Who Will Answer the Mother of All Questions as Anti-Social Facebook Faces Reality Check?

“We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere…” Elie Wiesel

Well, well, well … the chickens have finally come home to roost and the fox is trapped and documented.

To open the door, it took a conscientious whistleblower, Frances Haugen, a data scientist with a computer engineering degree and a Harvard MBA who wanted to work against misinformation because she had lost a friend to online conspiracy theories on Facebook.

She released tens of thousands of pages of internal research and documents to lawyers and SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) replete with evidence that Facebook was aware of several problems caused by its apps like Instagram with its “toxic” effect on teen girls.

In a Senate subcommittee hearing she testified, “I believe that Facebook’s products harm children, stoke division, and weaken our democracy … the company’s leadership knows how to make Facebook and Instagram safer but won’t make the necessary changes because they have put their astronomical profits before people.”

And so, the battle will continue perhaps for years as offense lawyers battle defense lawyers to urge the government to regulate this Social Media giant. And so, many debates will roll out between adults, some elderly with lesser experience, as they discuss “human trafficking” or “domestic servitude” or freedom of hate speech or responsibilities to shareholders.

But who will listen to the most vulnerable victims, the subset of teen girls with life-long scars, the future of mothers-to-be?

For many years now, the saddest part, is how Adolescent Brain research has statistically confirmed the negative hyperbolic media influence on the developing brain prone to cooperative peer pressure and likeability factors. Over and over we heard the statement that logical thinking processes don’t mature until the early twenties and yet here the innocent children were making adult orientated decisions to please the corporate algorithms, mostly for male views.

Now there is only more tragic verification how Facebook’s antisocial promotions really were meant to antagonize and polarize to get more reactions for clicks. It is deeply disturbing that especially our teen girls have grown up in this environment as cell phone addicts with their sense of social rites of passage and a productive healthy self forever modified to fit a false narrative.

I wonder how their lost development and maturity will be addressed by the legal teams since the psychological damage has now perpetuated for two decades since the advent of the cellphone and Selfie worship.

Will the legal teams get around to discuss how to remediate these teen social media struggles when time cannot be reversed?

Will they try to find answers or solutions to these dilemmas:

...how lack of primer definitions about power and features of social media meant more exposure to bad choices

…how ideal body images mandated breast, lip and butt enhancements by pressure and profiteers

…how a self-infatuated mother may treat her selfie children or may not want motherhood at all

…how beauty, influencers or mob mentality rule teen girls on Instagram, Fan Fiction and YouTube videos

…how does social media affect education or e-learning with 5 problems

…how the norms of culture itself have been transformed by clicks or tweets with music, literature, politics, and science where self-inflation not public good rules the day.

The Biggest Mother of all Questions

Which young woman will testify about how her timeline has been radicalized by Facebook’s manipulation on behalf of her sisterhood?

How will she describe how her young brain was targeted and modulated by anger, anxiety, depression, and emotions so she couldn’t sleep or do well in school?

How will she account for the stew of neurochemicals like dopamine, adrenaline, and cortisol which controlled her behavior to be “liked” or hated or consider suicide as an alternative (30 % possibility)?

How can she explain her addiction to this powerful neural feedback loop that exploited her feelings of weakness to belong to society’s expectations on her personal screen?

Consider how challenging it will be to now disconnect from this learned behavior, so often based on fraud, to reclaim her life and her children’s attitudes to believe in positive self-esteem and connections that celebrate unity and true cultural achievement.

In fact, the general question for everyone is how to become more self-aware knowing that Facebook’s successful conclusion was that angry content is what people want because that is what WE respond to.

Facebook will continue to be a mega-giant on a planetary scale far beyond messaging or sharing photos at whatever age. Its platforms are critical for doing business, virtual learning, politics, medical emergencies and much more. When Facebook was shut down for 6 hours, the world took a deep breath not to panic.

Facebook is 17 years old, started on Feb. 2004. As it comes of age to realize the energy growth of being one of the first pioneers, it will also cull its mistakes and regroup its priorities for positive connections with or without regulations.

Until then it will be our individual responsibility to watch our actions and protect our children especially teen girls.

Annemarie Berukoff

Thank you for reading. Your comments are always welcome.

