The Social Dilemma: Addictions, Comparisons, Reality-Loss, Oh My!
According to their own website, “The Social Dilemma blends documentary investigation and narrative drama to disrupt the disrupters, unveiling the hidden machinations behind everyone’s favorite social media and search platforms” (The Social Dilemma, 2021). Essentially this docudrama goes into ruthless detail about the good, the bad, and the ugly of today’s social media platforms.
There were several moments in the film that resonated with my own experience, the most prominent being becoming overcome with a social media addiction. As the character Ben fell deeper and deeper into his addiction to media, it brought me back to last year during the height of the pandemic when I would quite literally spend all day on some sort of electronic device, endlessly scrolling through social medias like Instagram and TikTok, often alternating between the two for hours on end. I remember my screen time got crazy high, and was more than half the amount of my hours spent awake. When I look back at last year’s lowkey addiction now I cringe, but I will admit that social media kept me entertained during those months of sitting inside- so much so that I didn’t even really recognize it as a problem at the time. The film is spot on when explaining that social media can get its grip on you, and once it does, it’s hard to break out of because sometimes the online world is seemingly better than the real one.
This distortion of realities, and which one you’d rather spend time in (physical or virtual), is real, as is the distortion of ourselves and our relationships. I’ll admit that I am a big fan of following large amounts of Instagram influencers, however, as I’ve gotten older I’ve gotten more careful about who I follow because I have definitely been negatively impacted by content creators who strive to make their lives look effortless and perfect, whether it be their body, relationship, home, and so on. Most creators that I follow now tend to be very forthcoming about how their lives, bodies, and relationships aren’t as perfect as they may seem. This is for good reason, which is that it’s extremely easy for social media to become a highlight reel. So creators who recognize this and help bring followers back down to a more realistic reality are inspiring to me.
The film’s ending consisted of a lot of talk of artificial intelligence- something that has always freaked me out, frankly. In the film, Tristan Harris says “It’s not about the technology being the existential threat, it’s the technology’s ability to bring out the worst in society. And the worst in society being the existential threat.” This quote is extremely hard hitting. Anyone remember the movie Wall-E, and how all the people who once occupied earth now only spent their time sitting in flying chairs attached to computer screens? This is a clear example of how poorly things can go wrong when technology brings out the worst in people- particularly their laziness and loose grip on reality. I think that one of the most important things to keep in mind when developing healthy relationships with reality is to find a good balance, and not leave the real world behind- as tempting as that may be sometimes. We weren’t created to stare at screens. We were created to be around friends, eat good food, explore the outdoors, and so many more beautiful, exciting things outside of technology. If we don’t lose sight of that, I think (and hope!) that we’ll be okay.
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