Social Media Is Harming Us All - Especially Our Children

On this lovely February 26th, 2023, we're gonna talk about something that everyone the world over loves, hates, despises, and uses all the time. 24 7, 365 or 360 6 if it's a leap year, depending on what your uh, time skills are looking like. I love how and also's like, wait, 365, 360 6. What does this mean? What is this number?

Thought was 360 4 . No, there's 365 days in a year. 366 in a leap year, sir. Aaron has now been schooled on things just by a day. Just by a day. But we're gonna be talking about something that everyone uses all the time. And when I say uses all the time, I mean, you can go outside in the middle of summer and you will see teens with their next hunched over staring into their phones because they have to get their latest dopamine hit from social media.

And social media is slowly going to kill us all.

Hot water machine.

Oh, this little red little redness 

of it. 

Oh. So yeah, it really,

Aaron is over here laughing at himself or you're that or he's cringing at myself. . I don't know which it is, but doesn't matter. Yes, because both are valid and proper to do in this day and age. As is social media. And social media is something that has been on my, how do I put it? It's been on my radar for a while and we've talked about it here and there over the harmful benefits of social media, the harmful effects of it.

But now there are actually starting to be studies coming out saying how harmful, how impactful this technology is and how just one month away from it oh, can improve so much. Now I'm going to grant the, the premise before we even start. Most of these articles that I have that talk about, oh, we studied blank number of teens or whatever, they are relatively small studies.

I will grant that they are. Talking about thousands or hundreds of thousands or millions of teens being studied. We're talking in the hundreds for most of these. Yeah. But yeah, 

put to make one situation 

better, let me put it this way. I don't think we should put millions or hundreds of thousands of teens in danger to prove that social media is evil.

Wait, okay. Maybe that's a little hyperbolic to say Call social media evil. It's damaging and I'll, I'll give you my, my conclusion up front here, honestly. Yeah. I think we should put social media as one of those things that requires age verification, huh? At 18 plus, ah, 18. Make it you're an adult. Really, that is my conclusion.

Let's get there on how I got to that conclusion, but, Wow. Let's, let's put in the same category as cigarettes, alcohol, firearms, and everything else. Well, that's 21. 

Well, well, 21 for cigarettes and alcohol. 

Yeah. Okay. Recently it moved to 21 for cigarettes? Yes. Okay. Previously it was 18 tobacco products.

Tobacco products. Okay. Previously it was 18 alcohol 21. That's been for a while, but yes. I'm, I'm saying put it at the adult only section of the internet. Yeah. Yeah. There are states that are trying to make it so that if you go to a pornography site, you have to verify who you are and verify your age, that you're 18 plus.

Yeah. Let's make this more strict than that, in a way. Or as, or as equally strict. Well as equally strict or more 

Right. But I mean, uh, I mean, pornography sites aren't even that strict anyways 

in most states. I understand. Let's make this a national thing. Social media, 18 plus across the board. That's gonna make a lot of people upset.

especially a lot of teenagers, 

lives live on social media, but 

that's why Yeah. It's not good. During the teenage years, we are having people grow up who are addicted to the dopamine highs. Yeah. Of social media. They are changing what they perceive about themselves based on the feedback or lack thereof that they get from their peers.

You have people who start starving themselves or going through extreme diets or deciding that they are no longer this, but they are that because of the feedback in the trends they see on social media, the likes that they get when, oh, they show a picture of themselves that looks a little bit skinnier than the last time, and all of a sudden all these people love it and they're like, oh, I must do this to continue to get that dopamine hit and.

Of acceptance. Right. This leads to a bigger conversation about things, first off. Right. Why are we seeking our acceptance from strangers and people online? I, I don't know. Call me old-fashioned. Call me old. I don't care. I am glad I did not grow up with social media. I, in fact, when I was in college, it was a rare thing to have a Facebook account.

Yeah. Facebook hadn't. Yeah. Rolled out. Rolled out. That's a tech term, you know, to be deployed. To be available to, yeah. Is available for you to consume yet at my college, because at that time you needed a.edu email address to get a Facebook. To get a Facebook account. Huh. And it wasn't available for cornerstone.edu at the time, I think until like my junior year, Paul Paul's just 

salty.

He didn't get to hop on right away. 

Oh no. I am not salty now. . 

Well, okay. I was thinking of. I was just thinking about this, um, before we got into this. Uh, just going back to compare, um, Facebook from how I remember it compared to now. Okay. Because now granted it probably, it very well could have all have been there from when I was on there as far as just like what Zan Facebook and all that stuff.

I had just never thought to go out and find anything, which, I mean, I haven't really gone out to find anything now, but I just know it. There's a bunch of junk out there. Anywho, um, well, I guess as far as like ads and stuff like that, like I don't rem the only thing I remember especially, well when I first created my Facebook account was literally you saw stuff from friends and that was it.

Right? That wasn't so bad. Now also, I mean, I didn't have, gosh, as many friends on my Facebook as I. Suppose I probably do now, which wouldn't be a bad idea to do the classic old, you know, filter through the friends, get rid of people that's like, who are you? And then just keep it down to the core group of friends that, you know, I actually keep in, try to keep in contact with, I suppose.

Okay. Um, but now if you do that and somebody got removed that didn't wanna be removed, now you have people's feelings hurt, all that kind of fun stuff now. But, uh, yeah, I don't know. Like I just, there didn't needs to be so much outside influences in Facebook from what I remember compared to how it's been the last several years where it's just like anything you look for on the computer or just anything that's popular or trending is now reaching your newsfeed and stuff like that.

Where from what I used to remember is literally just what friends are posting. 

Right. The original vision of Facebook Now. Maybe I'm dating myself here a little bit. Okay. Laugh all you want. I don't care. You're not old. I'm gonna be 40 this year. I'm old. You're not old. Not yet. I'm ancient. Let it be. No, now I am ancient and old.

Okay. . You'll be there soon. Someday too. And all this will be scary and no. And new to you as well. And you'll be like, no. Anyways, it already is scary. . Facebook when it started. Mm-hmm. was meant to be an online yearbook, essentially. What? Do you know what a yearbook is? I mean, 

okay. We, am I thinking of a 

different 

kind of yearbook?

Yearbook you had in high school? What was that? It was just 

pictures from all the people that went there and some memories throughout here. 

Exactly. Yeah. Essentially, it was made originally to be basically be an online living yearbook of people that you went to school with and were classmates with and were friends with.

So, but 

there's still the like the connection part where you could talk to one another, 

right? Yeah. But it was more like, I don't even think when I started, when I joined Facebook originally, I don't even think like Messenger was a thing in there. It was literally just public hosts. Yeah, that's it. 

That's kind of funny cuz then it's like, well now Facebook owns Instagram or 

has they own Instagram?

Yep. But they also own WhatsApp. Yeah, Facebook Messenger, right? Facebook it's itself, obviously. 

Yeah. But I was like, it used to literally just be pictures. Well, did it even used to 

be pictures much It It was pictures 

of, well, Instagram was, I'm sorry. Yeah, yeah. Instagram was pictures of the caption and that was it.

Yeah. And Facebook was just wall posts. Yeah. And so you would see all the wall posts from like my school. Cornerstone University. Yeah. And be able to comment on them. And maybe if like I went to transfer to a different school Right. And then I got a new email address, then I would be part of that community.

And then my friends I had back at Cornerstone would be able to see the stuff, some of that stuff and cross pollinate that. That's, you know, how, how it, that's how Facebook started. Yeah. I remember it back, back in the day. way back when Exactly. You're talking back in 2003, 2004 timeframe. Or maybe even a little bit later than that.

I, I don't remember the exact years. I just remember it was near the tail end of my college time. Mm-hmm. , that 

was crazy. Yeah. Thinking I was only in like, what, third grade or somewhere in that range. 

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. . 

So, which, yeah. Okay. So, 

so it, it, it, it, it really didn't, you know, it, it, it's nowhere near what it's like today.