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Index for Timely Tale for Teen Girls Struggles, Regrets ands Survival on Social Media with a Superpower Tool

The Tragedy of Teen Girls Blindsided and Dumb to Social Media Alarm Bells But What Can We Do?

 

The Tragedy of Teen Girls, Blindsided and Dumb, to Social Media Alarm Bells But What Can We Do?

If someone was literally hurting your kids — or making them hurt each other, even if they didn’t want to — what would you do? That is exactly what is happening here. Social Media is Destroying a Generation of Young People, Especially Women

Once again, the public is paying attention to frantic red flags while the sirens are wailing about the attack of social media against teenage girls in particular. Alarm bells are sounding again for parents and psychologists even though they have heard about this effect of too much internet interaction with the Selfie mindset since 2009 when Selfies became the norm and young girls began a competitive ritual to be the most liked, the hottest, the sexiest. The powers that set the algorithm early was to appeal to the male adult gaze.

Hear the newest public commentators below.

The tragic reality is that for the first time society is now paying the price for a generation of young women who have been objectified, scarred, under the pressure to play the game confirming to the hypersexualized beauty standards on Social Media. Hence, the ideal Bachelorettes have a stable of ideal would-be husbands and the Housewives flaunt reality shows with flagrant dramas of wealthy happiness formulas.

Sadly, there is only one group who doesn’t participate in hearing the sorrow and outrage … the innocent victims; namely, the teen girls themselves. Their young adolescent brains haven’t yet developed the frontal cortex connections for deductive thinking and judgment skills based on a maturity level that happens in the early 20’s. Their teen years are prone to learning new experiences often determined by peer pressure. There are no early warning educational programs how to handle this circus.

They are blindsided by seeking their own rewards hour after hour on their cellphones to be worthy of attention to look, dress, and act as implicitly directed or suffer ostracism and depression.

They are dumb to voice their comprehension of reality whether it is real or fake. In their curious innocence they are still learning what works and what doesn’t and that gadget attached to their hand shows what is to be liked and what to ridicule and hate. They do not write about their short time line or how a wrong choice today may derail their future.

They are the innocent lambs led to algorithm slaughter to be a somebody to worship celebrity status regardless of morality. They are the perfect prey to groom without feedback.

But Society knows the facts for a few years now.

The newest teen mental health problems research shows:

1. Half of all mental health conditions start by 14 years of age but most cases are undetected and untreated.
2. Globally, depression is one of the leading causes of illness and disability among adolescents.
3. Suicide is the third leading cause of death in 15–19-year-olds.
4. The consequences of not addressing adolescent mental health conditions extend to adulthood, impairing both physical and mental health and limiting opportunities to lead fulfilling lives as adults.

Society may not quite know what to do

There is no denying that social media is not innocent enough but only if skinny girls are preferred with perfect complexion and popular cosmetics, fashions and followers. The old Selfie mindset immersion is now filtering through new families now.

There is no denying the power of the internet with influencers like Emma Chamberlain, whose occupation is listed as a vlogger and YouTuber. Born in 2001, she is 20 years old, with 10.7 million followers and 1.4 billion views. A perfect internet persona; thin, pretty, petite nose, oval face and large eyes who started posting videos as a way of escaping from depression in high school, now sporting a clothing line, online mail order company whose financial worth is estimated at 8 million dollars.

Not to sidestep the influential bodily enhancements of the K family for 20 years.

But about educational value and self-redemption potential?

Social Media has created the mess that only it can fix

Two possible ideas:

ONE: Start a reality show about teens and their troubles and relationships including drug abuse online.

What teens really need is to go beyond what adults tell them and become actively involved as peer spokespeople and practice scenarios where they can learn to say no. They need to relate to stories of interpersonal skills with normal social interaction over long term.

What more inclusive way, other than first person participation, to watch and relate to a TV reality show about teens, their struggles and redemptions on their favorite mediums?

TWO: Create and popularize a heroine as a short story with an overview of consequences and morals to serve as a real rebuttal to Selfies?

Set a personal narrative obsessed with cell phone Selfies and facing an antagonist of epic proportions to a rash and bash adolescent brain with the theme that is it is not the teenager’s fault where offline time becomes far more important than online with the superpower tool.

