
Depression, Self-Identity and Reality: Living in a Story Created by Facebook - borjamoya
https://medium.com/privateid-blog/depression-self-identity-and-reality-living-in-a-fictional-story-created-by-social-media-38f230ab9bf7
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teleclimber
Interesting article about something we should definitely be having a
conversation about.

But i want to point out an anecdote: we have a newborn and we share pics of
her privately with fam. All the pics are of her good moments: her first
smiles, her just being cute, etc... We don't share pics or videos of her
screaming her lungs out, or of her diaper explosions, which intuitively woul
be weird.

Reading this article it sounds like we are doing ourselves a disservice by not
sharing the bad. Like we're not being honest with ourselves or our family. But
are we? isn't the point of memories to preserve the good ones? The printed
photo albums my parents have of my childhood don't have any pictures of me
having a meltdown. There is a saying among mothers that you forget the pain of
childbirth otherwise you'd never have a second child.

I'm sure social media makes things worse by being too present in people's self
esteem but I am not sure memories have to preserve the downsides of reality.

~~~
burdo3417
Interesting point. But I believe the problem relies not in the sharing but in
our perception of reality based on what others have shared. I understand that
it's an inevitable consequence of the first but that has been the case for
centuries. The new problem is that this misperceptions are now on a massive
and unprecedented scale and our brain is constantly attacked by this
misperceptions.

~~~
borjamoya
This is exactly right. The scope of social media is greater. It's a status
show where your stuff isn't just in your living room but out there for you to
“show off” to the world and compare it with others. This ultimately builds our
story, our culture, that's when everybody believes a particular story and
leads to the madness of crowds.

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annadane
Facebook is playing a very dangerous game by not allowing people full control
of their feeds and even algorithmically sorting things. That's different from
just "social media", it's a specifically Facebook way of doing things

~~~
borjamoya
I totally agree. And we're the ones paying the price of their actions.

~~~
TomMarius
Who is we? I am not paying anything AFAIK. When my girlfriend had problems,
she simply stopped using it that much. I myself simply don't subscribe to
pseudomotivational bullshit or internet "personalities".

~~~
RhodesianHunter
When people get stuck in a bubble of fake news and manufactured outrage they
tend to vote accordingly, and that does impact you.

~~~
nyolfen
fake news and manufactured outrage is how our political system has always
operated, it's just easier to see the process applying to people you disagree
with now

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ilovecaching
I think this type of depression that is supposedly a response to social media
is simply a symptom of something that would have manifested itself with or
without being plugged in.

One might write a novel on the subject, but humans are easily dissatisfied. We
chase after things we think we want, but are really unfulfilling. Many of us
lack a true calling. We travel to exotic places and buy expensive things only
to realize that the hedonistic treadmill is real.

~~~
borjamoya
You're right. This isn't new. It started way back with advertising. The
problem is the scope it's getting right now--we no longer have an active role
on this process.

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i_am_proteus
Facebook is the "cigarettes" of our era. It's addictive, and evidence that
regular use is detrimental to our well-being is mounting.

Strangely, it's also what we do at parties when we're bored.

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blfr
I'm all for burning Facebook to the ground but the rise in the use of
antidepressants started well before modern social media.

It does look associated with alienation, so does travelling alone, but social
media use is probably a result of loneliness, an attempt to connect however
feeble, not its cause.

~~~
bigbugbag
Interesting thing is that antidepressant use rised despite antidepressant
being mostly ineffective and their underlying principle of action being
flawed.

This raises the question of why antidepressant use rised this way. Could it be
that heavily medicated people are easier to manage and keep under control to
prevent them from rebelling against the lives they're forced into by the
societal system ? Could it be related to huge profits from pharmaceutical
corporations ?

Then again Facebook and the computer as a machine middleman in human
interaction is destroying social interaction and society fabric by replacing
actual meaningful interaction that builds human ability to be human. Not the
single cause but a recent and efficient accelerator of a trend that push us
further apart from each other.

I recommend watching the following BBC documentaries by Adam Curtis:

    
    
      The Century of the Self[1]
      The Trap: What Happened to Our Dream of Freedom[2]
      All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace[3]
    
      [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Century_of_the_Self
      [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trap_(TV_series)
      [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Watched_Over_by_Machines_of_Loving_Grace_(TV_series)

~~~
Ardren
> antidepressant being mostly ineffective

That needs a great big giant source. Because there are so many peer reviewed
studies and meta-studies that show that they are effective.

~~~
50656E6973
Antidepressants and the Placebo Effect

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4172306/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4172306/)

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egypturnash
The ending was perfect. “Be very careful with stories and social media ALSO
NOW IM ON YOUTUBE, LIKE AND SUBSCRIBE!”

~~~
borjamoya
What's wrong with that? I'm creating youtube videos because I know people are
there, and the change I'm trying to create is to change people's minds. I
can't change the way people consume media, so the only chance we've got is to
adapt it and make change happen.

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alfonsodev
I'd like to see studies of how social media affects different personalities
types. My intuition is that the negative effect can manifest in different
ways. For example a person that has social anxiety in real life, let's say
because is unconsciously worried about how to behave socially, maybe because
the fear of rejection or being bullied by the group. This person would post
probably close to zero, and avoid public comments, while being very anxious
while waiting for a private response. I think the effect in this case, is that
the person becomes even more isolated and even less social. Because these
people can manage still in small groups of 4 to 5 people but I think on
average we have 300 facebook "friends", that might not be manageable. And the
extroverts would engage reactively only to other extroverts, causing other
type of harms. That's my intuition from my direct observations.

~~~
pjc50
I would say that most of the Extremely Online people I know who post a lot
talk of introversion and social anxiety. These things manifest differently in
online spaces.

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boltzmannbrain
I'm happier and healthier that these conversations are happening; I'm not
alone.

Facebook is clearly problematic, and I've been suspicious of the negative
effects of Instagram and Hinge (dating app). The former would make me
jealous/depressed/frustrated as I compare myself to glimpses of my peers
supposedly winning at life. The latter would make me less outgoing in real
life, b/c somehow flipping through dating profiles satisfied an underlying
desire to meet new people.

I highly recommend Johann Hari's work: "Lost Connections" book [1], Sam Harris
and Ezra Klein podcast episodes [2, 3], TED talk [4].

[1] [https://thelostconnections.com/](https://thelostconnections.com/)

[2] [https://samharris.org/podcasts/142-addiction-depression-
mean...](https://samharris.org/podcasts/142-addiction-depression-meaningful-
life/)

[3] [https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/vox/the-ezra-klein-
show/e/5...](https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/vox/the-ezra-klein-
show/e/54111398)

[4]
[https://www.ted.com/talks/johann_hari_everything_you_think_y...](https://www.ted.com/talks/johann_hari_everything_you_think_you_know_about_addiction_is_wrong?language=en)

~~~
borjamoya
Thanks for the links!

------
xena
Malaclypse: Everyone is hurting eachother, the planet is rampant with
injustices, whole societies plunder groups of their own people, mothers
imprison sons, children perish while brothers war.

The Goddess: What is the matter with that, if it's what you want to do?

Malaclypse: But nobody wants it! Everybody hates it!

The Goddess: Oh. Well, then stop.

------
Yan-solucracy
[https://youtu.be/iGCGhD8i-o4](https://youtu.be/iGCGhD8i-o4)