Back when it first started, right? Yes. Back then it was literally changed a ton just to keep in touch with people you went to school with, you know, back when it was called the Facebook, the Facebook, you know, they dropped the word the, I think in like 2005 ish or 

so. Oh, really? Okay. Yeah. So that, that would meant, that was early on.

They, they bought the name facebook.com in 2005 for $200,000. Geez. Elise, the platform was made available for high school students and then the general public in oh six, what 2006 was made available for general public. Previous to that it was like just high school high 

S, so, well, I mean, okay. High school 

up.

Yeah. And yeah, it had already been available for colleges based on your email address. Right, right. But 2006 became available to high school students and then the general public. 

Weird. Okay. Huh? Which man? I'm trying to remember. I wonder if I can even find, like when I first originally even. Got on Facebook.

Well, it had to be after oh six, which you've made you how old? Holy crap. Wait a 

minute.

I didn't even know how to 

operate and get around my Facebook page anymore. goodness. 2008. I think this is when I 

first made it, which would make sense because most social media companies do not allow anyone under the age of 13 to join. Really, if you are under the age of 13, your parent or legal guardian has to establish the account for you.

Huh. That being said, most kids and teenagers just ignore that back and create their accounts anyways. Right. 

Which, uh, goes to the whole idea of having a age verification. How much does that even impact it? Unfortunately, 

it, it's, it'd be hard to do that for current accounts unless the law stated that they would have to do that.

To to verify your age. Yeah, it would probably be retro. It probably wouldn't be retroactive on current accounts. Those accounts would probably be grandfathered and they would've to do it on new accounts that were being opened. This would also do something else as well with that, and this is where I say 18 plus, but at the same time, I also understand this hurdle that comes up with it for things like Facebook and that where you want to be you.

Okay, that's fine that you tie it to your identity, your real life identity, right? But for maybe some other things where you maybe want to be a little more Lucy Goosey Anonymous, let's say, having to tie it all to a real identity or age verification of some sort is how do you verify the age ID credit card?

Right? How do you verify, right? That could then tie to a real identity, which could be bad in some cases. So I understand there are. Implications and some challenges to think through. And I don't have all the answers yet. No, but guess what? It's just the thought. You're not the one, you're not paying me to come up with these answers.

Yeah. , we're paying our politicians to come up with these answers. 

Yeah. Doing a great job. Um, , 

I I have a great solution. Hmm. We have Biden goes sniff them and he goes and walks away. Goes too old then They're 18 Plus

Sorry,

Um, I might cut that out, buddy. 

I, uh, I I guess I'm, uh, yeah, you could do the whole like driver's license thing cuz then obviously Yeah. All kids are gonna, well, not well most kids. Will, will you get that? Like what, 16? You can get that at 

16? Well, yeah, you can get your permit at 15, 15 and a half. 15 and a half.

Your driver's license at 16 in most states, most states. There are some states where we can get a little bit earlier. Wait, really? 

Oh, I didn't know that. Okay. 

Wow. But yes, but you could get that right? Yeah. And nothing that ties into, uh, government verification system, which I understand. I, I, I said I'm not a hundred percent for that with like the porn thing when we talked about that, because then it's tying it back to Wera, Danny and I understand there's the contradiction there and I don't know what to do.

Cuz when I read studies, I read articles that say teens who cut their social media use in half see improvements in body image in just a month. Yeah. You're not talking about a year, two years, three years down the road. You're talking a month. A month, 30 to 31 days. Yeah. That's, and you have a 50% efficacy rate for a Covid vaccine.

Was that effective? We'd be great.

Yeah. I, I guess, yeah, I don't see an issue with having to do, like, yeah, what a driver. I mean, is your driver's license like, ID that important, I guess, 

uh, where, where it becomes a problem with some people is they don't like it. That the fact that it's, it hits a government database Yeah. To verify your age, because then if, let's say Facebook wants to be nefarious for whatever reason, they could have, keep a copy of that information on file if they're not being truthful, that they're getting rid of it.

It's the same thing as in the argument against why using government ID for pornography. Age verification is a bad thing when for those people who are against it, and I can see that argument, which is why I'm kind of like stuck in the middle like, yeah, I wanna see the benefit, but at the same time, I understand the argument of why you don't wanna use something like an ID that ties into the government, that the government can then say, oh, oh, NTY, NTY, NTY.

You have a Facebook, we're now going to restrict you from doing anything because you threw a piece of paper on the ground, you crossed not at a crosswalk. You didn't say you're hail bidens. You didn't say you're whatever. Whoa. 

Wait for 

ties into the whole theory of the social credit score that like China does in that.

Yeah. That's why I said I get it and I'm conflicted on it. Mm-hmm. . 

I guess my other thought is, as far as social media goes, I mean you don't need social media. To have access to the stuff that impacts you, like social media does. I mean, just having access to the internet in 

general, right? I I, I is I get what you're saying.

Yeah. And I'm gonna raise you something to some, yeah. Okay. What these studies, and there's a couple that, I have seven links pulled up here, and a couple of them have studies, stuff from male clinic even, uh, Cleveland Clinic, uh, stuff from npr where they're talking about, what they're finding is happening is people mm-hmm.

male, female, doesn't matter. Both genders. Yeah. Okay. Well, 

all 

of 

them, both genders, . Yeah. They'll go online, let's say, right. And post a photo of themselves, and then they'll get a lot of response. Oh, you're so pretty, da da, da, da, da, da. Right? And then they're like, whoa, I'm getting all this attention. I need to go and do this again.

Right. They go and do it again. They get less attention. Oh, I'm not as purdy. Then they, then they do something, they alter something. Oh, you're so purdy that dopamine hit, continuously hit over and over and over again. Yeah. It's getting, yeah. They're comparing themselves and, and this is the part where I agree, yes, they don't need social media for this next part.

We're like, they're comparing themselves to mo, uh, this model or they're comparing themselves to this friend or, you know, maybe. Okay. Aaron, for example. For example, right. You as a drummer. Yep. Okay. If you were to sit there and compare yourself to Matt Griner Oh my gosh. Every day that, that's a little depressing.

Yeah. I'm not saying, I'm not saying you're a bad drummer at all. Okay. Oh, no, you don't 

have to. I already know it. I'm just kidding. 

But you're sitting there comparing yourself to Matt Griner. Yeah. Who is top of the class. Yeah. Okay. What a guy. You are going to feel inferior. Oh yeah. 

I would, I probably would sell my stuff by now.

you are going to feel low. The low, okay. Yeah. It's the same people doing this, comparing themselves online, and it's bad enough that they're comparing themselves against their friends, but then they can go and compare themselves against mm-hmm. , these quote superstars out there. Yeah. And then these, they go, well, I'm not as pretty as insert model X or Y.

Mm-hmm. , what do I need to do to become like this? Well, this person over here is Purdy. I'm, I have a big nose. I must get rid of that big nose. . They have a high voice. I have a deeper voice. I have to do something, get that higher voice. Mm-hmm. guys are not immune to this either. They look in, they go, well, that guy has a six-pack and he has all the girls.

I better go get one. I'm not talking about a six pack of beer. Oh, . No, I know. I'm well aware. Yeah. You know, you, you looked at, you go down the aisle, what do you see all the time? Especially like the men's fitness magazines, how to get the abs, how to get the, the chest, how to get the arms, how to get the triceps.

How, how 

to, how to look this good. But you can still eat what you want 

to eat. Yeah, exactly. So it's, this is not a female only thing. This is a male and a female thing. Okay. It is a human issue. We compare ourselves to others and then when we don't stack up to what we see in this Photoshopped magazine, no, that's even the best part.

Yeah. We say, what do I have to change about myself? I hate myself because I don't look like that. There was a, an article I read last night, it was called Photoshop Fails. You know, it's , these people on Instagram that just look beautiful. Right. Well, there was one, I wish I saved the article. Yeah. There was one.

