Social Media

The internet is a brilliant thing. It has encouraged connectivity, fostered creativity, and spread knowledge across borders. Social media is the source of sharing personal stories, reconnecting with friends, family and/or stranger, and keeping in touch with loved ones from all over the world. It is a beautiful resource of how to stay connected and make the world more open. It reaps with benefits, but like any “next best thing” it also sows with problems. The internet has made connection so easy that it’s taken for granted. A study showed that on average, we check our smartphones 150 times a day, with around 50 per cent of us updating our statuses or posting content via them while we’re on the move (A. Beattie). Our generation now is so dependent on connecting with the outside world that when being deprived of it, unfortunately it causes a very sad anxiety and disconnects emotional ties. Because the internet is so embedded into our lives now, it’s subconsciously having a detrimental effect on our well-being. Take Facebook for example, not only are people being consumed in complete strangers lives, but they very well could be leading false information and pictures that alter viewers sense of what is real. The information that is portrayed is most likely to be inadequate and more “grandiose” than actual. Bullying rates have increased due to social media as one can just hide behind their keyboard, and strong anxiety emotions take in to action when one starts to feel left behind or left out. Social media can unfortunately become a deceiving mirror where automatically compare ourselves and determine our own sense of worth. Social media also completely eliminates the benefits and effectiveness of physical human interaction. Technology is gradually brainwashing society of the real value of what it means to actually connect with someone. As technologies increase, our social skills and ideas of worth decrease. Unfortunately, we view our social media life as a high priority, if not the highest, and it’s slowly taking away the reality of what is actually important in this world. You don’t leave a legacy on how your pictures are on Facebook or how funny you are on Twitter- you leave a legacy on the personal impact you make on others and that change you try to make in this world.