
The Lonely Burden of Today’s Teenage Girls - laurex
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-lonely-burden-of-todays-teenage-girls-11565883328?mod=rsswn
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xtiansimon
> ‘Girls sleep with their phones and react to every notification.’

Maybe it’s just me, but I worry about the chance syncopations of external
stimulus and internal emotions mediated by social media. I worry about
judgment of cause and effect over social media when constantly connected. And
when you’re emotionally effected your threshold to be effected by those
judgments is reduced.

I can’t give an example, except that the examples are everywhere. I grew up in
the 80s, and 90s. So I take much of the gamification of Mobile Apps with a
grain of salt. I grew up with anonymous online personas, and I think that lead
to a healthy skepticism of people’s intentions on the Internet. I jealously
guard my Personal Information—-It’s an auto filter in my brain now.

You know what a ‘hustle’ is when you meet someone on the street—distraction
misdirection and manipulation of your desires.

So I have my own idea of how the ‘Internet world works’, and I can’t imagine
how to describe it to a youth who doesn’t share my belief all of the Internet
is manipulating your judgement. You have to selectively decide what your
willing to be hustled by, because it’s fun, and when to say enough.

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temp-dude-87844
Screen time can be had on the cheap, because your parents are paying for Wifi
and the phones anyway, and you're on the family Netflix and some other
streaming service, or using a friend's. Malls are dying, expensive, and flocks
of teens are no longer welcome. Wandering around the Target, the Walmart, or
the quirky knicknack store works, if you can get a ride. You spend money on
eating out with your friends on occasion.

On the screens, you watch shows, memes, videos, streams, but also interact
with your real-life circle and online friends. Your real-life circle overlaps
with people at your school, so you can never truly disconnect: time away from
school doesn't pause the happenings of the same social environment, and time
away from your phone will just make you seem more withdrawn the next day. You
can't ever quite get away from them. Then, the people you know from online are
a mixed bag: the fans, the creeps, the randoms, a few popular people who
replied when you reached out, the more professional influencers who who
didn't, and a small number of people you know through a stroke of luck who
share a common interest and you've become friends. These online friends are
probably really far away, you may never get a chance to meet them, and their
lives are probably just as chaotic as yours.

Online, you also read various slants on world events, culture, and justice.
People in your circles share tidbits and their takes. You realize people treat
each other like garbage, that some people can get shot at little fault of
their own and police are rarely held accountable, half the country wants to
curtail some people's rights, and the planet's warming and melting. None of
these are insurmountable, but it's easy to be swept up in the outcry about
these, conclude (immediately, or through later disenchantment) that there's
little one can do to personally to bring about meaningful change, and be left
with a pessimistic outlook on the world.

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lunias
When I was about 14 (2002) my parents sat me down and explained that they'd be
limiting my computer time to 4 hours on a school night and 8 hours on a
weekend day. I cried. I contested, "What am I supposed to do with all of the
extra time?". I tried to appeal to logic, "I can watch TV after my time is up,
but not be on the computer?".

They wanted me to do _anything_ else because they saw it as a distinct
addiction. It was; and I'm still addicted.

Soon I had friends that could drive. I would bum a ride to their houses and
use their PCs once I'd blown through my time allotment.

Now I'm a software engineer; and in recent conversation my Dad said to me, "If
I knew you were going to make a living like that I probably would have been a
bit easier on you about the computer."

Addiction aside, are you using the tool or is it using you? Maybe these girls
could be the next digital marketing gurus if they reframed their interactions.

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ekianjo
> Mothers and fathers need to protect their daughters (and sons) from the
> culture’s noxious elements and connect them to life’s goodness and beauty.
> In an increasingly complicated world, much of the answer is simple: Unplug
> and do the things families have done since the beginning of time—tell
> stories, laugh, work together and talk through life’s big questions.

What kind of generic piece of advice is that?

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jaredcwhite
The world of iPhone/Android devices has been around for well over a decade
now. Why is this suddenly a crisis? If anything, I would expect the negative
effects of smartphone addiction to be trending downward as parents become
better educated about safe internet access and the vendors have begun offering
tools to limit device usage.

