any social media sites failing to surpass the thousands.

Now that it’s 2018, the increase in the use of social media is apparent and not at all shocking. According to Smith, active social media users have risen to a monumental 3.03 billion with 116 minutes per day as the average daily time spent on these sites².

Since social media’s audience has expanded to children as young as twelve, and even reached those who are only eight years of age, its popularity within the younger generation, or ‘millennials’, is not at all something to be taken aback by — it may raise some questioning thoughts in terms of influence, however. Those who are younger are also joining this bizarre, yet slightly concerning phenomenon with parents allowing their children to watch children’s shows on YouTube almost daily.

With the younger generation dominating social media platforms and the whole of the Internet, some might say that this is a domination of the idiots. Of course, it’s a harsh word to call someone, but adults in general may use this particular word when describing those about to take the step in becoming a teenager, or those in the prime of their teenage years.

Adults generally view people in the teenage category to be individuals that have not yet reached a certain level of maturity, which can be seen through behaviour online that are considered to be idiotic. It is usually people in this age range that are involved in arguments online, teasing, cyber bullying, starting virtual fights, as well as reckless actions that cause harm to others.

It doesn’t take a scientist to figure out why the older generation tend to look down on the use of social media, and the younger generation itself.

During 2010–11, an online survey was conducted by Lüders and Brandzæg, where 290 people from the older generation expressed that social media integrated the idea of being self-centred and being nonsensical with updates that seemed uninteresting³.

With these reckless behaviours, the opinions of those individuals can be seen as right — it truly is nonsensical, deserving the title of being idiotic because they’re just plain wrong.

Four words: The Blue Whale Challenge.

This challenge is horrid and the epitome of malevolence. It consists of acts that causes the individual to perform tasks given by administrators, encouraging self harm with its final challenge being suicide. Just the thought would make anyone scream “Why?!” at the top of their lungs with a scrunched up face of disgust. It was described to be a “social network phenomenon” and rooted from, you guessed it, social media⁴.

It’s phenomenons like this that make you question what a person may be thinking — are they just too idiotic to follow a challenge like this, or is there a more deeper and complex story that involves the vulnerability of individuals in general and not just teens?

In other words, social media seems to be the place where trends and challenges begin, which probably have the characteristic of being idiotic, making the individual who follows them to possibly be an idiot.

However, there are cases where saviours and heroes exist even in the world of social media. Idiotic behaviour garners a lot of attention, but so do ones that inspire people to spread righteous actions — these are people who aren’t so idiotic.

Instances have occurred where individuals can be seen defending those under harsh, scrutinising eyes of antagonists on social media; promotion of self love is even more proclaimed through actions of accepting one’s self and speaking publicly about it; more and more people are sharing noble stories; more and more people are lending a firm voice towards disgusting acts of humanity in order to stop it.

Sure, 50% of social media radiates hues of idiocy, but the other 50% illuminates the opposite. There’s halos of hope surrounding social media, especially in times of a crisis. For example, people are finding it easier to donate through social media when disaster hits any country.

Social media is for idiots, but maybe it isn’t.

References:

1. ‘Social Media Facts And Statistics You Should Know’, SocialReport, https://www.socialreport.com/insights/article/115005068923-Social-Media-Facts-And-Statistics-You-Should-Know
2. Smith, Kit. ‘121 Amazing Social Media Statistics and Facts’, Brandwatch, https://www.brandwatch.com/blog/amazing-social-media-statistics-and-facts/
3. Bazilchuk, Nancy. ‘Older people think social media is superficial’, ScienceNordic, https://www.sciencenordic.com/older-people-think-social-media-superficial
4. ‘Blue Whale (game)’, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Whale_(game)

Mullin, Gemma. ‘ What is the Blue Whale suicide game, how many deaths are linked to the challenge and is it in the UK?’, The Sun, https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/worldnews/3003805/blue-whale-suicide-game-challenge-deaths-uk/