Who will write such a story or is there a draft already done looking for a super influencer who cares about children and young women?

Questions and comments are always welcome. Note several related articles in index below.

Annemarie Berukoff

Hear the newest commentators directly:

Facebook recognizes how harmful its photo-sharing app, Instagram, can be for teen girls’ self-esteem, according to company documents obtained by The Wall Street Journal. | Fox Business

What Can Facebook Do To Make Instagram less Toxic for Teen Girls

Stunning New Facts about Mental Health Conditions among Teenagers from Who World Health

Index for Timely Tale for Teen Girls Struggles, Regrets and Survival on Social Media

Wanted: Creative Writing for A Kinder Superhero for a More Moral Social Media

Wanted: Creative Writing for A Kinder Superhero for a More Moral Social Media 

Imagination is greater than knowledge ... Albert Einstein 

Do you ever wonder why there is a general fascination with superheroes, especially for young people in their mastery of maturity? This complex question must be examined in reference to ancient mythology, today’s social conscience within social media, and creative writing to create a kinder, gentler superhero for our times.

 Who hasn’t been fascinated by Greek mythological heroes, creatures and what they represented about the origin and nature of the world? There were gods, goddesses, half human, half god, magical mortals with and without superpowers, battling fearsome creatures like the Minotaur or Medusa, who are still  part of our modern folklore. It can also be said that many of these brave heroes were willing to take risks, face dangerous  situations in order to gain more understanding of society itself with many moral affiliations.

For whatever reason, children are fascinated by grim tales of ogres crushing their bones or wolves hunting their grandmothers. Perhaps there is solace in reading such an ending where everybody seems to live-happily-ever-after; a common phrase deeply embedded into our daily stories as well.

The effect and value of myths or superheroes cannot be understated because they can actively impact our thinking or cognitive frameworks as to what is right, wrong, good, bad, enemy or champion. But ancient champions never had to face the cyber world, an interactive matrix where the dividing lines between virtual reality and the real world are often blurred.

So, what kinds of superhuman forces affect our modern social conscience? Where do superheroes exist today? Who lives happily-ever-after in our current struggles and culture?

It makes me weep like the myth of the weeping willow tree that serves as a reminder that love cannot exist without tears. Take a look around at what young people see and acknowledge as superheroes. One type is found in comic books via movies and video games; and a second type is found in the social media circus, especially for young teens.

Today’s cultural heroes on films have almighty superpowers to vanquish evil forces that would destroy humanity or the earth itself. They display great fights with dismemberment flying everywhere in a violent phantasmagoria. Good wins over evil but at what spectacle on the visual cortex and collateral damage to the innocent?

Video games particularly add a depth of hyper realism with graphics that bring the actions closer; blood, guts and brutality are now full frontal. At which point can game violence  jump from the screen to the family room or public front? The impact of violent media on kids is relatively unstudied or unknown; never a problem with Pegasus, unicorns or dragons until their violent modernization in Game of Thrones.  

Today, our culture has been impacted and controlled by an almighty Zeus known as the internet with its lightning bolts of interdependence and interactivity. There is no doubt that interactions with open-ended, unlimited media exposure have profoundly influenced the social, economic and even political arenas; as well as impacting the mythic and moral spheres of influence.

Two new kinds of internet action figures have arisen.

First, there is a new class of social media heroes or heroines who have mortal characteristics but with super normal magnetic attractions based on looks, money, connections, or fame who call out their siren song for everybody to like and follow them. But they live in reality shows that are as elusive as the Elysian beautiful meadows in the mythological underworld where only the godly favored could find perfect happiness in an ultimate paradise where popular brands abide, where money talks, with or without justification or morals. Mere mortals dare to dream, like mini gods and goddesses, as close as their fingertips as much as their newly programmed mind can turn the abnormal godly world into normal. Do these self-entitled heroes have the right to feed on dispossessed and vulnerable victims for what purposes like old ogres in Grimm tales?

Second, there is the active digital cyber hero who wants to be the all-mighty "tough guy;” quick to bully, derogate, and offer safe haven for followers of the same stripes and scars. This profound leap from ignoble loser to worshiped hero would never happen in a mythological world where strength in morality was as important as physical might. It can be said that only a socially abnormality like this can threaten the shared social consciousness where such mass media control can produce and endorse an anti-hero. Even democratic rules can dissipate in the flood of the richest and boldest celebrities who offer the most happy-ever-after mantras.

