By:Ava Beswick

Now, I know a lot of you guys don’t  want to hear this at all but I think social media is heavily damaging to our young people. An example of this is just twitter where saying anything gets you absolutely slandered. People on the internet don’t need to hold back. They can hide behind a digital screen, and say whatever they want without facing any repercussions besides maybe some people telling them “stop, that isn’t nice!” It  is really important to keep yourself safe on the internet, and more than that, keep your mental health from deteriorating. 

According to mcleanhospital.org (https://www.mcleanhospital.org/essential/it-or-not-social-medias-affecting-your-mental-health) 

“According to the Pew Research Center, 69% of adults and 81% of teens in the U.S. use social media. This puts a large amount of the population at an increased risk of feeling anxious, depressed, or ill over their social media use.” Social media is literally proven to make you feel “high” off the dopamine and serotonin your brain produces, which causes you to feel happy, which may seem good until you realize social media is unable to properly retain those doses of serotonin. 

As well as social media causing you to get used to hyperstimulation. You know those videos on tiktok where they put reddit stories above of subway surfers gameplay? Hyperstimulation. That can cause you to be unable to focus when the time calls for it (doing schoolwork, reading a book etc), because of you being understimulated. Additionally, hyperstimulation leads to trouble sleeping, impaired cognitive function (what helps you think and remember things) muscle tension and headaches. 

Social media, as much as I hate to say it, also causes lack of motivation in a lot of people, and causes you to neglect your emotions and be unable to process and handle things. “I’m so sad right now, but that’s okay, because being sad means I can listen to Mitski and Lana Del Ray and be aesthetic.” Social media causes you to see somethings, and makes you want to copy it subconsciously. “Wow that person has such a nice house, I wish I had a house like that, now I’m depressed.” That’s what happens when you consume too much of a certain content. My mother always tells me that I need to sometimes take a break from social media, and she told me that whatever I see on instagram, and tiktok and all of those are fake. Nothing is real, and if it is, it’s all heavily exaggerated.

As much as a blessing social media can be, being able to instantly communicate with your friends and make new ones at a whim, it can also be a curse. I’m not saying that we have to stop using these socials altogether, but we definitely need to know when it’s best to step back, and take a break to get together in your own life.  

Ava Beswick

A 7th grade girl who loves anime and arguments, and has a lot of opinions and will share them if necessary. I like video games, manga, and am probably the (second) most opinionated person you will ever meet. I will argue for fun.