YOUNG PEOPLE & SOCIAL MEDIA - DAMILOLA GBADAMOSI (08/04/2015)

I recently watched a documentary on Channel 4, Teens, and it really got me thinking about young people and social media. I’ve always been fascinated by the power of social media, to change perception, change lives, bring people together and tear them apart. However more than that as “a spectator” as my friends affectionately (or maybe it was shade) call me, I tend to retweet, like, reblog and watch interactions.  That means I do not contribute often, and do so more in answering a particular questions. I am a keen observer of people online and offline and these are some of my observations, positive and negative, about social media and young people.

When you are using social media right, it can be a platform to showcase and elevate yourself and your talents. From sharing art, music, poetry and so much more, ranging from the beautiful and unique to the captivatingly bizarre. Young people use social media to access opportunities, and create opportunities for each other and themselves. Particularly because social media has away of bridging the gap between the traditionally unreachable and the masses, many find success “online”. Of course, the entertainment factor is the reason most of us use these platforms; you can always be sure a visit to the platform of your choice will provide some laughter or shock value. Platforms like twitter’s create the unique experience of watching a Friday night episode with hundreds of people, aware of their every reaction. Social media has also awakend a real social and political awareness in the youth, with political debates, major news stories and sometimes even more obscure ones getting as much if not more attention as Eastenders, any football match or Take Me Out. 

But there are pitfalls. Social media has bred the “online persona”, sometimes miles away from who we really are. And whilst harmless exaggeration of character is one of the joys social media allows us, I worry that some personas are borne of or breed insecurity. They also create a removed sense of accountability that leads to severe cases of cyber bulling. And whilst some people take it to the extreme, particularly when cloaked with anonymity, a “keyboard warrior” is something that social media has allowed all of us to be at some point. The speed at which you can share your opinions, sometimes mean it is done without thought. We say things we would never dare in person, and forget the emotions of people on the receiving end. More concerning than the hurt we can cause each other is the harm we cause ourselves. We lower our self worth and belief, often envying and coveting the unknown, in the names of  “goals”. Forgetting that a picture captures a fragment of a life, and people show the fragments they hope are enviable. To covet or envy the relationships, bodies and successes we see in fragments, with no sense of how the were achieved, boarder on dangerous.

Watching the documentary, and from personal experience I am motivated to stay on social media, by all the things young people can, have and will achieve through it. I just worry that many of us are more caught up in its drawbacks. I recommend you give the documentary a watch it’s previous episodes are now up on Channel 4’s website and the newer episodes will air on Tuesdays at 10pm. Maybe like me you will find yourself thinking a little differently before you hit send/post.