How Harmful Are Social Networks?
About two billion people are connected to the matrix of social media. Just as in the popular film the Matrix used people as batteries, social media uses us today as a walking purse.
Getting Rich On Our Account
Social networks take advantage of our social nature, our tensions and emotions, our energies and our desires. All this is simply to continue feeding the well oiled machine that generates cash for its billionaires, or serves other interested parties, such as governments and intelligence agencies.
We see the harmful results all around us. We are addicted to the social networks, and our youths view “likes” as a measure of social status. Many are emotionally enslaved to the point of depression and bitter loneliness, and judge their own worth in relation to the fake social bubble we all maintain. While our digital characters smile nicely to everyone, we feel a growing sense of emptiness inside.
They are called “social” networks but they are actually very good at alienating us against one another, and isolating us from genuine human interaction.
Our children are exposed to numerous examples of negative human behavior throughout all hours of the day, to the extent that they can no longer perceive the difference between right and wrong.
Opium For The Masses
Another harmful aspect is that our dependence on social media is even becoming worse than drug addiction. Researchers have found some troubling parallels, but the situation is much bleaker in reality . If you have a teenager or kids of any age actually, you know this to be true.
Clearly, we need to go through some intensive social rehabilitation process to wean us off social media, and we need to come up with a trendy social alternative — fast. We shouldn’t just hang out on platforms that are familiar to us. Ideally, we will spread our wings and begin using new platforms that foster positive human behavior.
We can do all the same things we do on platforms like Facebook — judge, compete, rank, try to impress. But instead of competing at being better than others, we can compete at helping others. Instead of giving sensational content top ranking, we can promote and award content makers that are focused on enhancing human relations.
Instead of arousing negative impulses in us, which encourage us to peddle, slander, judge, and compete over a number of shares, social networks must contribute to making us better human beings.
Nature Has A Better Network For Us
Nature has another kind of social network that binds all of us together. How do you connect to this network? The moment we develop a connection and sense of belonging to the foundation of human unity, when we focus on the center of the positive relationship between human beings, we will find the point of entry into a deeper layer of reality — a reality that values human connection, collaboration and equality. This will be far above our current narrow perspective that is driven by personal consciousness and private interest.
Is this too lofty an ideal? Does it require great capabilities? Definitely not. Fostering cordial human connections is our true purpose for being here. Therefore, anyone can, and in some cases must, connect to this network.
Technology Can Enhance Evolution
Any technological innovation that does not advance humanity towards the purpose of its development only harms it.
Nature does not expect a person to process data like a computer, or store information in a cloud. The brain is not a central processing unit and our memory is not a server. These belong to the world of mechanics and robotics.
Therefore, attempts by entrepreneurs such as Elon Musk and his competitors, to connect the computer to the human brain, will not bring real benefit.
The human modem, the device that enables communication between two people apart from each other, operates through the human heart.
Paying The Highest Price Imaginable
How far are we from a single heart and a natural human connection? The answer is obvious among the younger generation. Children are growing into a virtual world today. Social media is a second home for them. They are losing the human ability to communicate as human beings, and even the means to acquire this ability. Instead, they correspond through chats and emojis. One can argue to what extent all this harms them, but suffice it to say that the human factor in them suffers and slows down its development.
If this is not convincing enough, look at those founders who have abandoned Facebook, and speak openly about the conscious emotional manipulation of users, and how algorithms are programmed to draw the most attention from us.
The Silver Lining
The conclusion is crystal clear: social networks do not really connect us. What good are they really serving? Accelerating the discovery of our true nature that is pure egoism.
Who is wise? A person who envisions and prepares properly for the future. Therefore, at this stage we should look out to the horizon, identify the great wave heading toward us, and crack down on the process of social withdrawal before it’s too late.
We need to learn about and become completely familiar with our selfish nature, and take our first steps into the network of internal communication between us, which nature has provided.
The findings? Essentially, the more time a person spends on social media, the more likely that person is to be depressed. There are a myriad of reasons for the chilling connection, but one of the strongest indicators pointing to the relationship between social media and depression is the relationship between narcissism and social comparisons.
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