‘Social Media’-Through the lens of a teenager

Diya Changwani- Grade 10 student

_{Image credit: iStock}

We are currently living in an unprecedented era – The one of coronavirus, or as it is popularly known, Covid-19. These times have crippled us, forcing us to stay in and maintain social distancing. 

Cooped up in our houses all day, we are bored out of our minds, causing us to turn to one of the only sources of entertainment in these conditions – Social media. 

So, what is social media? Social media as defined by the Oxford dictionary, is, “Websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking.” 

Social media consists of many famous and known platforms, like WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. They were initially used as a means to communicate and connect with people in different parts of the world. A person in Mumbai, India could easily speak to someone in Africa, so long as they had social media. From this perspective, social media was considered a boon to mankind. However, overuse of anything ruins its value, and social media was no different. What was once used as a platform to spread positivity and kindness and connect with people now had tons of hate, negativity and explicit content. People began to misuse this platform, and as of today, the situation is at an all-time low. We can use this platform to follow our favorite actors, artists, musicians and authors and see what they are up to, but now, almost every post of theirs has a lot of negative comments from netizens. All of this is unhealthy and takes a toll on the mental health of a person. Not only famous personalities but also teens are obsessed with this deadly habit.

They see the posts of beauty moguls and daredevils and aspire to be them. For example, the Kardashian-Jenner clan is famous for their surgically enhanced lips and the “perfect body”, so the teens who view their content become self-conscious and undergo surgery under the misconception that they are not beautiful as they are. A study published in Aesthetic Plastic Surgery in 2019 that analyzed search data for specific procedures against relevant celebrity news found all-time-high interest in lip fillers, lip implants, lip injections, butt enhancements, and butt implants.

One example: Following then-17-year-old Kylie Jenner’s admission of lip augmentation in 2015, searches for “lip fillers” went up 3,233 percent. The fear of missing out and trying to ape these social media frenzied personalities has caused many mental health related issues in teenagers at such a tender age. About 20 percent of all teens experience depression before they reach adulthood. Between 10 to 15 percent suffer from symptoms at any one time and one of the causes is overuse of social media. Only 30 percent of depressed teens are being treated for it. These numbers are shocking and are growing at a steady pace. We need to do something about it before the situation spirals out of control. We need to nip the evil in the bud by decreasing the time spent on social media and in today’s times, learn to not only maintain social distancing but also distancing from social media.

Let’s be more responsible and minimize the usage and use the various social media platforms, if needed be, only to spark positive vibrations.