The Social Dilemma is a documentary on Netflix that aims to get us to delete our social media accounts because they're controlling our lives. It certainly had an impact on me: As soon as I finished watching it, I immediately signed into all my social media accounts and, instead of deleting them, posted this blog explaining how stupid that was.
So how bad is social media really? To give us some idea, the show opens with a bunch of super-progressive developers recalling stories of when they used to work at various tech companies (e.g. Facebook, Google) and how they left because they're all evil. However, when pushed by the interviewer on why they think they're evil, they fall silent, seemingly too emotional to give an answer, and conveniently providing a pause so that we might recognise their bravery. They choke up, and claim they cannot put their answer into words, which is hardly surprising, because they don't really have one.
Regardless, the show launches into an attempt to tarnish social media apps and to shock and horrify us. It does so by revealing that these apps "use our own psychology against us" (whatever that means). Specifically, they refer to the way these apps deliberately organise posts they think we'll find most interesting first and, when they suspect we're getting bored (our scroll speed starts to slow down) and we're about to leave, they'll hit us with something else to pique our interest and keep us there a bit longer. This allows them to target us with more ads as, the more time you spend on a social media website, the more revenue it generates. Clearly, you're supposed to feel outraged by this revelation and think "wow, that's really evil". All I could think though was "yeah, that's pretty smart".
Just in case you can't follow the arguments they make, the show has an utterly bizarre drama series running alongside it, featuring a "typical" family who have fallen victim to the perils of social media. In an early scene, the mother suggests all the family members place their phones in a glass jar and cannot touch them until they've finished dinner. This starts off well until one hears that they've got a notification on their phone and proceeds to smash the jar open so they can read it. This, apparently, is an every day example of family life. It is, they claim, a stark reminder of how addictive social media can be.
Except it isn't. If you can't go one mealtime without checking your phone, you have issues that extend far beyond anything you can blame Facebook for. It's not like addiction or child disobedience is anything new. What would happen, for instance, if you told the same child they weren't allowed any cookies. I'd imagine that, pretty soon, you'd find them with one hand in the cookie jar. In fact, I'm pretty sure that's where the expression comes from.
At one point in the show, the same delightful child tries to score some admiration from her followers on Instagram by posting some tragic 'duckface' selfies. Unfortunately, for her, this backfires, with one telling her that her ears look a bit big in one of them. The conclusion? Instagram is evil and we should all delete our accounts immediately.
Well, hold on just a second, because I'm pretty sure this stuff doesn't just happen on Instagram. The show talks about bullying like it never existed before social media. Of course, bullying isn't fun anywhere, but you cannot seriously deny the reality that, if this didn't happen on Instagram it would almost certainly happen on the playground. You cannot lay the blame on social media for behaviour that already exists in the real world.
If you're still not convinced, the show then takes aim at social media companies that learn things about us and tailor content specifically to us. They explain that they monitor our interests and use this to filter out content we probably won't find very interesting and, instead, tell us about products we are likely to be genuinely interested in and send us videos they think we might enjoy.
Bastards.
This, of course, is how social media apps work and, if you've spent more than five seconds thinking about it, you'll know this already. If not, then, yes, perhaps you shouldn't be on it, and no doubt lots of people will now think twice about whether they want to keep their social media accounts and will start deleting them. "I'm not going to be a cog in a capitalist machine...", they'll say, peering over their designer sunglasses on their shiny iPhone, "...I'll never let a company take advantage of me".
Netflix managed to drag out the cons of social media for an hour and a half, but I'm pretty sure I could film one on the pros for about ten. That's because there's absolutely no denying the fact that social media has made my life better. Google has saved me money on my heating bills, it keeps me organised, and provides me a level of home automation that makes me feel like a wizard. Facebook makes it much easier to reach my friends if I want to organise something. I can also sell things via their marketplace, attend local events I wouldn't have heard of usually, and support local businesses and meet new people in the process. If the price of all this is that I exist as part of a faceless database with billions of other people, then - you know what - I think I'm okay with that.
The biggest lesson I've learned from this though is that social media impacts you differently depending on what you want from it. If you use it as a practical convenience, then it will most likely make your life better. If, however, you use it to push an agenda, broadcast to others how amazing your life is, and to seek social approval, then I'm afraid it will probably worsen the downward spiral you're already in.
The dilemma isn't whether we should abandon social media; it's simply that people don't understand how to use it.
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