Social Media is For Performing, Not Communicating
4 smartphone parenting directives, how social media works on us, and some required viewing for parents and educators.
Hello Bar-setters!
I have a few thoughts today to help us make sense of phones and parenting…
After New Year’s a buddy sent me this:
This is the sort of photo we all chuckle at. We acknowledge it reveals something disturbing about our moment and the propensity of our tech to manipulate us en masse.
But then, we move on. Let’s hover here a while longer…
This photo highlights a fundamental principle of environmental design. We think we are rational and in control. But often, we are swept away by the interplay of our biology and whatever stimulus we are presented with.
Put simply, phones hack us, all the time. And most people put up very little resistance.
What Should Be Core in 2024?
My consistent contention, is that the most important subject for success in the modern world is a basic knowledge of how smartphones and other supernormal stimuli hack us, accompanied by a basic primer in the principles of self mastery.
We must help our kids develop a sense of how humans flourish and how they can pursue a good life. And, to that end, we must give them a toolkit for how to live in a world of supernormal technology without being sucked in and used by these forces. We need to prepare them to thrive in this world.
How Social Media Works on Us
In the spirit of better understanding how social media affects us, I want to share a few thoughts from Chris Williamson’s January 1st 3 Minute Monday Newsletter.
He begins with a quote:
Social media makes more sense when you view it as a place people go to perform rather than a place to communicate. —Morgan Housel
This is a crucial distinction. It gets to the core of what is so destructive.
The social-media induced behavior that I find most troubling is this constant call to perform…
…this low-level background noise that weighs on people’s psyches in every waking moment.
You can see the anxious excitement in people’s eyes when they realize that they are experiencing a moment that might be worth status points. You can sense their desperate need to start documenting, curating, and taking advantage of what, in the before times, they would have just enjoyed.
This pressure is especially evident in young people. The only beliefs that matter to most in Gen-Z and Gen-Alpha are those that they see online. And all day they feel the pressure to perform. They are hooked on a game that is more likely to delude and distort their reality than enhance their lives in any tangible way.
More from Williamson:
Given that so much of our time is spent online, and it seems unlikely for that to change in 2024, I thought this would be a useful message to end the year on.
So much of our experience of the world is mediated through the internet.
But the internet is not real life.
The internet is a selection mechanism for the most outlandish stories, real, exaggerated and fabricated.
If the world seems deranged, it’s probably because of what you’re seeing on screens, not what you’re seeing in real life.
ChatGPT has started being trained on its own content, making it a recursive creator and victim of its own blind spots.
The same thing is happening online.
Most people get their information from the internet, but the stories which garner the most attention from influencers are preselected to be the most egregious and outlandish, meaning that many influencers’ worldviews are being trained on other influencers’ worldviews, further worsening the way they see the world.
The world isn’t that bad, and don’t hang around with people who say it is.
Can Social Media Be Used Well?
I’ve become convinced that it is impossible to casually use social media without toxic effects. Time is co-opted. We become more anxious, more self-absorbed, and we spend less time engaged with others or engaged in fruitful pursuits.
There is always an opportunity cost for the time spent on social media. Teens, who should be exploring and stumbling into transformative experiences, are likely to spend upwards of 9 hours a day on screens.
The way you spend your time, inevitably, changes you. Make no mistake, social media changes us.
BUT, with strong limits and intentional filters, there could be some upside to limited and specific social media use. From what I understand:
Twitter/X can be curated to be good for news and finding good articles…
Facebook can be a good way to keep up with family and old friends…
Instagram can be used for bite-size learning about exercises and health…
I’m sure you could get news, connect with family, and learn about health in other ways (ways that didn’t expose you to all the other ills of social media), but I can see why someone would want to try to use social media apps for some of the specific utility that they offer. Cal Newport argues as much in his book, Digital Minimalism.
The point is that if you wade into the social media waters, you must be vigilant, prepared, and intentional. These apps don’t have your best interest at heart. Their bottom line is driven by a desire to keep you engaged, emotional (angry works best), and compulsive in your use.
You have to know going in that compulsive, disordered use is their end game. Disciplined adults may be able to weather this temptation gracefully. But I don’t think it is something we can expect adolescents to navigate well. They are too psychologically vulnerable to this technology and they are at a period of their lives that is too formative. And the proof is everywhere.
Right now, more than any other influences (parents and teachers included), Instagram and TikTok are raising our children. That’s insane. That’s cultural suicide.
4 Smartphone Parenting Directives
So, I tend to agree with Dr. Jonathan Haidt whose forthcoming book, The Anxious Generation, suggests these four new smartphone norms:
No smartphones (flip phone or light phone only) until high school (or later);
No social media until age 16 (or later);
Phone Free Schools (all phones go into phone lockers or Yondr pouches);
Far more free play and independence (e.g., more and better recess, and give students the “Let Grow Experience”)
For more on this, I’d highly encourage checking out the first 15-minutes of this, at least. It should be required viewing for parents and educators:
Also, related:
Thank you for reading and sharing with anyone you think would find this valuable!
Carry the fire!
Shane
So good, Shane. I read that even Bill Gates didn’t cave to the digital phone for his kids until high school. I think he knows something about digital.