The anecdote about girls sleeping next to always-on phones with constant
notifications is bonkers to me. So switch off notifications at night! This
isn't rocket science. But a two-line article about how humans (teen girls and
literally everyone else) feel better when their phones aren't constantly
buzzing isn't sensational enough I guess.

~~~
viklove
There's a big difference between getting your first phone at 18 when 90% of
your friends aren't on social media, and getting your first phone at 8 when
90% of your friends _are_ on social media. You really can't figure out what
the difference is today compared to 10 years ago?

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gingabriska
Younger people's understanding of how world works and what a person is like
comes entirely from the internet.

The moment you try to break out of your internet and go meet new people, it
frustrates the hell out of you that life isn't as cool and people aren't as
witty as they are on internet.

And you start thinking maybe you aren't with right people, so you try to meet
the cool people from internet in real-life and it's again same. The same
people you enjoy on internet, you can't tolerate them for even an hour in
person.

What internet portrays is only a part about a person (which they've edited
then edited and then edited again).

What we assume life is like a Hollywood movie and yes retakes frustrate the
hell out of us but life is actually the retakes.

~~~
solveit
> Younger people's understanding of how world works and what a person is like
> comes entirely from the internet.

They (we?) do/did go to school you know... Replace internet with tv and your
argument goes through just as well, which is to say, not at all.

~~~
tzs
TV was passive. You just sat there and watched what was broadcast after you
selected a channel to watch.

The internet is interactive. This easily allows the internet to become a much
larger part of someone's life than TV could.

This is a big enough difference between TV and internet that I don't think you
can really use TV as a refutation of his argument about internet.

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gingabriska
I've also seen that people are losing ability to tolerate each other in
relationship.

Every relationship advice offered on internet sounds like, "he is abuser,
breakup now" and people are assumed as perfect who make one mistake and they
have to be walked out of your life.

There is also rise of movements like Femminism and MGTOW.

A lot of females are now career focused and have no time to maintain
relationship. A few are able to manage both at once. But many come out for
dating when they are in 30s and they are confused like "I am educated and
indepdent girl, why guys aren't interested in me". Men don't seem to value a
women with career as much as females would like, they find it favourable yes
but it's extremely weak.

Sometimes back I read in study that younger couples have more attractive kids
and the kids who are product of love marriage are more attractive than those
of arranged marriage.

Now, I can see why it could be that because when we are younger we are more
superficial, we are more optimistic, more shallow and as we've less
disappointments under our belt (due to less experience) we aim for most good
looking and those who are able to succeed (maybe because they are themself
good looking?), obviously end up with good looking partner and it can also be
possible that reproductive process is better (less errors?) when we are
younger.

Women also have very high standards when it comes to dating, they want too
10-15% men in looks and they compete for them. In such system, obviously the
men who are in demand will see that they are rare and will exploit the
opportunity and many women will be disappointed.

Repeated failures can also lead a person to depression and anxiety.

Plus, lot of people look at Instagram and find perfect looking people and
start thinking of themselves as inferior. Attractive people are rare 1 in 1000
looks stunning without makeup or other camera effects. This rate could be
higher in developed economies due to proper nutrition received throughout life
and better healthcare facilities. It also depends on individual's and their
family's awareness. But it's not a hard rule, people marry quite late in
developed countries which can lead to unattractive kids.

Just looking at the number of people subscribing to those groups on Reddit,
seems alarming.

A lot of people just do what internet tells them to do.

Kids often say, "leave it, you'll not understand" instead of making you
understand what their problem truly is.

~~~
js8
These are all valid points, but it cannot be the explanation because the
anxiety in teenage girls happens before there are any meaningful romantic
relationships.

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xenihn
Ctrl/Cmd-f "boy"

0 matches

What about the boys?

> Girls in 2019 tend to be risk-averse, focused on their studies and fond of
> their families. They are also experiencing high levels of depression and
> loneliness. A 2019 survey by the Pew Research Center found that 36% of girls
> report being extremely anxious every day. They are particularly worried
> about school shootings, melting polar ice and their ability to afford
> college.

These don't seem like issues exclusive to teenage girls.

~~~
dang
There are articles about boys as well. Please don't turn a thread like this
into yet another gender war. This is in the site guidelines:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html).

~~~
dTal
I think it's a perfectly valid observation if an article that purports to talk
about the problems faced by girls ends up talking about problems shared by
both sexes (especially if by doing so there's a hidden implication that boys
don't have those problems). Parent's example wasn't cherry picked, the whole
article is like that - you can substitute 'teen' for 'girl' in almost every
sentence. I _know_ that young girls have problems unique to their sex - why
not talk more about them? My intellectual curiosity is not very gratified by
this article.

~~~
pornel
I still find it informative to know they're worried about many more things
like everyone else. Filtering this out and leaving just "boys" and such would
paint a vacuous picture.