It was this lady, Asian lady looked beautiful in the photo, but then you looked in the reflection of the window. Oh, it was Jekyll and Hyde. Yeah. Oh. But if people never looked at that reflection and they only looked at her, they'd go, she's just so beautiful. I can't compete, I can't compare. And then they go down on themselves.

When I say, go down themselves, they cut themselves down or they may literally cut themselves. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and I wish I was making this stuff up, this article again from, uh, this is from Daily Mayo, but there's similar things from Cleveland Institute, Mayo Clinic. They say this, they studied a group of teens who spent at least two hours per day on their phone.

We're not talking nine plus hours. Two, two hours. Two. 

Well, I, no. Okay. I'm trying to think of what the average, 

we'll get to what the average teenager does in a little bit. Okay. Okay. They said if those, from that group of teens, they had them cut their usage in half for one month. So just to an hour. A day.

An hour. Or if they were, like I said, at, it says at least two, remember? Yeah. So some of them might be three, some might be four, blah, blah, blah. Okay. Okay. But they, they told 'em all cut in half. This includes Snapchat, uh, Snapchat, Snapchat, Snapchat, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook. 

Yeah, I was saying now, cuz TikTok is also, I was asking, uh, I was asking someone about that as far as like, so it was like TikTok 

considered social media or Oh yeah, it is.

Definitely. Yeah. Okay. Alright. So. This group of teenagers was between the age of 17 and 25. So they call 'em teenagers. They're young adults still. Okay. Yeah. They had them cut their time in half that they spent on these social media apps. All these teens going into this had symptoms of depression, anxiety, body image issues, you know, where, you know, you could look at someone and go, well, you know, you're a healthy weight.

I am so fat . You know, me and you will maybe joke about that. And we're, we're bigger guys. Oh yeah. 

Okay. I know I am not healthy by any means. Okay. 

But, you know, we're talking about someone who's maybe a, a healthy, good weight interest and they'll be like, I'm so fat. We, we've all, 

if you've ever seen, I can think of some people like that.

If you've ever seen letter Kenny, oh my gosh. The two miles that comes back with Katie when, after her time in the city as a model, and they're just like, Talking about themselves, about how chunky and fat they are and overweight they are. That is what we're talk, that's what I'm talking about. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. So participants were asked to respond to a series of statements about their overall appearance and weight, and then completed a similar questionnaire at the end of the experiment. All right. During the first week of the study, participants were told to use social media as they normally would, then half.

So the, what they're trying to do is they're trying to, uh, control group and a study group, okay? Half were instructed to try and reduce social media to no more than 60 minutes a day for the next three weeks. Those who were instructed to restrict their social media use reduced it by approximately 50% to an average of 78 minutes a day.

Okay? Meanwhile, the control group, those who weren't asked to change their usage at all, were told to use it as normal. They averaged over three hours a day online. That's the average between the group. Now they did this and they published the results in the journal Psychology of Popular Media. And what they found, what the, was that those who reduced their time on social media had a significant improvement in how they regarded both their overall appearance and body weight.

The control group, however, recorded no change, right? Hmm. Youth are spending on average between six to eight hours per day on screens. Most of that on social media, according to this study, six to eight hours a day. The Wow , 

I guess I, man, I wonder know how much I do on my phone shoot. Or I guess just screen time in general.

But see your phone, because my phone has the same software. You can turn on something where it will give you a report every week. Yeah. And it'll tell you, is your screen usage increasing or decreasing? Yeah, for the week. 

I had that one. Um, Gosh, I wanna say it was like last week or so. It said I had used it, I think it was close to like a half hour less than I did the week before.

I was like, Hmm, okay. But like, I'm trying to, I mean, I, man, I'll have to love to look at that at some point just to 

see what it's saying. Right now. It's, it's an interesting metric to look at. Yeah. Now I realize for me, this isn't always gonna be an accurate, uh, number because for example, the last two nights I've found that I've left my phone on playing like YouTube overnight.

Oh. So that counts against my screen on time, you know? Right. So those, my numbers are a little skewed with that, but if you are find a way to take that out, then we could find out my, my information. But anyways, back to the study. They said this was just a four week trial run for these teenagers, young adults, and they said they saw this significant improvement in their overall wellbeing.

Okay. Now you get over to somewhere like the Mayo Clinic. You know the Mayo Clinic, right? Yeah. What's the Mayo Clinic known for? known for? Yeah. It's known for being one of the top Oh, okay. Hospitals in the us? Yeah. Oh, okay. I was, they published this article back in February 26th, 2022, so one year ago today.

Okay. Literally nice. Literally one year ago today, right? Yeah. What they wrote is this, the Pew Research Center in 2018 discovered that of 13 to seven year olds, they found that 45% are online almost constantly, and 97% use a social media platform. 

Yeah, I believe that. I mean, just going into my local pick and save, it's crazy to see all the younger kids.

Yeah, I guess that are employees there, how many of them especially, well, especially the ones like at the, uh, well, self, self checkout, uh, sections. They're all just sitting there looking at their phone. 

Yeah. It, it's become a common thing of, oh, I don't know what to do right now. I'm bored, lemme look at my phone.

Yeah. And I'll, I'll admit I'm guilty of this at time, Sue. Oh, 

it's, for me, I, I've noticed, and that's where there's been times where I'll put my phone away at work cuz if I have it out sitting at like, out next to me sitting or whatever, I'll be doing a task, double tap my screen real quick, look at it, keep going at my task.

And then like, not even a minute afterwards, I'll just go back to it and click on it as if like to check the time. I'm like, dude, I literally just did that a second ago. Yeah. So it's like, I'll turn it over, put it off to the side and try and get away from it. Cuz it's, yeah. I mean it's one of those things where it's, you're always waiting to see something new.

What's next? Why, you know, 

you're looking for that dopamine hit. Yeah. That, that's exactly what it is. 

Is that okay? Yeah. I guess if that's all 

it, 

it's that reward, it's that reward system. It, it's a system where you go online, you see something new, it's either exciting or you like it or whatever, and you get that little dopamine hit, and that's your body's mentally giving yourself a reward.

And so you seek out that next thing that's gonna give you that reward. What's that next thing? What's that next thing? What's that next? What's that next thing? Really? It it's a, it's a reward cycle. How's, that's, that's why social media works so well. They figured it out that it will give you that little dopamine hit.

It'll make you feel good, and that means you're gonna keep coming back for it because you keep wanting to feel good. It's just like alcohol, . It's like alcohol. It's any drug. Well, yes. It's also like the porn industry as well. Yeah. They figured that out. Yeah. The, that's y People who are addicted to pornography keep going to more and more depraved things as they go on because the things that they are addicted to, the things that they're viewing all the time.

Do not give 'em as big of a high, a dopamine high as they did before. Yeah. And that's why you have people going, well, yeah, I started with porn when I was 12, but you know what? Nothing got me excited anymore. And so now I'm into tranny porn. Yeah, yeah. That's not an uncommon story to hear. No, 

no. 

Uh, it's because I need that dopamine continued on with this, this Mayo Clinic study, right?

Yeah. Some of these things in here that they talk about are just, wow. Okay. A 2019 study found that 12 to 15 year olds in the US that a majority of them spend more than three hours a day using social media. And if they spend more than three hours a day using social media, they are at heightened risk for mental health problems.

Another 2019 study of more than 12,013 to 16 year olds in England found that using social media more than three times a day predicted poor mental health and wellbeing in teens. Another stor a study. Observed a link between high levels of social media use and depression or anxiety. A 2016 study found that the greater the social media use, especially at nighttime, especially at night.

Yep. And then social media use and emotional investment in social media. Like you, you're like, oh, I love this. I love this creator. Right. I have to. Whatever. Such, and they also said such as feeling upset when they were prevented from logging on. You know, fa, oh, Facebook is down. Oh, no, I can't. Oh, I can't. I can't.

