I am standing in a room full of addicts
yes
addicts and most of you don’t even know
the substance that you’re abusing I
would know because I used to be addicted
to and my addiction controlled me but
during this period of my life I remained
in denial and refused to confront
reality because the fleeting high that
my addiction gave me was enough to
outweigh the lasting feeling of distress
and the obvious strain had had on my
time and energy but one evening after
realizing how much my addiction had
consumed my entire life I decided to
quit once and for all and while my
addiction might be cured over 210
million people across the world suffer
from something similar and 3 billion
more are susceptible to obtaining this
addiction as well so what’s the drug
causing the problem the answer is
remarkably simple and I guarantee most
of you probably took a heavy dose today
it’s social media so no you and I don’t
have an actual drug problem and though
my heavy chocolate consumption is
probably enough to be considered
substance abuse I’m talking about
something more intangible yet equally if
not more dangerous it seems like a huge
exaggeration but if you look at the
facts
social media addiction is a real problem
that afflicts more of us than we know
now you might be thinking of me there’s
no way I barely use my phone much less
enough to be addicted to social media
the research proves otherwise in fact
studies say that the average person
checks their phone a hundred ten times
per day the average teenager can spend
up to nine hours daily on social
platforms and 25% of Facebook users
check their accounts five or more times
a day additional additional research
shows that during these times we’re on
Facebook our perception of time is
dramatically warped to the point where
we underestimate the hours we spend
commenting liking posting and stalking
yes stalking we have all done it don’t
act like you haven’t seen someone and
realized you only knew who they were
because you were a little
to deepen to your best friends cousins
grandparents Instagram account we’ve all
been there but that’s aside from the
point our society is hooked and while we
might think there’s nothing wrong
spending a little extra time tagging our
friends and facebook memes studies show
that the psychological damage is deep
these apps can cause poor psychological
well-being a decreased quality sleep a
lower attention span and social media
can just be a plain waste of time but
the 21st century world ignores these
facts and instead chooses to fuel our
addiction so how did I go from Instagram
addict to completely off the grid let’s
start at the beginning in my junior year
of high school I was strongly encouraged
by my friends to open up an account most
of my friends had Instagram since 2010
when the app was first created
so by 2016 everyone was experiencing the
social media hi and I had yet to take a
hit buddy eventually I caved I got one
and I was instantly addicted after my
first post which you can see here I was
thrilled by the likes and the comments
and the validation of my online presence
so I posted again and again and again
until my desire to post evolved into a
strange anxiety to post I began to
develop shallow concerns thinking things
like well people like my post or what
will they think of me now I started
posting pictures of everything editorial
dog photos pictures of flowers lots of
pictures of flowers lots of food
pictures and even several photos of my
feet yes these are all photos that I
actually posted but the short-term
gratification of posting evolved into an
anxiety every time i refresh the app and
these shallow concerns would resurface
and when scrolling through Instagram I
would think things like if she’s on
vacation then why am I at home re
watching episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and
while I probably shouldn’t have indulged
in any binging sessions these questions
were really damaging and they riddled me
with self-doubt but I didn’t even
realize it this toxic mindset reached
its worst point for me at the end of
last year
I developed the bad habit of scrolling
through social media every morning
before even getting out of bed for
turning on the lights and this behavior
which I know countless people practice
was toxic and left me feeling partially
unsatisfied with the way I was living my
life but last winter I had the chance to
re-evaluate my priorities I realized
that no one’s life is the highlight-reel
they portray it to be online and it was
wrong of me to expect my life to match a
standard I wasn’t even sure I cared
about meeting I read a Psychology Today
article about how social media fuels
toxic self comparison one line in
particular stood out to me
social media activates parts of the
brain not unlike a drug does which may
be why adolescents are truly addicted to
social media and I knew that this
statement applied to me within 5 minutes
of reading that article I decided to
impulsively delete all of my social
media accounts so I did and in the long
run this has been one of the best
decisions I’ve ever made many of my
friends and family even applaud my
choice yet they can’t seem to take the
plunge themselves and are still addicted
to these apps I wanted to figure out why
so I asked 40 of my friends some
questions why do you have social media
what do you like and dislike about it
and have you ever thought about deleting
it in response to this last question
several my friends immediately responded
saying I wouldn’t delete it only because
I know I’d inevitably redownload it very
soon it statements like this responses
that blatantly captured the undeniably
extensive role of social media in our
lives that weren’t critical thinking of
