Social Media: Curse or Blessing?
These days tech is everything. In the past year, we’ve relied on technology more than even science fiction writers ever thought possible. Just think: 16 months ago the government was warning us we were spending too much time on screens. Then in January 2020, the same government gave us no choice. A worldwide pandemic hit and we were effectively ordered to stay at home. Covid-19 has been devastating. Businesses closed and fired workers. Schools canceled classes. Friends and families were forced apart. I’ll say it: Thank God for the World Wide Web!
Due to advanced technology, the devastation was far less than it would be ten years ago. Many small businesses were able to transfer online. Restaurants developed online take-out, the application Zoom was utilized to hold classes. Because of the internet and social media family and friends were able to keep in touch.
The pandemic hit right around the time I would normally visit my extended family. My family spends every Easter together but we had to cancel. The ability to Facetime and Skype with the whole family took the edge off missing one of the few times a year we saw each other.
This was social media’s redemption arc. For as long as social media has been around it has been widely seen as a curse on society. But this past year we saw profound blessings come from it too. We almost forgot the “toxic social media” trope (depending on how much you followed Twitter wars about Fauci’s masks).
So how “social” should you get? In her article, Why I Deleted All My Social Media Accounts, Felicia C. Sullivan, discusses how her own mental health increased significantly when she deleted social media. Sullivan mentions the initial shock her peers had about her decision.
But Sullivan was writing before the pandemic. When coronavirus struck many skeptics found social media and technology indispensable lifelines. It’s how they got to work, saw family, and entertained themselves. Sure, it’s taken over our lives. But considering the circumstances, that’s not all bad.
Of course, almost everything can be okay in moderation, while anything can be dangerous when taken to excess. Drinking occasionally is fine and normal, but when someone drinks all the time — that’s trouble. Eating three meals a day is advised. Hitting the all-you-can-eat buffet between stops at McDonald’s — not so much. Having the ability to have Twitter news at your fingertips — what a gift! Posting a thread at 2 a.m. attacking a stranger who disagrees with you about Taylor Swift’s new album… perhaps not so good for your mental well-being.
I realize the “happy medium” approach to screen usage is nothing new. As a kid, I remember Nickelodeon would stop broadcasting one day a year to encourage kids to go outside. Then again, if Spongebob Squarepants was a tenth as addictive as TikTok, American teens would have torched their towns in protest when Nick went black.
In his article, Two Things You Should Focus On Instead of Social Media, John P. Weiss has an intriguing take on dealing with social media. He starts by discussing areas in his life he wasn’t happy with. The article mostly talks about his relationship with working out. Weiss used to be occasionally active which was fine when he was younger but as he got older, he became weaker and prone to injuries. This sparked him to get a trainer and take his health seriously.
So, what does this have to do with social media? Weiss explains that he wanted to focus on something he truly cared about. He wanted to point his energy to something that enriched his life. And he realized social media was not in that category.
I agree with Weiss that social media habits can crowd out or undermine more important things in our lives. I can stipulate from experience that TikTok is a waste of time, Snapchat is toxic and Instagram isn’t reality.
At the same time, social media has become a social necessity for some. The only proof you need of that is the speed with which older generations have learned to adopt apps like Facetime. If my Grandma didn’t figure it out, she wouldn’t have seen her grandkids for a year.
That, to me, is the most remarkable blessing of social media. It is beautiful to give someone who lives alone the ability to not feel alone. While social media can definitely affect one’s mental health, it can also be profoundly good.
My Grandma was very upset that Easter 2020 was canceled. It was her holiday. 10 years ago, all our traditions would be broken that year, but because of social media, they weren’t. We were able to complete our annual family scrabble game digitally and make recipes together over facetime. Social media glued our family, and I assume many other families together when the world was falling apart.
So to answer the question: yes. Social media can be a blessing just as much as it can be a curse. Unquestionably, it can make you feel fat, or worry that you’re not having as much fun as the friend who went to the University of Arizona, or convinces you that Trump or Biden or Pelosi or Amy Coney Barrett has ruined the country for good. It can waste huge stretches of your time, allow you to let others invade your privacy, and even get you in trouble. But, on the other hand, it can also give elderly widows respites from loneliness, allow far-flung cousins and siblings to instantly share a kind word or funny video, and — for all of us — make living through a pandemic… almost tolerable.
