#017 The Corrosive Nature of Social Media Without Godly Boundaries and Discernment -Further. Every. Day.

Are we making good decisions with Social Media? Are we potentially doing more harm than good? Join us as we discuss this as our culture strays Further. Every. Day.

As promised, here are the notes and stories discussed in the podcast.

Due to filters, Photoshop, and man's propensity to compare oneself to others:

“Thirty-two percent of teen girls said that when they felt bad about their bodies, Instagram made them feel worse,” the researchers reportedly wrote. Facebook also reportedly found that 14% of boys in the U.S. said Instagram made them feel worse about themselves.” https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/14/facebook-documents-show-how-toxic-instagram-is-for-teens-wsj.html



Social Media has many negative effects on youth, including academics.

“There was a negative and significant relationship between the overall use of social networks and academic performance of students. Therefore, it is imperative that the university authorities take interventional steps to help students who are dependent on these networks and, through workshops, inform them about the negative consequences of addiction to social networks.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6500070/

But it gets worse. An NCIB study shows a close link to exposure to sexual content and drug use. "The current and extant findings suggest that a common network exists for sexual-cue reactivity and drug-cue reactivity in groups with CSB and drug addictions, respectively. These findings suggest overlaps in networks underlying disorders of pathological consumption of drugs and natural rewards. While this study may suggest overlaps with substance-use disorders, further clinical studies are required to determine whether CSB should be categorized as an impulse-control disorder, within an obsessive-compulsive spectrum or as a behavioural addiction.” https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0102419



Add to this, we are having privacy data breaches from these companies to unscrupulous nations like China. Personalized data can be used to target vulerable youth and this data is being treated very loosely by these companies. https://techcrunch.com/2021/09/15/ireland-probes-tiktoks-handling-of-kids-data-and-transfers-to-china/

Another common complaint is that these companies push sexualized content onto minors after an interest is shown by browsing history. Now, of course the algorithm is driven by engagement. That is what it was designed to do! But is pornography or sexually explicit material truly fit for the public view? What invariably happens? Innocents with no idea of what they are getting into fall prey to not just porn addiction but, often enough, trafficing as well. “The content shown on the for you page is set based on previous searches, as well as the content types most often viewed or that a user spends most time watching. The more the user lingered on sexual content, the more sexual content was shown in the for you page - despite the users age being set in their profile. TikTok said they don't currently differentiate between videos served to adult and children accounts, but were working on a new filter tool for younger accounts.” https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-9970435/TikToks-algorithm-promoting-sexual-content-children-young-13.html



“While we have commended TikTok for making significant safety improvements over the last year, it is clear that TikTok needs to do much more to protect minors from exposure to sexual content and pornographic websites. We have been pressing on TikTok to proactively moderate content because even our own research confirms what the Wall Street Journal found: under an account we created as a 13-year-old, we were easily able to find videos promoting OnlyFans, as well as other pornography and prostitution sites despite the fact that this type of material is against TikTok's Community Guidelines,” said Lina Nealon, director of corporate and strategic initiatives for the National Center on Sexual Exploitation.” The thing some people don't understand is, this is how grooming often starts. Through exposure to this content, and the content's creators, on social media.
https://endsexualexploitation.org/articles/tiktok-exposes-kids-to-sexual-content/

Now some may just say: “Well only fans are just consenting adults exchanging money for art… Well, according to this article: “Just two weeks ago, 101 Members of Congress sent a letter to US Department of Justice demanding an investigation into OnlyFans for reports of child sex abuse material and sex trafficking. Journalists shared insider information that the FBI opened a “sprawling” investigation into the financial activity and wide array of potential crimes of the multi-billion dollar company and its owners.”
https://endsexualexploitation.org/articles/onlyfans-criminal-behavior/

These are not individuals, these are multi-billion dollar companies pimping children.