why we use these apps and how we allow
them to shape our thinking so today
we’ll deconstruct three of the most
common responses I received as to why my
friends justify their continual social
media use and understand the detriments
that come from social media addiction
and hopefully by the end of the day
you’ll feel inclined to go off the grid
too now I want you to all think for a
second about why you personally use
social media how many of you immediately
thought I use social media to stay
connected with friends and family
that justification makes sense these
apps were created with the intention of
connecting us to new and old friends
thereby developing relationships between
people and larger communities but in
reality
studies show that social media actually
doesn’t accomplish either of these
functions and instead causes two major
problems the first is that it creates a
false sense of strengths and friendships
through shallow constant communication
and the second is that these apps work
oxymoronic lis producing communities
comprised of completely isolated
individuals let’s take a look at that
first point when it comes to online
friendships social media fools us into
thinking that the repetitive nature of
seeing liking and commenting on our
friends posts is enough to maintain and
strengthen friendships but in truth it’s
not most of these interactions are
superficial at best and simply
interacting through comments instead of
holding personal private conversations
allows users to play a passive role in
their relationships and what’s more is
that these interactions are almost
always impersonal too when we
communicate through texts or comments or
tweets we lose the 93% of communication
that comes specifically from body
language and it turns out that 93% is
crucial to getting the right message
across I’ll give you an example imagine
one evening getting a text from your
grandmother that says this I heard your
sister was in a car accident lol to
which you shocked respond she was and
were really sad about it so what’s so
funny about that she says I don’t think
it’s funny I’m sad too so then why did
you text laughing out loud I didn’t lol
means lots of love oh grandma let’s hope
she hasn’t made this mistake before but
in all seriousness when people shift
from in-person to online they often
sacrifice authenticity and their true
intentions by shifting their focus
purely to their online image and people
portray their ideal selves instead of
their actual
selves but that isn’t the only evidence
that these are poor venues for
strengthening friendships the Pew
Research Center indicates that 68% of
teens have seen or experienced some form
of online drama and 26% have fought
because of something that happened
online the damage doesn’t only apply to
teenagers though adults report that
higher Facebook use correlates to higher
relationship dissatisfaction and even
worse higher divorce rates but that’s
not even the half of it though social
media is often praised for its ability
to create and grow communities members
who spend a lot of time online have
reported feeling more socially isolated
than their counterparts with less social
media use but why the answer is simple
these apps bring people together online
yet online only and membership into one
of these communities functionally
requires individuals to sit staring in
isolation at a screen which precludes
real human interaction and as more users
substitute genuine human engagement with
online communities it’s more likely that
our society is to see an increase in
social isolation and the subsequent
mental health issues that come with it
so put down the phone and talk to a real
friend because one of those is worth
more than a million Facebook friends or
a thousand Twitter followers but
speaking of Twitter let’s take a look at
the second most common reason my friends
are so keen to stay on social media it
allows them to receive their political
and social updates most commonly through
Twitter Twitter is often overflowing
with controversial tweets covering
everything from the actions of our
government International Affairs urgent
human rights issues kim kardashian
selfies well maybe not that last one but
you get the gist there’s lots of room
for controversy online in fact 500
million tweets like this and others fill
up the internet daily but don’t let this
quantity fool you into thinking Twitter
delivers quality as well I mean I’ll
admit there’s nothing like watching
Wendy’s roast McDonald’s on Twitter but
when it comes to actual news that
impacts us it’s important that we focus
on Twitter’s quality and
fortunately Twitter doesn’t deliver
quality or quantity the 280 character
limit on most tweets prevents people
from sharing in-depth information and
two important topics that deserve
important attention and what’s more is
that the information on these topics
isn’t guaranteed to be correct either an
MIT study of 4.5 million tweets revealed
that fake news was 70% more likely to be
retweeted than the truth meaning that
the information you absorb from a
five-minute Twitter scroll could be
completely misinformed researchers
attribute this to the fact that users
have a propensity to retweet shocking
information instead of the truth but
this type of online behavior is
detrimental especially to impressionable
youth who rely on twitter as their
primary source of political and social
knowledge these tweets bend reality for
the sake of likes or retweets and
ultimately retweeting politically
divisive statements does nothing but
reinforce bad stereotypes and prevent
education and conversation on issues
that deserve our attention so at the end
of the day relying on sites like Twitter