I can't. My picture. Describe your Starbucks to me. Oh my gosh. All of these things were linked to worse sleep quality in higher levels of anxiety and depression. A 2015 Stu found that social comparison. Comparison. Yes. And feedback seeking by teens using social media and cell phones was linked with depression depressive symptoms.

In addition, a study in 2013 found that older adolescents who use social media passively, such as by just viewing others photos, Reported declines in life satisfaction. Whoa. That's it. it. It does say however, those who use social media to interact with others or post their own content didn't experience these declines hold up.

So people that just view it to view it to see others get depressed or have all those things. Yep. But if you're one posting, 

they didn't see those declines in that 

study. That's weird cuz what about people that post and don't get 

reactions? Then they would probably be on the more passive side cuz they're not interacting cuz it does say interacting.

Right. And posting their own content. Yeah. 

And then there's me just scrolling through, seeing what everybody else is doing and all the new 

bands. I'm like, which accordance to that stay would mean you have a lower satisfaction in life. Another study on the impact of social media on undergraduate college students showed that the longer they used Facebook, the stronger their belief was that others were happier than they were, but.

The more time these students spent going out with their friends, the less they felt this way. In other words, the less time they're in front of Facebook reviewing what other people were doing for life and how others were living and having fun and they were their own stuff. Exactly. 

Made it so much better.

Now that makes a lot of sense. That's, I guess, I wonder if that would change, um, for people viewing it if well, one, if they believe and, uh, understand the whole thing of, obviously most of social media is just, uh, it's showing the good moments that people wanna share. Like, you don't see all unless somebody loves posting sad sobi.

No. Right. Sad stuff on the internet for, I'm well at that point, almost wondering if it's for attention or not. Uh, well, I wonder if. Like you understand that, okay, well they're showing the exciting stuff for their life. Obviously everybody has issues. So it's, I guess in the sense to compare yourself like that, it's like, or realize that they're just more happier than you and they'd never seem to have issues.

But again, at the same time, you can look at how often they're posting and depending on how often they're posting, cool, exciting stuff. It's like, oh, well they must just be mu much, must just be much better off 

unless they're TikTok users. Cause then this study came about in 2021 and this came from, uh, was highlighted by the Cleveland Clinic.

Okay. Another top hospital here in the us. Yeah. Uh, they talk about a study that highlights how children who use TikTok Yeah. Are developing ticks and have tick like attacks. They're experiencing a movement disorder brought on by stress and anxiety, and they said it was probably made worse by the pandemic and teens increased social media consumption.

And they link to the study that talks about this, where they're seeing in teenagers and younger children who are consuming a lot of TikTok videos or even posting them all this like tick like behavior. You know what a tick is? Right? Just like random, like a random movement 

or word in a sense. Like a Tourette's 

e kinda.

Yeah. They also talk about how increased use of this social media stuff, right, uh, causes in, uh, changes to children's daily behavior, such as increased irrit. Increased anxiety and lack of self-esteem, which we've talked about from the Mayo Clinic as well. Right. So Cleveland Clinic is highlighting the same exact thing.

They're specifically talking about TikTok in this case, but it's a another one. Those social media apps. , 

I'm gonna send this stuff to my sister. My nephews are gonna hate me. , 

yeah. What the heck 

uncle? Like get off the phone. . That's, that's man. 

And both Mayo and Cleveland Clinic, one of the things they say to do a, you know, for a parent, you know, Determine if your child is ready.

First off, no, just don't be like, oh, you're 13. You may go on social media now. Which, which is like the lower age for most social media companies, right? Yeah. But also talk to your kids about what's going on, because there's other things that can happen online with social media that the Cleveland Clinic highlights, such as cyber bullying, online predators, uh, sharing too much information, you know, especially if they're the ones posting content.

Mm-hmm. , uh, they could be victims of false marketing, you know, and also, well, like, think back to the tight pods, dangerous viral trends that are popular and, you know, you wanna do that for popularity. But both of them also say, you know, what's a great thing you should do if, especially if you have teens, limit their screen time.

Screen time. Yep. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends screen time, limiting screen time to two hours a day for children. So, 

uh, does it specify as what the age range for or what a 

child is. In this case, they're talking about up to 18. Up to eight. Huh. 

Okay. Wow. Okay. Yeah. 

And, and they do say, you know, sometimes obviously you're gonna need more, sometimes you're gonna need less depending on the situation.

That's up to you. Mm-hmm. as a parent, as a guardian, to make that determined. But they do say it's not always just the fact that it's screen time. It's what the screen time is in place of, you know, Uhhuh. . Is that becoming your only one number one priority, or are you neglecting these other things? And they say it's all too common that they have that irritability.

Uh, you know, especially in children, they have this quote here. If kids are being asked to get off social media and do their homework, then parents might see increased periods of irritability or frustration directed towards the parents. They're being asked to do something they don't want to do and stop doing something they enjoy.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. And that was, and that was, uh, one, uh, one thing someone had brought up when I was talking to him about this. Okay. But it was, um, instead of having like an age restriction on social media and stuff like that, it's parents just don't do their job. And being a parent to their kids, like it's the parental side of things is not too great.

Parents just don't care. Yeah. Um, 

I, and I get it, we're all busy and, and I'm saying this Yeah. As a guy who has no children, right. What, what . Nuh . Sometimes it feels like you're my child at times. Yes, . Okay. Let's be honest here, but, but in reality, I have no children. Okay? So I'm saying this as someone with no children and I get that.

And parents pregnant. Well, you had, you had no idea what it's like. You're right. I don't, I don't. No, but, but at the same time, hate to say this and hate to break the bubble to you or break the bad news. Whatever the phrasing you wanna use, depending on how old you are, burst your bubble. You are a parent.

They are the kid. They can get upset and cry about what it is that they don't get to have. I'm sorry. You don't get to go see your TikTok floss dance for the 5 million time today. It's okay. Go do your homework.

Oh, I can't re big enough for that one. , 

you know, and obviously I'm saying TikTok floss, cuz that, yeah, that's probably an older trend, but there's probably something on there now that's, that's popular and happening in TikTok land. I don't know, I don't have a TikTok account, so I don't know. , even though, even though Christian Podcast Association keeps saying, oh, you have to get Tech TikTok account.

I'm like, no, I am not getting on that trash wagon. No. . , okay. No, not worth it. So there's probably something that's popular and trendy on there right now, but guess what? Instead of seeing the 5000000th stitch or whatever you call it, where you have two videos side by side, go outside and listen to some music play in the grass, or, I don't know, walk down to a buddy's house and talk to a friend in person and not over Skype.

Oh, 

well, I mean, they'll, they'll just, they can watch TikTok together. 

Then I hope that other parent at the same time will scream at a time. But you're right in that regard, we need parents to be parents. Yeah. We don't need parents to be friends of their kids. 

No. Is it awesome if that can happen? Yeah. I, well, I, I guess that, I guess I would say that's probably most likely something that just happens over time as they get older.

That happens over time when your kids, when they're older 

Yeah. You, when they can sit down together and have that first beer with, you know, one another and stuff like that. 

And, and, and look at it this way, when your kid is five and throwing a temper tantrum, they don't need a friend. They need a parent.

Yeah. Okay. Right. When you, Mr. Johnson, were younger and may be doing something that you shouldn't have, you didn. You didn't need me to be necessarily a friend. Friend. You needed me to be someone, be like, Aaron, what the heck is going on now? Doesn't mean I'm not gonna help you with whatever it was. Yeah, but it wasn't a, oh, I'm sorry.

You're going through that. Let me, let's just sing Kumbaya. It was Aaron, you're an idiot. and mean. You have had that conversation how it's gone from now that you're older. And I just had this conversation with Jonah as well, actually. Oh really? of you are no longer, it's no longer this mentor, mentee, older person to younger person thing anymore.

Now you're more on that friendship level and I, and I consider 21 kind of like that cutoff age for at least me with you younger guys. Okay. . All right. Yeah. That, that's where it is for me. And, and I imagine with parents, it's probably the same thing, you know, at a certain age they can go, you know what, hey, I don't have to parent these kids anymore.

