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So quick to blame social media, even the article just waves it's hand and makes the assumption. Why not declining social mobility? Why not climate change anxie

by 303uru 3y ago

So quick to blame social media, even the article just waves it's hand and makes the assumption. Why not declining social mobility? Why not climate change anxiety? Why not late stage capitalism? Nah, it's always easy to blame Tik Tok as if the chosen release isn't indicative of something much greater going on.

nkohari 3y ago
Constant doomscrolling on social media is what causes anxiety about those topics.
AlexandrB 3y ago
> Why not late stage capitalism? What is social media if not an aspect of late stage capitalism? Unlike a normal customer <-> business relationship social media companies don't give the slightest shit about your well-being or satisfaction. Indeed, you're not the customer at all.
alienicecream 3y ago
Yeah that's what the kids are thinking about, late-stage capitalism and declining social mobility.
- PawgerZ 3y ago
  In comparison to other generations? Yeah, they are.
- 303uru 3y ago
  I'd challenge you to enter a school. I volunteer and run two clubs and they very much are talking about these things.
- irrational 3y ago
  I’m in my 50s and I’m not even thinking about those things.
- CalRobert 3y ago
  I was very worried about climate change as a kid, and still am.
  - ben_w 3y ago
    I was worried when I was a kid, now I'm much less worried. Plenty of other things to worry about, and there's still a non-zero risk, but I think there's enough money to be made fixing that particular issue that we'll probably be OK.
    - CalRobert 3y ago
      I hope you're right!
roenxi 3y ago
Even if it were one of those things; nothing has changed since 2010 to make them worse. The current negative economic trends set in around 1970, "social mobility" isn't a thing most people ever have access to. I've never been able to figure out what the problem is with climate change was so I dunno; maybe that is fair. But nothing new seems to have happened in the last decade that wasn't also happening in the 2000s.
- paulryanrogers 3y ago
  Microplastics have accumulated as well as other forever chemicals, and awareness of them. It's likely several factors at play and at different severities in different places.
  - AlexandrB 3y ago
    I think awareness of microplastics, etc. kind of undermines this theory. In the 60s we were spraying all kinds of crazy crap - CFCs, DDT - into the environment and plastic was already pretty widely used, while recycling was nowhere in sight. 5-6 decades of additional plastic accumulation is not nothing, but people are much more aware - hence the return of metal water bottles, for example. Many pesticides/herbicides have also either been banned outright or are much harder to get since then. Plus microplastics likely accumulate over your lifetime - a mental health issue caused by microplastics would show up much more quickly in the elderly of middle aged than in teens.
pmontra 3y ago
The archive of that site has many posts answering your question. Some have been on HN in the past months. Archive https://www.afterbabel.com/archive https://www.afterbabel.com/archive Here are 13 Other Explanations for the Adolescent Mental Health Crisis. None of Them Work. https://www.afterbabel.com/p/13-explanations-mental-health-crisis https://www.afterbabel.com/p/13-explanations-mental-health-c...
- WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
  > Here are 13 Other Explanations for the Adolescent Mental Health Crisis. She finally gets to the deciding modern condition - the one where kids are systemically denied critical growth time (daily blocks of adult-free time & safe places to roam [safe=no threat of police or other compulsive adults]). And even tho she has this on her list of false suppositions she admits probably isn't as false as she infers. But she then immediately minimizes this historic erasure of development by saying it's just 'independence' kids have lost. Gaslighting done, she bizarrely accuses devices & social media of causing it, even tho it was obvious by the 1980s that options for free-roaming and adult-free time were well on the way to being eradicated. Perhaps being so invested in pregurgitated conclusions, she's unable to notice super-obvious competing factors.
  - granshaw 3y ago
    Bingo, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38937293 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38937293
  - watwut 3y ago
    The article is about mental health crisis being international. Meanwhile, German, French, Swiss, Japan or Scandinavian kids walk around towns free without adults. They walk to school at age of 6 or even sooner. If it was just about independence, countries like Germany or France would not had the issue.
    - naasking 3y ago
      Exactly. Everybody just immediately jumps to their pet theory without actually digesting the full set of data that needs to be explained. The article very clearly lays out why those other explanations are less plausible than social media, and the cross-cultural nature of it is a big point. All that said, the authors who publish on that site are also very pro-unsupervised free play and think its decline has caused mental health issues of its own (see Haidt's The Coddling of the American Mind).
LAC-Tech 3y ago
I think the sort of people who push "climate change anxiety" and espouse theories about "late stage capitalism" are a huge, huge part of the problem. Near every communist I've met was miserable.
- nradov 3y ago
  There is a high degree of correlation between mental illness and leftist political views. https://twitter.com/ZachG932/status/1248823584111439872 https://twitter.com/ZachG932/status/1248823584111439872
  - 303uru 3y ago
    It's easier to refer to the true and highly studied issue here, depressive realism. "Leftists" have more accurate knowledge of the world and that leads to depression. Ignorance is bliss. That's not even mentioning the fact that the right belittles mental health and those who seek help.

by 303uru 3y ago

nkohari 3y ago

Constant doomscrolling on social media is what causes anxiety about those topics.