for unbiased in-depth and truthful
information is not necessarily the best
thing to do but these negatives don’t
seem to stop anybody from using social
media and according to my friends there
is one reason why it’s FOMO or the fear
of missing out users are also afraid of
missing out on a taste of their friends
lives that they end up consuming every
bit of unnecessary information instead
this creates a toxic cycle where users
feel jealousy or inadequacy at seeing
other people’s posts but then contribute
to the highlight reel phenomenon by
posting their own happy images and
instigating these feelings and others
but having left the grid I can tell you
firsthand that I don’t feel as though I
really missed out on anything because
I’m still updated on my friends lives
through other means means that are less
toxic and that don’t cause many of the
problems that we earlier discussed
social media in this vicious cycle might
be undermine but really the impact can’t
be ignored depression and anxiety have
risen
dramatically over the years and studies
report that depression and anxiety are
linked to social media use that’s the
thing about social media the impact is
collective simply liking a funny video
of two teenagers doing something
immature or thoughtless validates
harmful behavior and increases its
likelihood of being repeated choosing to
not follow someone back for any reason
whatsoever affirms the online
exclusivity atmosphere that already
exists and posting your own happy photos
adds to the highlight-reel phenomenon as
well the facts are overwhelming and at
the end of the day there’s only one way
to really get rid of these problems
delete your accounts entirely I’ll admit
I understand the temptation to keep and
use these apps and I myself am not
exempt from relapsing and opening up an
account again and I’d be lying if I said
there weren’t a few benefits that social
media provides but if you weigh those
few benefits against the many harms of
social media addiction and these mental
health problems you will see that it’s
really not worth keeping them using your
social media accounts is a personal
choice but it’s worth deleting them
knowing what can happen if you don’t
have them being free from all of these
harms but alongside that we also have to
have a shift in mindset that focuses
ourselves on our real lives rather than
online personas deleting our accounts is
a huge step in achieving that mindset
because it’s the click of a button that
can free you it’s time to stop watching
snapchat stories and start reading real
ones
it’s time to start making real friends
instead of just followers and it’s time
to stop counting likes and start truly
living life I hope you’ll join me and
share this importance with your friends
even if it means posting on Facebook one
last time thank you [Applause]
yes
addicts and most of you don’t even know
the substance that you’re abusing I
would know because I used to be addicted
to and my addiction controlled me but
during this period of my life I remained
in denial and refused to confront
reality because the fleeting high that
my addiction gave me was enough to
outweigh the lasting feeling of distress
and the obvious strain had had on my
time and energy but one evening after
realizing how much my addiction had
consumed my entire life I decided to
quit once and for all and while my
addiction might be cured over 210
million people across the world suffer
from something similar and 3 billion
more are susceptible to obtaining this
addiction as well so what’s the drug
causing the problem the answer is
remarkably simple and I guarantee most
of you probably took a heavy dose today
it’s social media so no you and I don’t
have an actual drug problem and though
my heavy chocolate consumption is
probably enough to be considered
substance abuse I’m talking about
something more intangible yet equally if
not more dangerous it seems like a huge
exaggeration but if you look at the
facts
social media addiction is a real problem
that afflicts more of us than we know
now you might be thinking of me there’s
no way I barely use my phone much less
enough to be addicted to social media
the research proves otherwise in fact
studies say that the average person
checks their phone a hundred ten times
per day the average teenager can spend
up to nine hours daily on social
platforms and 25% of Facebook users
check their accounts five or more times
a day additional additional research
shows that during these times we’re on
Facebook our perception of time is
dramatically warped to the point where
we underestimate the hours we spend
commenting liking posting and stalking
yes stalking we have all done it don’t
act like you haven’t seen someone and
realized you only knew who they were
because you were a little
to deepen to your best friends cousins
grandparents Instagram account we’ve all
been there but that’s aside from the
point our society is hooked and while we
might think there’s nothing wrong
spending a little extra time tagging our
friends and facebook memes studies show
that the psychological damage is deep
these apps can cause poor psychological
well-being a decreased quality sleep a
lower attention span and social media
can just be a plain waste of time but
the 21st century world ignores these
facts and instead chooses to fuel our
addiction so how did I go from Instagram
addict to completely off the grid let’s
start at the beginning in my junior year
of high school I was strongly encouraged
by my friends to open up an account most
of my friends had Instagram since 2010
when the app was first created
so by 2016 everyone was experiencing the
social media hi and I had yet to take a