They're old enough. I can be their friend. While they're growing up, while they're growing up, while they're still under 18, living in your house, they don't need a friend. They need a parent. And I get it. I, I, I, I don't know how many times I have to say it, I'm not a parent myself. I've had a parent, Erin, I've had to parent Josh at times, but I am not a parent.

So yes, you can go. Well, you don't get it. I know that's fine. But guess what? The fact that I have to sit here and go, you need to stop screwing up your kids and stopping their friend and be their parent. And I can see that from the outside is a bad thing, I guess. 

And I don't know, just for me thinking about it right now is, I mean, even as a friend, you would hopefully, um, have those moments.

I mean, cuz obviously, I mean, I guess I'd say we're friends, right? ? Yes. But at certain times, if this one being me is being stupid, Kinda lay down the law, bring out the little smack or whatever, and Right. So I guess in as far as that goes, it's like, for parents, it's like, it's, I, I don't know, maybe, maybe I'm just being weird about it, but it's, it's, it's not being afraid to be harsh and corrective, but here, here's, they just want to be the gentle lovey.

Like, here's the difference, here's the difference. Yeah. Me and you have built up this friendship over many, many years. Right. Oh, okay. There is a lot of trust. Yes. There is a lot of, we understand each other a lot better than, you know before. Right. You, you're talking like a five year old who's throwing a temper tantrum.

It doesn't matter how nice you are with it. Sometimes you just have to say stop. Yeah. Sometimes you just have to be the parent and say stop. And sometimes there are situations when you, especially if you have kids where you just have to be the parent and say, stop, knock at all. There are times even between me and you, man, when we're friends.

Yeah. When. One of us might have to lay down the law a little bit. Okay. Yeah. And that, that could happen both ways. Mm-hmm. . And, and that's the beauty. Here's the thing, here's the difference between a friendship and a parent. Friendship is two ways, right? Yeah. Parent is definitely, parent is one way. And if your kid is confused, if you're a parent or a friend mm-hmm.

like, especially when they're under 18, still growing up, that's a problem. There's no authority there. I know we wanna, we wanna try to raise these kids up. I get that. And we wanna try to show 'em the right way. And there has, we're overcorrecting, I would say we're talking like people who grew up in my generation are younger or maybe a little bit younger than me, you know, who had very super strict parents.

Mm-hmm. . And then they want to try to swing the pendulum the other way cuz they're like, oh, I don't wanna grow up. My kids grow up the way I did and they're swinging it. But look where you are now. And they're swinging the way too far. Yeah. And I have a feeling these kids, when they grow up, Some of 'em are gonna swing back the other way.

Again, be very strict. It's, it's not gonna be in that middle. It's gonna keep the phone back and forth. Okay, cool. 

Swing. 

Yeah. But that's, you know, that's why I said, you know, we need parents, not friends for 

these. 

Yeah. Um, that, yeah, that makes sense. 

I mean, you continue looking at the data from these various studies.

Psychology today highlights this very well, here's what they say. They reviewed 19 studies of young adults, of young people, not young adults, from ages 11 to 20 in social media usage. Right. They identified four major themes in these studies between these 19 studies, the first theme connections, and they found that in some cases, yeah, it's great to, useful to keep in touch with like family and friends.

Mm-hmm. , but they're having trouble then making connections in real life. Okay. The second thing they found is that social media, and they found this in 13 of the papers, 13 of the 19. Found the social media harm. Their connecting, oh, I did say connecting with others. And this was either through them not knowing how to make that connection or they're being bullied or they're receiving threats, or they were always being criticized or they always had negativity during their social media interactions and they cited they and admitted of social media as part of the problem, as well as miscommunication.

Cuz social media, most of it is at least like Facebook and Twitter and that, that's text only. It's really easy to misconstrue a message when text only and you have no context of the tone and all that behind it, right? Mm-hmm. , the second theme is that they identified adolescents who felt frustrated on social media in trying to develop their identities.

And this course, you know, they're, they're talking about either their sexual identities or their, you know, identities as, uh, for the religion that they're following or whatever part of you as your identity or cultural identity and all that. The third theme, describes how social media uses supports or hinders education.

And in fact, they found studies that said, Hey, people are doing worse because they're spending so much time on social media. They weren't doing their homework. Mm-hmm. , they weren't spending time to studying. They were losing interest in their passions and their hobbies cuz they, instead of going and practicing, they'd sit there and scroll through social media feeds.

Right. The last thing they found was that in all almost it says in nearly all of the 19 papers, participants said social media was a source of worry and pressure. Participants expressed concern about judgment from their peers. They often felt embarrassed about how they looked in images and most participants expressed concern that they were addicted to social media.

Yeah. This goes back to Mayo Clinic. This goes back to the Cleveland Clinic saying, limit that screen time, two hours a day. 

Wow. 

Yeah. And then you look at this, this university from Australia, they said, Adolescent brains are still developing. It is. It's more vulnerable to time online. And since teens can sometimes struggle to self-regulate their screen time, their exposure and the risk of harm increases as a result.

Teens, social media use often correlates with depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, envy, loneliness. Hmm. In the most interconnected world we have through social media where you can get on TikTok, Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, whatever choice of communication method you want, feel lonely. You feel alone and isolated.

And I get that. I'm not, I'm not saying this is a very unique or thing talk to with anyone with depression, and they'll go, I can sit in a room with hundreds and feel isolated. Mm-hmm. . But the fact that we have this now as part of our online teen culture, no wonder why depression is going through the roof in teenagers.

No wonder why people struggle with their self-identity, with their self-worth, and with hating themselves. And when you look at the data that Australia has, and here's the thing, they studied Australian kids, right? Their kids are spending way less time on social media, and they're still seeing that issue.

In Australia, girls aged 14 to 24 spend on average of 822 minutes of social media each week or about two hours a day, boys age, 14 to 24 spend 528 minutes a week, just over one hour per day for a grand total of 1.6 hours per day on average between boys and girls in Australia. And they're still having that issue though.

Yes. So in other words, what, what, what, what they're getting at e even with that lower screen time. Yeah. These issues still persist, 

right? So then does it, well, at that point then it's like, does it even matter then, how much you limit it? I mean, granted obviously seeing that limiting it compared to what was the normal amount has already decreased some of the, you know, the, the depression anxiety and some of that, the, well, as you said, those like the, with the self image and whatnot, right?

Um, I mean, and they would be viewing it potentially just as much as people normally do in Australia. That's, 

this is why, this is why I said, I said my conclusion first. My conclusion is 18 plus. 

Yeah. I guess I'm not one, I could care less cuz it's, I mean, I use social media to see what, like bann information.

Mm-hmm. , see what some, you know, friends are doing sort of, I mean, the ones that I really pay attention to, um, and talk to people I used to post, uh, I, I barely post stuff. I don't remember the last time I've made a post about something. I don't think I use it that much. But then and then, hmm. That's interesting.

Yeah. And, and so here's, here's this last p, this last article I gonna bring up here. This is from the Newport Academy and they have a lot of treatment options for people who have made depressed or addicted in that, right? Mm-hmm. , this is what they found, and this is what they ran, won, won their articles.

And this is indicated of what keeps teenagers up at night, so to speak. 35% of teenagers on social media worry about being tagged in unattractive photos. This leads to some of their Eid in their depression and that right 27 are stressed about how they look when they post pictures we've ever seen, you know, the making fun of the person, you know, taking all the pictures.

Oh, yep, yep. That's a good one. Yeah, that's reality. 22% feel bad about themselves when nobody comments on or likes their photos. They also found, I was just 

thinking of just some of those things about people worry about whatever a certain, like pictures getting posted where

I will say that was one picture that got posted of me on Facebook that at first I wasn't excited about. I didn't care for being up on the internet, but at the end of the day, I just laughed and thought it was funny. Now it's what I, I could care less, but it's where I'm at. 

I at 

was at John's parents' house and I fell asleep and I, I don't know if they set it up or if I naturally did this on my own.