As a teacher, the point I am trying to make is that any cultural system helps to reproduce itself by the value of its symbols and heroes. We are all plugged into this public arena, watching and participating with different distinctly human behaviors; honor, pride, respect, or guilt, selfishness, shame, disgrace and dysphoria. 

So, how do we find a social conscience in a digital society where approval and disapproval are determined by narcissistic rewards of living up to hyped-up, unnatural group expectations even when virtual group standards are less worthy of social unity and freedom?

Remember what happened to Narcissus who was a very beautiful young man in Greek mythology, loved instantly by many for his looks for whom he only showed contempt. He even cast aside a nymph now forever called Echo because she wilted away from her unrequited sorrow to a mere sound. In retribution, a goddess, led Narcissus to a pool to see his own reflection, but when he realized that a reflection can never materialize into reality, he committed suicide. Therein lies the moral that narcissism or ego should not be about vanity and true self is beyond self-reflection or public perception. 

So how does this morality apply to posting Selfies for gratification for the sake of whose morality?

We can never undermine the fact that the combined power of the group in our culture is what makes our social conscience; greater than an individual, a collective rule of thumb. Our society’s heroes, groups and norms are us. 

However, the ingrained problem in any culture has always remained that we cannot remove the images, icons and concepts once they have marched across the stage or infiltrated the brain. People just want to believe in the impossible, in following the promises of heroes to add some magic to ordinary lives. Contradiction is futile in any cognitive schema of hope and living happily-for-ever-after.

Finally, so how can creative writing help?  We need to create new heroes who are gentler, kinder and more interactive who believe in the greater good in a more equitable and democratic society without recourse to violence. We need a brighter “heroic imagination,” with attitudes about caring, helping others,  and moving forward to defend moral causes. The internet offers such potential where every person can collaborate and share our acts both online and offline.

Here are two examples of creative writing to help set new role models for noble goals.

A story about a teen girl’s survival in social media with a personal superpower tool; namely, the management of a timeline connecting in real time the intangible past, present and future. What can be more powerful than that for success?

A story about a special water sprite with roots on a mission to discover cyclical truths in the natural ecosystem with continuous surprises about the interdependence of all living forms from the smallest to the invisible largest inhabitant. 

Our culture needs more stories and movies especially for younger people. How about your imagination to create a reality that matters to humanity? What kind of superheroes can you introduce with morals and beliefs to change the world? How can we work together towards to making the dream real and to live-happily-ever-after?

Comments and dialogue are always important. What are your ideas and thoughts.

Sincerely,

Annemarie

amarie10@gmail.com   Please set a time that works for you.

Check out two e-books:

Teen Girl Faces Time in the Sand

The Incredible Journey of a Water Sprite with Roots  

Putting the Story Pieces Together for Teen Girl Faces Time in the Sand

Putting the Story Pieces Together for Teen Girl Faces Time in the Sand

One Selfie swipe will instantly show me images and words with as brief an engagement as I wish. There is no debate; it's not a relationship. It can show me ignorance, intimidation or threats, bombast, or absolute fakery.  It is normal to favor only cosmetic standards with plastic interventions and sensational spectacles where regular common everyday things and people no longer matter....  

Is this what communication has flat lined to … short term attention spans, immediate reaction, fear and anxiety and judgment calls without facts?

(excerpts from Teen Girl Faces Time in the Sand)

The previous three blogs have summarized this story and explained the challenge of portraying time and the rational for using visual language and symbolism.

1. How to stop social media from taking advantage of a rash and brash teenage brain still in development personified here as a Giant Clown Face of epic proportions.  (blog 1)

2. How to start looking at value of Time and power of choice as a super power tool to avoid making bad mistakes that may affect or change  the total Time Line. (blog 2)

3. How to use diagrams or symbols as a base for discussion of growing up in a mass media world, of visualizing strong social forces, and structuring experience of time. (blog 3)

Now there is time to share a few closing personal words.