hit buddy eventually I caved I got one
and I was instantly addicted after my
first post which you can see here I was
thrilled by the likes and the comments
and the validation of my online presence
so I posted again and again and again
until my desire to post evolved into a
strange anxiety to post I began to
develop shallow concerns thinking things
like well people like my post or what
will they think of me now I started
posting pictures of everything editorial
dog photos pictures of flowers lots of
pictures of flowers lots of food
pictures and even several photos of my
feet yes these are all photos that I
actually posted but the short-term
gratification of posting evolved into an
anxiety every time i refresh the app and
these shallow concerns would resurface
and when scrolling through Instagram I
would think things like if she’s on
vacation then why am I at home re
watching episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and
while I probably shouldn’t have indulged
in any binging sessions these questions
were really damaging and they riddled me
with self-doubt but I didn’t even
realize it this toxic mindset reached
its worst point for me at the end of
last year
I developed the bad habit of scrolling
through social media every morning
before even getting out of bed for
turning on the lights and this behavior
which I know countless people practice
was toxic and left me feeling partially
unsatisfied with the way I was living my
life but last winter I had the chance to
re-evaluate my priorities I realized
that no one’s life is the highlight-reel
they portray it to be online and it was
wrong of me to expect my life to match a
standard I wasn’t even sure I cared
about meeting I read a Psychology Today
article about how social media fuels
toxic self comparison one line in
particular stood out to me
social media activates parts of the
brain not unlike a drug does which may
be why adolescents are truly addicted to
social media and I knew that this
statement applied to me within 5 minutes
of reading that article I decided to
impulsively delete all of my social
media accounts so I did and in the long
run this has been one of the best
decisions I’ve ever made many of my
friends and family even applaud my
choice yet they can’t seem to take the
plunge themselves and are still addicted
to these apps I wanted to figure out why
so I asked 40 of my friends some
questions why do you have social media
what do you like and dislike about it
and have you ever thought about deleting
it in response to this last question
several my friends immediately responded
saying I wouldn’t delete it only because
I know I’d inevitably redownload it very
soon it statements like this responses
that blatantly captured the undeniably
extensive role of social media in our
lives that weren’t critical thinking of
why we use these apps and how we allow
them to shape our thinking so today
we’ll deconstruct three of the most
common responses I received as to why my
friends justify their continual social
media use and understand the detriments
that come from social media addiction
and hopefully by the end of the day
you’ll feel inclined to go off the grid
too now I want you to all think for a
second about why you personally use
social media how many of you immediately
thought I use social media to stay
connected with friends and family
that justification makes sense these
apps were created with the intention of
connecting us to new and old friends
thereby developing relationships between
people and larger communities but in
reality
studies show that social media actually
doesn’t accomplish either of these
functions and instead causes two major
problems the first is that it creates a
false sense of strengths and friendships
through shallow constant communication
and the second is that these apps work
oxymoronic lis producing communities
comprised of completely isolated
individuals let’s take a look at that
first point when it comes to online
friendships social media fools us into
thinking that the repetitive nature of
seeing liking and commenting on our
friends posts is enough to maintain and
strengthen friendships but in truth it’s
not most of these interactions are
superficial at best and simply
interacting through comments instead of
holding personal private conversations
allows users to play a passive role in
their relationships and what’s more is
that these interactions are almost
always impersonal too when we
communicate through texts or comments or
tweets we lose the 93% of communication
that comes specifically from body
language and it turns out that 93% is
crucial to getting the right message
across I’ll give you an example imagine
one evening getting a text from your
grandmother that says this I heard your
sister was in a car accident lol to
which you shocked respond she was and
were really sad about it so what’s so
funny about that she says I don’t think
it’s funny I’m sad too so then why did
you text laughing out loud I didn’t lol
means lots of love oh grandma let’s hope
she hasn’t made this mistake before but
in all seriousness when people shift
from in-person to online they often
sacrifice authenticity and their true
intentions by shifting their focus
purely to their online image and people
portray their ideal selves instead of
their actual
selves but that isn’t the only evidence
that these are poor venues for
strengthening friendships the Pew
Research Center indicates that 68% of
teens have seen or experienced some form
of online drama and 26% have fought
because of something that happened
online the damage doesn’t only apply to
teenagers though adults report that
higher Facebook use correlates to higher
relationship dissatisfaction and even