I can't remember which I, which one they said. Was how it went down. But like my shirt kinda like came up like I was sleeping on the couch and for whatever reason I put my finger in my belly button. I was just sitting there sleeping with my finger in my belly button and they took a picture just dying laughing.

And then John, yeah, he ended up posting that on Facebook just for like a Well when did he do that? For when it was like the whole man crush Monday thing. And then he posted a picture of me. He is like, just cuz I know I can get away with this cuz of how close of friends we are. Kind of thing. You won't hate me that much.

I was like, oh, . I was like, that's a great one for people to see of me, whatever. 

Oh, I was thinking it was gonna be someone posted the naked mo rat picture of you. . Wait what? . You shaved. It doesn't exist. , 

huh? Gosh, that's there. Is that on Facebook too? I think somewhere, but I was just thinking, I was like, all right, so there's probably been one time.

I was just like, ah, people aren't gonna see that. But now I look back, it's like, dude, it doesn't matter. And with like the whole thing of, I get, yeah, I guess I'll say even, I mean, I don't know. I mean, this should be of no surprise, but it's like, yeah, I've had moments where it's like, yeah, you post one thing, it's like, oh wow, didn't expect this many people to interact with it or like it and comment on it or whatever.

And then you post something, you're like, oh, this will be a good one. Then you just get a couple's just like, oh, all right, . Yeah. But it's just funny to me on how I get Yeah. I get why people get so hung up on it cuz it is a whole accepted and anyways, 

I wanna read this. Yeah, read the paragraph. Read this paragraph.

Read. So Newport Academy, Newport new, they're, they were, they're like, uh, they're, they're an a addiction mental health recovery place for teenagers in, in the United States. That's what they are. Okay, so in other words, this is their business to know how to make sure the teens are healthy mentally because they help them recover for these things.

Right? Right. So here's what they write. Many experts believe that the constant overstimulation of social networking shifts the nervous system into fight or flight mode. As a result, this makes disorders such as a D H D, teen depression, oppositional defined disorder, and teen anxiety worse. A fight or flight.

Yeah. What? Okay. They also, right when teens are depressed, they have found that they look at social media more often. In one study of young people, researchers found that social media use did not predict depressive symptoms, but greater depressive symptoms predicted more social media use Over time. Hmm.

Shoot. When I get depressed, I just feel like sleeping all the time. 

Uh, right there with you, right there with you on the, on the sleep one. But, so that's why I, as we go through this, I'm like, this is why I start with my conclusion. 18 plus, we're a social media. Yeah. A teenager's brain is developing over time, and we are in essence experimenting on teenage brains, right?

With social media, dopamine, reward, feedback loops, and there's no need for it. Guess what? A teen that doesn't have Facebook between the ages of 13 and 18 will grow up just fine. 

What? What about all the stuff they might miss out on, you know, by. 

What? Their depression, their anxiety, their self-hatred.

They're loathing, they're wanting to hurt themselves. They're comparing themselves to others. What, what if that sounds good for them to miss out on? Uh, all 

of it? Uh, no. Um, I guess now thinking about that though, as well as, has that ever not existed with 

machines? It hasn't been as easy to do. 

It hasn't been as Yeah, I guess as amplified as it is now, 

because nowadays kids are pretty much, and I, I like to joke about it, but it seems real kids are pretty much born with a phone in their hands.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Mm-hmm. , they can look up what inf information they want on the internet. Mm-hmm. Compare themselves to whatever celebrity. Yeah. Before Aaron, let's say for example, you wanted to compare yourself against like some fitness crew, right? You'd have to go to the store, find the magazine, buy it.

Whoa, cut it out, post it up on the wall. Yeah. Do the comparison, whatever Now. There's no, there's no, there's nothing to stop you. You just go, boop, bloop, bloop. Lemme me search. Oh, I found 

it. But then, okay. Is that social media or is that just internet access and all that kind of stuff? 

I love it. It's probably on social media, cuz it's probably more than likely they, you know, where they're finding it on Instagram, Facebook, Reddit, those places.

Hmm. I said more than likely it's possible to find that stuff off, off offsite, off, off social, right. 

Yeah. I mean, I guess when I look at, when I just pop up the internet browser on the computer, it's got all these different stories and all these other things going on and ideas of how to, how to achieve this and you know, or.

But at the same time, things to buy and look who owns this. And so 

it's like it's, but at the same time, you know, as part of the things they're also talking about, right, about the people who don't get likes or comments on their pictures. I 

see. That's the only thing I can see is people not getting that response from 

others.

Also, and, and I'm being honest here, if we didn't have social media, right? Mm-hmm. , you wouldn't see a lot of times what your friends are doing or people you have tangential relationship or somehow know from a distance are doing all the time 24 7, can't go down the newsfeed and be like, yeah, now I don't know that right now no bands and that they could still post to like their own websites and that, you know, people who have a technical know-how Oh, could still do that.

Yeah. But it's not gonna be centralized in one feed. Right. 

I guess. Well, and that's the thing I would say is different is like checking up on a abandon and seeing posts by them versus looking for what either friends or other. I guess individuals are posting would be different than me seeing, oh, where's this band at?

Or what are they doing? And stuff like that. 

But see, you gotta remember, you're not growing up in the prime of this social media stuff too. A as they point out here at Newport Academy. Mm-hmm. and I love this, this little thing, and they're f faq, is social media really addictive ? That was a question. Okay.

Here's their answer. Scientists have found that teen social media overuse creates a simulation stimulation, not simulation. Mm-hmm. stimulation pattern. Similar to the pattern created by other addictive behaviors. The brain releases dopamine when a teen posts something online and is met with likes, shares, and positive comments.

Yes. From their peers. Yes. This can prime the teen brain for other addictions, I 

guess. Yeah. Is it one of those things where it's, it, it just introduces kids into things? 

Sooner. Yes. But, and, and this is why I also said teenage brains, young adult brains mm-hmm. are still developing. Yeah. That's why we don't allow them to drink alcohol.

That's why we don't allow them access to other things that we allow adults access to. Yeah. 

Right. Okay. Not any more, at least. 

Right. Because we know that it has an impact on the development of their brain. Mm-hmm. triggering a dopamine cycle like that, that's priming them Pretty good to be addicting.

Addicted to stuff. Addicted. Yeah. We shouldn't there there's reasons why even back in the day mm-hmm. before the internet. Why the back room at the family video was 18 plus only. Still Wait, isn't it? Not now. Well, I'm saying even before the internet, before like, you know, porn was pretty available everywhere.

You know, we didn't just allow kids to go in there. It was even back then, it was still 18 plus. Cause we understood the. That there are certain things there for adults where we, where we agree with it from a Christian perspective or not. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. There's still things that we realize do impair the development of a healthy, functional adult.

And, you know, and I look at it from all these lenses first, you know, , and then I look at it from like the Christian perspective. You know, one, the, one of the things that even, I forget which article it is, I'd have to go back through 'em off the top. I don't remember off the top of my head. But one of them even hinted at it and said it, it produces feelings of envy towards others.

Even just even based off of that. And I go, well, you know, that tells me something right there. That is, I'm not saying social media's sinful, so don't Oh no. So don't take it that way. No. But it is for someone who is maturing, potentially an avenue where sinful behavior could be introduced because they're either envious, uh, not.

Envious of someone or something else. They may be, you know, wanting it, whatever for themselves. They may be lusting after whatever. Yeah. So even so, even from the Christian side of things, I look at 'em like, yes, social media in itself is not sinful, but it could be used for that. I'm not saying let's, you know, ban social media altogether.

Mm-hmm. , it has been, we would've to, has been useful so much. Yes. I know it has been useful, but let's maybe take a step back and realize, hey, you know what, maybe kids need to not be in this until they're older. Yeah. I would personally say for me, 18 plus, but you know what? We don't have any legislation in the land No.

For it. And at that point, it's a conversation between you as a parent and your kids. And what they're allowed to do. 

