Social Media has had such a high, negative impact, we need to focus on the causes.

[Shoeless Louis]

In particular, a few recent articles that show Facebook’s disregard for our democracy.

Special treatment for “conservative” content which heavily tilts the playing field.

Multiple articles available on Techdirt, regarding their algorithms. Particularly this:

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20210221/12145046290/yet-another-story-shows-how-facebook-bent-over-backwards-to-put-place-different-rules-conservatives.shtml

——————-

Also,, Shutting down platforms, to prevent honest appraisal of FB’s manipulation. Ala:

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20210806/12140147316/facebook-acting-badly-shuts-down-researchers-accounts-over-claims-privacy-violations-that-dont-stand-up-to-scrutiny.shtml

and…

https://crooksandliars.com/2021/08/facebook-blocks-accounts-investigating

(These two links may be nearly the same, I found the crooks and liars one right before I hit send.)

[endinequalitynow]

3. Social media will have negative consequences for society.

SM will hurt society by promoting materialism. People will overspend on pricey shoes and become trend followers. The disparity between haves and have-nots will be made clear on all platforms. Eventually , you'll get explosions of anger like the capitol siege as misinformation becomes religion.

Social media will hurt traditional power-structures like the Catholic Church by exposing that Science preaches no after-life. As these power-structures which have been in place for centuries implode , there will be a lot of upheaval.

Republicans will suffer the most because of social media , because all of their pundits will be extremists who push the nomination of fringe candidates. Tucker Carlson can have a big audience , but if he wins the nomination he will lose because his views are so crazy for example.