worse higher divorce rates but that’s
not even the half of it though social
media is often praised for its ability
to create and grow communities members
who spend a lot of time online have
reported feeling more socially isolated
than their counterparts with less social
media use but why the answer is simple
these apps bring people together online
yet online only and membership into one
of these communities functionally
requires individuals to sit staring in
isolation at a screen which precludes
real human interaction and as more users
substitute genuine human engagement with
online communities it’s more likely that
our society is to see an increase in
social isolation and the subsequent
mental health issues that come with it
so put down the phone and talk to a real
friend because one of those is worth
more than a million Facebook friends or
a thousand Twitter followers but
speaking of Twitter let’s take a look at
the second most common reason my friends
are so keen to stay on social media it
allows them to receive their political
and social updates most commonly through
Twitter Twitter is often overflowing
with controversial tweets covering
everything from the actions of our
government International Affairs urgent
human rights issues kim kardashian
selfies well maybe not that last one but
you get the gist there’s lots of room
for controversy online in fact 500
million tweets like this and others fill
up the internet daily but don’t let this
quantity fool you into thinking Twitter
delivers quality as well I mean I’ll
admit there’s nothing like watching
Wendy’s roast McDonald’s on Twitter but
when it comes to actual news that
impacts us it’s important that we focus
on Twitter’s quality and
fortunately Twitter doesn’t deliver
quality or quantity the 280 character
limit on most tweets prevents people
from sharing in-depth information and
two important topics that deserve
important attention and what’s more is
that the information on these topics
isn’t guaranteed to be correct either an
MIT study of 4.5 million tweets revealed
that fake news was 70% more likely to be
retweeted than the truth meaning that
the information you absorb from a
five-minute Twitter scroll could be
completely misinformed researchers
attribute this to the fact that users
have a propensity to retweet shocking
information instead of the truth but
this type of online behavior is
detrimental especially to impressionable
youth who rely on twitter as their
primary source of political and social
knowledge these tweets bend reality for
the sake of likes or retweets and
ultimately retweeting politically
divisive statements does nothing but
reinforce bad stereotypes and prevent
education and conversation on issues
that deserve our attention so at the end
of the day relying on sites like Twitter
for unbiased in-depth and truthful
information is not necessarily the best
thing to do but these negatives don’t
seem to stop anybody from using social
media and according to my friends there
is one reason why it’s FOMO or the fear
of missing out users are also afraid of
missing out on a taste of their friends
lives that they end up consuming every
bit of unnecessary information instead
this creates a toxic cycle where users
feel jealousy or inadequacy at seeing
other people’s posts but then contribute
to the highlight reel phenomenon by
posting their own happy images and
instigating these feelings and others
but having left the grid I can tell you
firsthand that I don’t feel as though I
really missed out on anything because
I’m still updated on my friends lives
through other means means that are less
toxic and that don’t cause many of the
problems that we earlier discussed
social media in this vicious cycle might
be undermine but really the impact can’t
be ignored depression and anxiety have
risen
dramatically over the years and studies
report that depression and anxiety are
linked to social media use that’s the
thing about social media the impact is
collective simply liking a funny video
of two teenagers doing something
immature or thoughtless validates
harmful behavior and increases its
likelihood of being repeated choosing to
not follow someone back for any reason
whatsoever affirms the online
exclusivity atmosphere that already
exists and posting your own happy photos
adds to the highlight-reel phenomenon as
well the facts are overwhelming and at
the end of the day there’s only one way
to really get rid of these problems
delete your accounts entirely I’ll admit
I understand the temptation to keep and
use these apps and I myself am not
exempt from relapsing and opening up an
account again and I’d be lying if I said
there weren’t a few benefits that social
media provides but if you weigh those
few benefits against the many harms of
social media addiction and these mental
health problems you will see that it’s
really not worth keeping them using your
social media accounts is a personal
choice but it’s worth deleting them
knowing what can happen if you don’t
have them being free from all of these
harms but alongside that we also have to
have a shift in mindset that focuses
ourselves on our real lives rather than
online personas deleting our accounts is
a huge step in achieving that mindset
because it’s the click of a button that
can free you it’s time to stop watching
snapchat stories and start reading real
ones
it’s time to start making real friends
instead of just followers and it’s time
to stop counting likes and start truly
living life I hope you’ll join me and
share this importance with your friends
even if it means posting on Facebook one
last time thank you [Applause]
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