And that's where, I mean, that's assuming, that's I guess where it's kinda kinda sad thing to think about for me. Whereas it should be that easy where it's like, all right, it's up to the parent to have that discussion and that communication or whatever with their kid.

But because parents don't seem to care to do that, kids are just free to do whatever they want to go and do. Um, and yeah, that's where, as far as even just social media goes, I mean, yeah, I guess it'd be great to see some sort of potential limitation or yeah, age restriction for it. But then at the same time I'm thinking it would be curious to see how much things would change, I suppose, for obviously looking at the studies, how maybe there has been improvements just over a month of reduced time.

Mm-hmm. . So I wonder if that would, I guess, how much that would change, I suppose. because my biggest thing is just thinking just the internet in general for a lot of the whole comparison stuff. The only thing you're taking away potentially is the like reactions you get from people you can still see and compare yourself to so much stuff on the internet.

Right. That'll give you anything that social media's giving you. For the 

comparison part, bud. It's not gonna give you all the other stuff of, oh, I post a picture. But 

yeah, and, but you'll get that like public 

though. There's something different about that in public than, versus social media. Well, it's 

a lot more intense, 

but it teaches you so 

much more.

What do you mean teaches you So, I mean that's where it's like 

it teaches you how to interact with people. Yeah. Better but than social media. 

Yes. Well you get to pick up physical, like body language and stuff like that. Yeah. It's not just text. And that's where I say it's like it's a lot, it'd be a lot more intense and you're taking a bigger, I would say, in a.

Some sense, a bigger step in having, I guess, more confidence in what you're doing by going about doing something in public versus just posting something online. It, I would imagine that having more ramifications and publicly like, uh, physically in person than just having reactions online, 

I think it would've less, here's why.

Yeah. You post something on internet, it's there forever. Okay. Because even if you take it, even if you take it down, I could archive it. Yeah. And guess what? It's still there. You do it in person. People could take a picture 

of it and 

it's forever if people, yeah, if people take a picture, but if they don't, then people forget about it.

Yeah. Thanks. Forget our 

over time. That's the thing. That's not gonna happen now though, because of the internet. Cuz people, I mean, you look at how much people have phones and they're always ready to take a picture or a video of something wild that happens and then they post it on the internet. So in that sense, none of that stuff will ever go away.

But there are a lot of people who are not always, I bet you, yeah, you, you are not ready to take a picture at a moment's notice. There are some people, me personally, no. There are people obviously who have made their job content creators, right. They always have their gear ready to go. I get that. Okay. Yeah.

But 

well, not even, you don't even have to be a content creator for some of that stuff. I mean, you just look at stuff that gets on the news and whatnot and just images of, well, some of it, obviously when it comes to the crimes is like surveillance 

camera stuff, right? And some of it they just happen to catch or they miss the first few seconds of it because they're fumbling to get their cameras on that.

Right. But you'll still get some of 'em. You'll get the idea or the basis of what's going on. I mean, I think about that. Granted, this was also a crime , and it pisses me off that people. Decided to take their phones out and record it instead of beating the dude. But when wasn't there was a guy raping somebody on a train or whatever it was.

Yeah. It's like people are gonna take their phone out and record it before they actually interact and stop 

something. Yeah. That's a whole other conversation on that one. Well, I'm just, and why people weren't willing to do that. Oh, well, 

yeah, but I'm just saying like, cuz yeah, I mean, you go out and do something in public, people would be like, Ooh, catch ya.

I mean, that's all it takes is two clicks, hit a button and then boom. That that's 

on your phone. Well, any smartphone, not any smartphone, but regardless, 

regardless of it's very easy to do. If you have your phone, you know your phone and use that feature, then yeah, it'll be quick and easy for you to do that.

But, so that's why I just, I think even if social media is gone in a sense, just because the internet is there, 

It's not, but my question is this, how much has social media warped our usage of the internet towards what it is now? Yes. Yeah. That is why I think we use the internet like we do essentially one big gigantic Facebook and not the internet as is an interconnected system of computers for facts and data.

Yeah. , right. Which that, that's honestly why I think we use it the way we do. Mm-hmm. , it's cause Facebook and Twitter and all that have just manipulated it to such a degree that we just mm-hmm. are posed like this. Yeah. And that's just my opinion. 

Oh, I'm not gonna, I wouldn't, I couldn't disagree with that off the top of my head.

Um, 

but the one thing that keeps coming back to mind over and over and over again as we go through, And as I read these articles and as we discuss this more and more mm-hmm. , it, it is the concept of we as humans. Mm-hmm. as Americans, and Americans are responsible for this thing, Zuckerberg. Um, but we as humans have made essentially Facebook our new God.

Oh, wow. God is the thing we, I'm not saying I'm saying it in this way, it's what we spend a lot of money. Money. Mm-hmm. time and devotion to, yeah. Mm-hmm. . 

Oh, a hundred percent. I mean, anything can become that. Yeah. Anything could, each individual to be could be different, but I mean Yeah. On a grand scale.

Exactly. On a grand scale of things. Mm-hmm. , we need to look at what we're spending our time and our resources on. And honestly in, I guarantee you Christians are just a hundred percent as guilty as the next person. Okay. Mm-hmm. , we devote a lot of time to social media. Hmm. Because let me, let me, I'm gonna say this statement for me.

Mm-hmm. , I'm not gonna speak for you Aaron, in this regard. Good. Don't. Okay. It is a lot easier to pick up a social media app and scroll and read and be outraged or entertained or whatever, but read and read page's worth of junk then to pick up a physical Bible or even a digital Bible and read. 

Yeah. Cuz then you actually challenge your mind on 

stuff.

And that tells me and, and I'm just as good as the next person. I'm not like saying, oh, blah blah, blah. I'm calling myself out on this one as well. Mm-hmm. . Okay. Where it's just as easy to do that, which means we lost the point. Social media is not to be the God it is to. The entertainment and connection between people.

Mm-hmm. and God is supposed to be God. And that social media thing is when we have five minutes or be like, Hey, I'm at a vet, an event with friends. I want to document that I'm at an event or mm-hmm. , hey, I'm gonna set up this thing. You got all want to come to this and do this. Right. Not, alright, let's heat an entire data center because I keep scrolling through Facebook for five hours on end.

getting stuck in those shorts. in the reels. Okay. My goodness. Yeah. 

Yeah. And like I said, I'm just as guilty at times, so 

that's why. Ooh. Yeah. That's why I hopped off of Facebook for one reason with all those stupid short videos and stuff like that. I was like, it's, I've spent how long on this? Never again.

Now Facebook has strictly become my Wednesday night like group chat thing with friends and. That's about it. . 

Oh, so you're like my mother. What 

great. Um, yeah. Yeah. 

It's so, yeah, we need to, it's, as a society, we need to reconcile how much time and energy we're putting into social media. And we need to say it, man.

Screen time. 

Screen time in general. 

Yes, that too. Just 

all across everything. Shoot. Cause I mean, that'll be like, that'd be the next worst thing would be like video games for me, for, for teens and stuff. It's like, oh, this is so much. Well, , Fortnite for my nephews. Um, um, but uh, yeah, it's just literally parents being parents and making sure that they do what they need to do and can enjoy the pleasures of the screens.

Right. And, uh, You know, sensible manner I suppose. 

And, and you know what, as parents being parents, guess what you get to do? 

Yell 

at the kids. . No, you don't get to yell. Set limitations on things. Yes. Use the tools available for you. That's, 

yeah, and that's the 

thing, um, if you have a modern smartphone, guess what you can do, especially if they're under 18, you can set a lock on, like, say, Hey, guess what?

I'm gonna set a goal here that, uh, let's see here. YouTube can be used for this many hours per day. Mm-hmm. , these apps can be used for certain hours per day. And guess what? If you don't want your kid using social media, you can block that. You can block it. Yeah. Use the tools that are available for you. And guess what?

