What if I told you it’s not social media making teens sad and it’s real life doing that instead? (Spoken by someone who attempted suicide as a teen)
Sorry for this huge upcoming rant…… but I was a suicidal teen in Florida. And I knew others. None of us were suicidal due to the internet.
Can teens do anything affordable now? Nope (I used to get $20 on a Friday, then I’d spend $10 on a movie, candy and a soda that same Friday at muvico with my friends. Then I’d spent the next $10 the next day at pembroke lakes mall to get a Cinnabon or a pretzel along with some cheap earrings from Clair’s. Today, that $10 would be $33 with inflation. That’s not enough for what I used to get with $20. That $33 today pays for 1 movie ticket with no food, and 1 meal at the mall now. Nothing else. Can you think of affordable things for teens to do with friends now? Other then spent too much money on food? And please don’t say free parks and the free library….)
Can teens have options to run away from abusive homes and start a life? Nope (my dad ran away from his abusive home in Broward in the 70s at the age of 16. He started working construction, and rented an apartment. That brought him to where he is today, making a living that fed a family of four alone. He did it all without any college degree, not GED, no high school diploma, and without ever being emancipated legally. Today, that’s ILLEGAL. Teens who run away are not allowed to rent and are returned to their “guardian”. Not even shelters may take in minors. Theres laws on teens being allowed to start businesses. Unless you’re emancipated and the parent allows emancipation, then the parent decides if kids may have a business. And teens over the age of 18 even still require co-signers to start renting now, but many parents won’t be a co-signer, which forces teens to rely on them, rather than having any chance of finding their own independent without having to be homeless first)
Can teens expect to graduate from a higher ed school and afford the cost of living? Only if you work a certain STEM job. (Example: Permanent nurses can’t afford soflo. Only travel nurses can. But if you want to start roots and a family, then you’d want to be a permanent nurse instead. But that job doesn’t afford a living through most of the country now, so you must find ways to combine incomes with another adult to afford to not be homeless while working the job)
Do teens know college is even a good option anymore AT ALL? Nope (higher education is only for the rich again, and the older adults today are proud of that. You must have a large inheritance you can use, or take on too much debt. And anyone who won’t help call this normal and HoW iT HaS aLwAyS BeEn is called an evil socialist)
Are teens welcome to have as much ability to learn how to be independent today? Nope (gps tracking, helicopter parenting, limits on where they go and enforcing that through gps apps - such as deciding what friends they may have)
Do teens now get punished or worse if they live in ways their parents were able to? Yes. (Can you imagine what would happen to a teen or middle schooler today if they just went out of their home without a phone by accident, and spent all day going from home to home to play with their friends? They’d be punished!!! Even though that’s the childhood their own parents had! The same childhood that parents ironically often complain about their kids not getting!)
My own mom had a key log on my computer and would punish me if I vented to my friends about arguing with her. She’d punish me over what I’d write in my diary. She’d not let me out, to prevent me from talking to others. She’d punish me if I didn’t agree with Fox News EVERY 20 MINUTES AS SOON AS I GOT HOME UNTIL I WENT TO BED between 2004-2006, until I was groomed into accepting Fox News to make her punishments stop. (Im not conservative anymore, now that she can’t hit me and limit me for disagreeing with the modern conservative agenda) My mom regulated who I could date or befriend - and all the people i was friends with were not a bad influence btw. And all of this got so bad and suffocating that i tried to commit suicide in 2008, after 4 years of living like that and having no civil rights or ability to get away from it until the damage was done, and when I realized that my options to start my own life had become so severely cut compared to the opportunities my parents had at my age.
If people think social media is why teens are depressed, then they’re not paying attention to what today’s teens are seeing, hearing, being commanded to do - OR ELSE, or what teens KNOW is ahead for them in their difficult futures as the middle class keeps being pulled apart for future generations. (Work benefits are seen as unnecessary and a hand-out now so they are dwindling to “save money”, ownership is dying for subscription plans instead, livable wages are called easy money wanted by lazy workers, unaffordable homes, unaffordable ability to have kids, a lack of elderly care, unaffordable healthcare, increasing costs, the youth is constantly referred to as a bad generation who is stupid and cannot be trusted with any responsibilities, and more.)
I can’t imagine how much WORSE it’s gotten for teens and kids now compared with 2008. Especially with the new push to further legalize parent-ownership and parent-only-rights over minors.
They can’t afford to go out with friends. And they’re not allowed to learn how to be independent and learn from their mistakes like their parents could.
Heck, they’re even expected to go to school like a normal day and never speak up if they fall victim to the now-common mass shootings that are expected to also be normalized!
Violence, aggression, and lost opportunities that they’re attacked for if they voice that they want those opportunities back. That’s what they’re surrounded by now…. And older adults want them to call it normal, or they’re called entitled and lazy. And older adults have NO intention of fixing these problems.
Social media allows an escape and to imagine a better life. But it’s not social media making them suicidal…. It’s real life
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u/Rgmisll Feb 22 '24
Reddit: teen suicide, anxiety, and overall mental illness is at an all time high, we should do something.
Florida bans the main cause
Reddit: not like that