There are plenty of reasons to hate the social media companies. They erode our privacy, manipulate us through algorithms, and have fundamentally altered the norms governing human social interaction.Yet, one thing social media is probably not doing is making children and teenagers more anxious, depressed, or suicidal. Despite all the recent saber-rattling and attempts by legislators to age-gate large portions of the internet, and whatever you may have heard from Jonathan Haidt, the author of The Anxious Generation and anointed figurehead of this crusade, the evidence for claims regarding what social media is doing to the mental health of children increasingly seems based on flawed studies that have yielded mixed results.If you’re old enough to remember the late ’90s and early ’00s, some of this may seem vaguely familiar. Recently, while reading a serviceable enough book on Goth subculture, I was reminded of this period as the book recounted how, following the Columbine High School massacre, a moral panic erupted over violent movies and video games, specifically The Matrix and Doom; spooky-looking Marilyn Manson; and the sometimes black-clad teenagers who enjoyed these things.
Back then, the movement had its advocacy groups, experts, and politicians insisting something had to be done. If policymakers failed to act, they warned, even more children would surely be hypnotized into shooting up their schools after spending too much time listening to “Coma White” while playing first-person shooter games.
