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On the other hand, 'Social media damages teenagers mental health' sounds a lot like puritan arguments against rock music, weed, and video games from decades pas

On the other hand, 'Social media damages teenagers mental health' sounds a lot like puritan arguments against rock music, weed, and video games from decades past. All of those things had legit studies done on them that showed harm, too. Honestly I think the kids are gonna be alright.

johnfn 6y ago
Well, sometimes they get things right, like (only stretching slightly) alcohol, which is not great in excess. You have to consider these things individually rather than trying to draw generalizations like "all puritan backlash is wrong."
- grahamburger 6y ago
  My argument isn't really "they said these things were bad and they're not," it's more like "these things are actually kinda bad in some circumstances, but mostly we all turned out ok anyway, and things wouldn't really be much different or better if rock music were more heavily regulated when we were kids."
  - johnfn 6y ago
    Really? How is rock music bad in some circumstances? I think I just got hung up on a technicality in your argument.
notsureaboutpg 6y ago
These days I think the Puritans were right about some of that stuff. Weed is pretty addicting. It's nowhere near as bad for you as it's been made out to be, but it's still bad for you. Music is the worst in my opinion. Most of the most popular music is full of terrible lyrics which only promote bad things and rarely ever promote good things. Constant misogyny, hypersexuality, etc. A large part of pop music is selling "sexy" older boy bands to preteen girls (which is super creepy). And kids are addicted to this stuff like crazy. I've seen 8 year old kids throw tantrums because someone told them they can't listen to this garbage pop music while doing homework. It's not good for small kids to be exposed to sexuality the way pop music does it. And that's super obvious. If thinking that makes me a Puritan, then so be it.

johnfn 6y ago

Well, sometimes they get things right, like (only stretching slightly) alcohol, which is not great in excess. You have to consider these things individually rather than trying to draw generalizations like "all puritan backlash is wrong."

grahamburger 6y ago
My argument isn't really "they said these things were bad and they're not," it's more like "these things are actually kinda bad in some circumstances, but mostly we all turned out ok anyway, and things wouldn't really be much different or better if rock music were more heavily regulated when we were kids."
- johnfn 6y ago
  Really? How is rock music bad in some circumstances? I think I just got hung up on a technicality in your argument.

notsureaboutpg 6y ago

These days I think the Puritans were right about some of that stuff. Weed is pretty addicting. It's nowhere near as bad for you as it's been made out to be, but it's still bad for you. Music is the worst in my opinion. Most of the most popular music is full of terrible lyrics which only promote bad things and rarely ever promote good things. Constant misogyny, hypersexuality, etc. A large part of pop music is selling "sexy" older boy bands to preteen girls (which is super creepy). And kids are addicted to this stuff like crazy. I've seen 8 year old kids throw tantrums because someone told them they can't listen to this garbage pop music while doing homework. It's not good for small kids to be exposed to sexuality the way pop music does it. And that's super obvious. If thinking that makes me a Puritan, then so be it.