I think the site is getting hugged to death. The quotes explaining the "bungled" bit is:
"Here’s the thing: misuse of personal data and hateful content were not the reasons emphasized by AOC for why she quit Facebook. She instead called social media a “public health risk” that too often leads to “increased isolation, depression, anxiety, addiction, escapism.”"
and
"In other words, the important story is not the fear that social media companies will improperly use our data; it’s instead the fear that they’ll subvert our primal drive to cultivate a meaningful life."
I haven't logged into Facebook in almost two years. I can't imagine much has changed since my last visit. I do enjoy using Messenger for its convenience, but Facebook as a social platform is long dead for me.
Never used FB with the exception of creating a dummy account in high school to host a project page. Graduating university in a month and I may have to bite the bullet on it as my internship uses FB to connect the interns together. So far, I have enough distractions with Reddit, Twitter, and Hacker News (and various other forums) that I never felt like I was missing out on the FB punch bowl.
i use it all the time to keep up to date on my friends, I used it to be informed about my class reunion, and there's now a "I grew up in <Hometown> group" that I enjoy because it posts historical photos and reminiscences.
But, what I absolutely cannot stand is people constantly posting propaganda memes.
The parent was asking a serious question, as indicated - not mocking AOC's decision as ironic. And the question is reasonable. These are all different services. How do those differences affect how damaging they are, and in what ways? Was AOC engaged with them differently, or less than, Facebook? Does she plan to not leave those services, now or in the future? Etc, etc.
I don't think this is much of a story whether it's bungled or not.
Cal Newport wrote a book about quitting social media (I'm in the middle of the audio version of Digital Minimalism).
He is leveraging AOC's popularity for his own crusade. Which is fine, but considering AOC still uses social media extensively I don't think she's a good example for him to hold up.
This article only references one news article published by the Washington Post[1]. It's not even completely clear to me after reading it that the writer was trying to do what the author of this post was saying.
To say the entire media has bungled the story is disingenuous. Go look at other articles that don't mention CA or any other political scandal[2]. This is a real non-story.
I'm glad this article touched on 2 good reasons why people are quitting social media nowadays: data privacy concerns and public health risks.
But I think there's a third, equally important reason why people should consider quitting these platforms: public image management.
I find that a majority of people who use social media accounts simply do not know how to properly maintain a clean public image. Whether it be because they don't understand or refuse to tighten their privacy controls, or because other people take everything they say out of context for the sake of tarnishing their reputation, the things you post to social media can always be used against you. And for all intents and purposes, you can never take it back once you post.
For politicians, this rings especially true, and as far as I know for U.S. politicians, their social media accounts are 100% their thoughts, unsanitized or evaluated by a management team.
I suppose the old addage remains true: if you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen.
"Here’s the thing: misuse of personal data and hateful content were not the reasons emphasized by AOC for why she quit Facebook. She instead called social media a “public health risk” that too often leads to “increased isolation, depression, anxiety, addiction, escapism.”"
and
"In other words, the important story is not the fear that social media companies will improperly use our data; it’s instead the fear that they’ll subvert our primal drive to cultivate a meaningful life."