AlexandrB 3y ago

> Why not late stage capitalism? What is social media if not an aspect of late stage capitalism? Unlike a normal customer <-> business relationship social media companies don't give the slightest shit about your well-being or satisfaction. Indeed, you're not the customer at all.

alienicecream 3y ago

Yeah that's what the kids are thinking about, late-stage capitalism and declining social mobility.

PawgerZ 3y ago
In comparison to other generations? Yeah, they are.
303uru 3y ago
I'd challenge you to enter a school. I volunteer and run two clubs and they very much are talking about these things.
irrational 3y ago
I’m in my 50s and I’m not even thinking about those things.
CalRobert 3y ago
I was very worried about climate change as a kid, and still am.
- ben_w 3y ago
  I was worried when I was a kid, now I'm much less worried. Plenty of other things to worry about, and there's still a non-zero risk, but I think there's enough money to be made fixing that particular issue that we'll probably be OK.
  - CalRobert 3y ago
    I hope you're right!

roenxi 3y ago

Even if it were one of those things; nothing has changed since 2010 to make them worse. The current negative economic trends set in around 1970, "social mobility" isn't a thing most people ever have access to. I've never been able to figure out what the problem is with climate change was so I dunno; maybe that is fair. But nothing new seems to have happened in the last decade that wasn't also happening in the 2000s.

paulryanrogers 3y ago
Microplastics have accumulated as well as other forever chemicals, and awareness of them. It's likely several factors at play and at different severities in different places.
- AlexandrB 3y ago
  I think awareness of microplastics, etc. kind of undermines this theory. In the 60s we were spraying all kinds of crazy crap - CFCs, DDT - into the environment and plastic was already pretty widely used, while recycling was nowhere in sight. 5-6 decades of additional plastic accumulation is not nothing, but people are much more aware - hence the return of metal water bottles, for example. Many pesticides/herbicides have also either been banned outright or are much harder to get since then. Plus microplastics likely accumulate over your lifetime - a mental health issue caused by microplastics would show up much more quickly in the elderly of middle aged than in teens.

pmontra 3y ago

The archive of that site has many posts answering your question. Some have been on HN in the past months. Archive https://www.afterbabel.com/archive https://www.afterbabel.com/archive Here are 13 Other Explanations for the Adolescent Mental Health Crisis. None of Them Work. https://www.afterbabel.com/p/13-explanations-mental-health-crisis https://www.afterbabel.com/p/13-explanations-mental-health-c...

WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
> Here are 13 Other Explanations for the Adolescent Mental Health Crisis. She finally gets to the deciding modern condition - the one where kids are systemically denied critical growth time (daily blocks of adult-free time & safe places to roam [safe=no threat of police or other compulsive adults]). And even tho she has this on her list of false suppositions she admits probably isn't as false as she infers. But she then immediately minimizes this historic erasure of development by saying it's just 'independence' kids have lost. Gaslighting done, she bizarrely accuses devices & social media of causing it, even tho it was obvious by the 1980s that options for free-roaming and adult-free time were well on the way to being eradicated. Perhaps being so invested in pregurgitated conclusions, she's unable to notice super-obvious competing factors.
- granshaw 3y ago
  Bingo, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38937293 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38937293
- watwut 3y ago
  The article is about mental health crisis being international. Meanwhile, German, French, Swiss, Japan or Scandinavian kids walk around towns free without adults. They walk to school at age of 6 or even sooner. If it was just about independence, countries like Germany or France would not had the issue.
  - naasking 3y ago
    Exactly. Everybody just immediately jumps to their pet theory without actually digesting the full set of data that needs to be explained. The article very clearly lays out why those other explanations are less plausible than social media, and the cross-cultural nature of it is a big point. All that said, the authors who publish on that site are also very pro-unsupervised free play and think its decline has caused mental health issues of its own (see Haidt's The Coddling of the American Mind).

LAC-Tech 3y ago

I think the sort of people who push "climate change anxiety" and espouse theories about "late stage capitalism" are a huge, huge part of the problem. Near every communist I've met was miserable.

nradov 3y ago
There is a high degree of correlation between mental illness and leftist political views. https://twitter.com/ZachG932/status/1248823584111439872 https://twitter.com/ZachG932/status/1248823584111439872
- 303uru 3y ago
  It's easier to refer to the true and highly studied issue here, depressive realism. "Leftists" have more accurate knowledge of the world and that leads to depression. Ignorance is bliss. That's not even mentioning the fact that the right belittles mental health and those who seek help.