Opium of the 21st Century: How social media shapes us

Source: Shutterstock

In 2009, caught by the evil web of online social media, I embarked on my journey into an abyss of the depreciation of human values. After nearly one decade of abduction, I broke free, quitting social media altogether. To some, it may sound incredible, given that the whole society has not just been addicted to, but poisoned by social media for over ten good years. The reasons for my decision are not relevant; what’s important is what I have observed since then.

Before I start, let me show you some figures:

1. From 2009 to 2017, the number of Internet users worldwide increased by 133 per cent, from 1802.3 million people to 4199.2 million people (Internet World Stats).
2. From 2012 to 2017, the average daily usage of social media worldwide increased by over 50 per cent (GlobalWebIndex).
3. The worldwide social network penetration rate is forecast to reach 73.1 per cent by 2021, up from 64.8 per cent in 2014 (eMarketer).
4. The world population will grow by 2 billion in around 30 years (UN DESA), and these people will grow up with social media’s influence over the society in full swing.

With the staggering advancement and penetration rate of personal information technology, however big the world population will be, it’s only a matter of time before the social media penetration rate reaching 100 per cent, maybe within half a century. That’s how scary the social media invasion is.

So why is social media so damnable? Why is it the new opium?

Problems of social media

The online social media network is the extension of people’s lives into a virtual world. People are addicted to the virtual world because it’s fun to do things behind a screen, without interacting with others in reality. But in fact, social media no longer stays virtual — it becomes our reality.

Social media is the ultimate embodiment of human hubris, selfishness and desire. People post their lives and thoughts online to draw attention, considering the contents so meaningful, worthy and important that everyone should be interested. The ‘glamour’ generated by likes and comments becomes so crucial that people can’t live without it. Through such, social media hypnotises people to believe that posting a picture and some description suddenly constitutes who you are. It’s self-involvement, all about yourself, not others. However, without the likes and comments, it wouldn’t have worked at all.

If we break down the action of posting a selfie, for instance, here’s what we get:

1. The user takes a selfie, or a hundred selfies.
2. After choosing the one to post, the user opens the target App (Facebook, Instagram or any other) and uploads the image.
3. Staring at the blank caption section, the user now tries to come up with something to fit into the box, often irrelevant to the image itself. After it’s done, he or she posts the work.
4. The user waits the whole day just to see if anyone likes the post or comments on it. Like a stupid monkey living in a zoo with a funny hat on the top of its head, dances and awaits passing visitors to applause or perhaps throw him some bananas.

On platforms where a post can’t be done without an image, like Instagram, users will simply upload a random photo and then publish the texts they aimed to share with the world. Either way, it’s the same. All they want is to show off their intelligence, humour, sadness or other capabilities and emotions. It’s hopeless and utterly pathetic. These are superficial interactions among people, and what’s worse, comments from one’s ‘online friends’ may hurt you as well. You post a statement and someone stupid enough might reply with opposite opinions, foul language or hate speech. Is this necessary in the age of social media? No, but consider it the inevitable consequence of using it. Nonetheless, even though people know that social media is destroying our civilisation, they still cannot give it up. Social media is an addictive drug, deadly but legal.

In addition, relationships between people in social media is based on a crazy assumption: you read their posts and pictures and you think you know them. You may be their follower but you know nothing. It’s only virtual knowledge.

Also, sharing your personal life on the Internet can be harmful to you, no matter with an exclusive, selected audience or not. I once did a controversial stalking experiment with a mate to find out just how dangerous it is to expose your life on the Internet:

1. I went through my mate’s Instagram account and randomly chose an active Instagram user followed by Kate, a friend of my friend (also chosen randomly) as our guinea pig — let’s call her Susan. I confirmed with my mate that he did not know Susan at all, online or in real life.
2. We started the experiment by collecting every single piece of Susan’s background information we could possibly get from her Instagram posts and stories, including schools, workplace, favourite breakfast shops, favourite haunts to hang out with friends, favourite brands, social media accounts followed etc. Later, we spent more time on collecting similar information from Susan’s close friends on Instagram.
3. We researched into the values of Susan’s clothings, accessories, shoes, cosmetics, meals at restaurants, flights and hotels booked for holidays etc, and we did some calculation to know how much she might have spent on recreational purposes every month.

After three weeks of playing private investigators, we collected enough information to do several triangulations and determined where she might live. By going through the posts of Susan’s close friends, we even scaled down the area to 4 square kilometres, or some 1.54 square miles on the maps. Through Kate, we checked with Susan, who was astonished as the results were presented with the accuracy of over 93 percent. (Susan, albeit not your real name at all, if you’re reading this, we really meant so harm.)

What social media does to us

It threatens our mental health. As more and more people tend to read on their phones and write short sentences in a post, our patience attention span and concentration levels have decreased. When it comes to physical health, it gets worse. Beside the vision problems after gluing our eyes to the screen for too long, more and more youngsters are being diagnosed with cervical spondylotic myelopathy, or spinal cord compression, originally a disease that mainly suffered by elderly people. Thanks to social media and smartphone, its enforcer of darkness, the disease is now common among young people, too.

Apart from the threats to our health, it also sabotages our perceptions badly. Social media is not a trustworthy source for news. The Internet is a wasteland. People publish news stories on social media everyday, and without proper editing and fact-checking, they are not necessarily accurate or true. Everyone can post, so be careful with news sources when you are looking at the world through the eyes of social media.

However, the worst impact of social media is the twisted meaning of making friends that it introduces to human beings. Social media has revolutionised our concept of making friends and how to maintain them. Traditionally, we meet some people somewhere, and after a while of knowing them, we may become friends. It’s based on trust and mutual understanding. However, in social media, the word ‘friend’ becomes a different term, more like a ‘contact’ rather than a good mate. Online friendships are based on profile sharing. Without real interaction like eye and physical contact, online friendship is fragile. There’s no trust if you don’t know others in real life; and without trust, a relationship — any relationship — cannot last.

After quitting social media

Not being attached to social media anymore, my life seems to be lightened. Just one week after I quit, according to a brilliant new usage tracking function on my phone called ‘Screen Time,’ my average time of phone use decreased by 32 per cent. It was so astonishing that immediately I told all my (real) friends about it. I start to wonder how social media is harming our civilisation.

Another week later, I began to read books while commuting. Gradually, my ability to read returned. On my way somewhere, I’m now capable of appreciating the trees, architecture, streets and even the people who are using their phones. I’ve got back my ability to observe and think. I’m living as happily as a child. With so many things to learn and appreciate in the real world, we should just leave the virtual world behind.

The social media is the last word of both human intelligence and stupidity. Maybe it’s a great tool when it comes to business, but for your private life? Just avoid.

Originally published on Taida Student Journal on 14 December 2018