If you are someone who is addicted to a social media app where you're like, I can't always have to get my fix, have a trusted. Person, buddy, family member, whatever. Yeah. Set up parental controls that they know the code for on your phone. And you don't and you don't. And guess what? Bye-bye. Social media apps.

Yeah. They sometimes you have to take those extreme steps. Yeah. And sometimes those things are needed. 

Yeah. Absolutely. I have , um, I know, yeah, I know my assistant and them, they have a whole like, timed system thing set up for the kids and whatnot. Um, can't you even go, you can go into like what your network settings and manage, like what kind of content is available for you to 

go onto?

Oh, yeah. And you can even set at least my, depends on your wifi system. My wifi system, right? Yeah. I can set, like if I had kids, I don't have kids, but if I had kids I could set all their devices into a group mm-hmm. and then be like, okay, at this time, Let's say it's dinnertime. Right? O all of your internet access goes off.

Yes. . That's so funny. So then that way they don't get a chance to use it. 

They have to get creative with their mind and think of other things to do if they still want to do 

something. Exactly. And so that's what I said, use the tools available to you as a parent and figure out how to do these things.

Mm-hmm. And guess what? At first it's gonna be difficult at first. There's probably gonna be some yelling and some screaming, though. You don't love me. Oh my gosh. What? Kid has never said what kid has mom said that they're 

younger. I, I, I watched my, my niece throw a fit like that because of something that Yeah, my sister didn't do or wouldn't let her do.

And then, and then dad came home and sister was like, Talk to her . But uh, yeah, I remember, I, I remember this wasn't over. It's funny cuz like this wasn't over using. So, I mean, I was too young at this time to have social media and internet or Right. Really do anything on the internet. But I remember my mom had forgot, um, well, she fell asleep and lost track of time.

I was just sleeping, uh, to take me to youth group. And I remember for whatever reason, for once I was so excited to go to youth group and then I found, I woke her up. I was like, mom, is it time to go? And she's like, oh, it's too late. And I just threw a fit. I was screaming and I was like, I hate you. And I was in my room and then my sister heard that.

She , she gave me one heck of a stern talking . I'm saying she, you did not say that to your mom doing all this other stuff. And I was like, 

I'm so sorry. sees kids 

need that , they need to be corrected. Yeah. My goodness. 

Otherwise, or parents not friends. Yeah. 

Well see, that was my sister. And we all, I know siblings can come in handy too, if they're really Yep.

With you. You know? 

So any other comments? Oh, I've got more disagreements on 

this. Um, oh gosh. There's another aspect of, uh, social media that, uh, I was thinking about where it's for as far as like posting and stuff like that. Yeah. Um, should there be any sort of, uh, which I, this would be a lot more tough to do, but it made me it.

It came up, I was talking about like kinda like the pedophile rings and stuff like that happening. Oh yeah. Where it's like, you know, moms will post pictures of their daughters and kids and sons and stuff like that. Mainly girls that are in like, kinda like little like dancing classes or like beauty pageanty stuff.

Yeah. And there's just all the madness that goes on where it's like these creepy dudes are all over that kind of 

stuff. And that's some of the dangers that we live in, in the, uh, internet world as well. Yeah. You know, and, and that's one of those things of, if I, and I've seen some people do this, like one of those things of like if I ever have kids Yeah.

Right. Adopt them or whatever. That's one of those things where if any photos were posted, it would be to a very locked down group that could see them. Yeah. And it probably wouldn't be on. Like a social media app. Mm-hmm. , what would probably be, is be like I would upload them to my Google Photos, drive and directly share them to friends and family.

Friends and family. I'd be like, Hey, you want, you know, whatever. You know, sort of like, how, so, like for my own family, I have a thing where any, any of my family members that my, that the photo app sees and tags, it automatically adds 'em to the group and shares them to specific people. Mm-hmm. , in fact, I think there's one where it's you and Josh.

Any photo with you or Josh, it automatically tags and makes it available for you two to see. Oh, 

okay. Okay. Just available to see. 

It doesn't, for all your friends, you are these guys. No, it's, it's just for you two. Like if either of you two are detecting the photo, either of you can log in and see that list.

That's, yeah, that's what I would do. Gotcha. That's smart. Yeah. I wouldn't do a public thing now once they're old enough and we can have that discussion and we're. And I'm not talking like 12, 13, I'm talking like 17, 18. Yeah. Where they're able to start actually thinking about the consequences of the future, because let's be honest here.

Yeah. A younger person, 12, 13 years old, is not thinking about the consequences of their actions that they're taking. They're thinking about the immediate thing, oh, is this gonna be fun? Is this gonna be cool? Is this gonna make me look awesome? Right. They're not thinking, what's this gonna do to me 3, 4, 5 years down the road?

Well, that, yeah. No, 17 and 18, still not fully there yet, but thinking hopefully a little bit more. Mm-hmm. , once we have that conversation, once, I'm like, okay, they are confident, they are mature enough and we can have that conversation. Mm-hmm. , and they're like, yeah, that's cool for photos then, okay, whatever.

Well, but until then, yeah, no , because guess what I'm seeing firsthand? Mm-hmm. how social media, like this is destroying people. Mm-hmm. , I'm seeing. Younger people whose parents posted all this stuff about them on social media because they're younger and posting about them, and all of a sudden these peop these kids are growing up and they're going, all my life is out there for everyone to see.

And they had no control over posting any of that. Ooh, yeah. That's, that's stuff from them, from their 1, 2, 3. Yeah. It's one thing when a family member or a close friend of a family sees the photo album mm-hmm. , you know, either the physical or the digital version. It's another thing when it's public for all to see, like you said, the pedophile rings and all that too.

A lot of parents mm-hmm. not tech savvy. They don't know how. Lock it down so that only their family or friends could see it. And then what happens is someone sees him and goes, Hmm, yeah, that was creepy enough to do it. , , there you go. You, you, you, you, you succeeded in doing the creep . I shouldn't be proud about that

But so that's why, you know, on that too, Because here's the thing, and a lot of people don't realize this, your social media presence, when you apply for a job, guess what? One of the things that an employer does checks out social media. They check out your social media. That's why what will happen is you'll see when people who maybe say things online that society doesn't like, let's say

So 

at some point, any 

Christian Yeah. When they apply for a job, they might lock down their social media or they might do something so that way no one else can see it. Right. 

And that's, yeah. That sucks. If a job would require to see your social media, my 

job does get hard. Yeah. My job monitors all their employees social media.

If they s, if they deem us as saying something that the company doesn't like even. Even that goes this far. If I was to be in a phone call with you Yeah. One-on-one. And you got upset about something I said, and you reported me to my job and said, Paul said this on the phone call, they could fire me. That's 

not okay.

That, well, that that's how I'll lose freedom. If you want a job, you have to just do whatever, work for a company that Well, no. You have to 

work for a company. Yeah. Yeah. Live how the company wants you to. Yep. We're going back to the coal mines, the company stores, you know all that. Right? Wait, hold up. What company stores coal mines and all that.

Maybe not. That's where they paid you in special money. That could only be used at the company store. Therefore, you can never earn enough money, real money to work anywhere else because your money was only good at one spot. It wasn. Anywhere else. That's great. So you could never save money to get ahead. So in our words, I'm working for the company store, I'm work and I'm doing, I have to live by their terms in order to make a living.

Awesome. Yeah, I like that. Great. Right. But anyways, any other comments? Parents? Be careful. What'd 

you post on about your kids ? Um, no, other than 

that, jeans, be careful about what you post online about yourself. Yeah. 

That too. Mm. Don't be stupid. And, 

oh, gee, that's a phrase I say to you all the time 

up . 

I just, I'm a slow learner.

Okay. . Very 

slow. All right. Any other, um, but yeah, no, it'd be interesting to see where all the social media stuff goes. 

It's going to the metaverse in 3d, so that's great. What I already know what the theme song. Of Metaverse is gonna be what our, our song, it's gonna be unholy by Sam Smith.