There is no simple answer to what is a good life because it makes a unique symbol for each of us within our circumstances. As an old person I have the privilege of looking back at my time line and breathing a sign of satisfaction and relief. My young brain was never assaulted by a social media clown face. Now young people need to be warned about the dangers of growing up too early in a mixed-up media's brew with adult lifestyles and attitudes with no defense from their immature brain development drawn naturally to affection and rewards.

The change is made so much more profound when I fondly remember my teen years. The poster on my bedroom wall was of Dr. Albert Schweitzer, who celebrated success as a musician, writer, humanitarian, and philosopher; and, yet decided as a doctor to open clinics in the poorest villages of Africa.  His photo with his large drooping mustache was the only one that inspired me.

My pop icon wore poodle skirts to her ankles covered with bobby socks. Gyrating was jiving…a good exercise. Drinking and smoking were simply not permitted and to talk back to parents was a matter of being sent to your room without supper.  Only once it happened to me and the guilt of disrespecting my mother still lingers sixty years later. School and good report cards were a serious responsibility with parent's pride in a job well done was the best star of all.

So how in the world did this all change?

The true tragedy is that young girls with their nascent beauty and nurturing spirit now need to be protected from losing their innocence by trying to become desirable "like me" adults before their brain is able to make deductive judgment calls or take on adult responsibilities.

The deeper tragedy is that there seems to be a tolerance to allow any young people to use their cell phones to present a falsehood to the world and still get applause even if it's fake. 

What kind of lesson about morality does this teach them?  What does it mean to manipulate truth on purpose ? How will this carry on into other activities and beliefs about society and norms that are the very fabric of culture and civilization?   

It is a hard exercise to look at all the possible addends in a potential Life experience, and see how a few beginning years (7 teen years) can interfere, derail or even cause death to young people's spirits. The time for youth is short enough to explore, self discover , experience AHA moments, take pride in learning and achieving in daring to climb the mountain of achievement because parents will be their cushion when they fall.

This main theme in of this story is to hold and respect time as if you can hold it in your hand, invisible but all powerful in its choices. To better manage the passage of time, there are numerous pictures or symbols for consideration.

Another recurring theme is that it is not the teenage girl's fault if a Mass Media Circus influences her young rash and brash adolescent brain and corrupts the potential of adulthood before its time.

The moral or lesson is not to give away your privacy to a public sphere but to protect your independent Self, separate from media rule or mob control. There is no pretense of any kind allowed based on predatory influence.

Interestingly, a little damselfly plays the role of life's fragility yet respect. Her nymph larva is about well prepared survival in a pond environment versus an adolescent feeding off social media.

But, how sad, that this abnormal transmutation continues to disrupt the adolescent nature into an adult, based on social media criteria? This book addresses one way to possibly divert or contain it.

How terribly sad when you do a worldwide web search with the words teen girls, and after the first 3 titles about clothes, shoes and accessories; the next items are about real teens twerking, why teen girls crave older partners and a Facebook page for hot teen selfie shots!  Even pornographers have found that they can get more clicks and  views with extreme encounters involving with  teenage girls and boys.

As well, it is time to pay more attention to beginning research that finds "social media use can make profound changes to the brain in similar ways that drug addiction can…receiving likes on the internet releases dopamine in the brain.This creates a sense of pleasure. Similar triggers for this experience includes eating chocolate or winning money."

In the last chapter as Kit wanders down to the beach where she retraces her sand drawings, she realizes the power of Self and protection of Choice.  She comes to terms that many things in her past are not her fault.  Her story serves as a warning to young teens not to fall prey to social media pressures and addictive impulses.

The story concludes with how to use personal cell phones to set boundaries and interact more positively with the social media and environment. Also, there are 10 separate exercise to download and practice some of the concepts outlined in the story.

Check out Teen Girl Faces Time in the Sand.

Your questions, comments and concerns about teen girls in a mass social media culture are always welcome. Together we can work on a resolution, if this matter bothers you, too.

Sincerely,

Annemarie

You understand that the future only appears as a vision and today is the only time you have to react to anything. What if you had the power to connect to the future to help direct your present actions to fulfill that future?  I wonder what kind of choices you'd make ….would they be the same?

But what if there is some kind of super power tool to help make better choices to take you into adulthood? (excerpts)