Social Media started off as a fun way to keep in touch with friends and family. Now, it seems to be all people are concerned about. Any free moment is spent looking at instagram, scrolling through snapchat, laughing at tweets, or taking pictures for VSCO. Everything revolves around social media and constantly looking at what other people are doing at all times. This brilliant invention has become an issue for most of the world and has turned into a negative thing. Now, it is more of an addiction then just an app.

Social media has a negative affect in multiple aspects of everyday life, and more and more people are starting to notice this issue. People are finding themselves doing nothing but constantly and obsessively checking social media.

“Social media is an issue for me sometimes because whenever I am with my school I will snapchat my dance friends, and when I am at dance, I snapchat my school friends.” Freshman, Siera Boffa describes, honestly. “It’s also an issue when I feel like I need to block someone or when I’m receiving rude comments” Boffa adds.

Many people see social media as an in between of helpful and smart and pointless and stupid.

“Social media has a big impact because nowadays if you’re doing something, or if you’re going out, you’re snapchatting it with a geofilter. Nobody cares but you still do it. I use snap to talk to friends when I don’t have their phone number, so sometimes it’s reliable.” Freshman, Jun Hong truthfully responds. “However, there are other times mindlessly scrolling through instagram and snapchat. It really does play big impact but it’s not good.” Hong adds thoughtfully.

People have lost touch with the real world and having real life conversations because of social media.

English Teacher, Ms. Pfleging  said, “Yeah, even with my friends it’s similar to what Siera said. If I’m out with my friends and everyone’s on their phone then I’m just wondering ‘why are we hanging out.’ Even with my older sister and my mom, they are always on their phones–even at dinner.”

For some people, social media is now a complete waste of time and way worse compared to when it first came out.

“At first, I wasn’t allowed to get snapchat, so when I did get it I was so excited, then,I ended up using it all the time.” Freshman, Simmie Brisman tells her story. “Now, I hate when people send me selfies on snapchat, I’m just like ‘okay.’ I just send a blank screen back.” Brisman continues, annoyed.

Social media is not just causing stress and self esteem issues, but it is also affecting student’s work.

“I feel like once I’m on my phone, I don’t start my homework for another 30 minutes. Or, sometimes, I’ll just subconsciously press on the home button, it’s a really bad habit.” Freshman, Daniel Albert explains the weird ways social media affects his life.  “I’ll go on, look for 10 seconds, turn my phone off, then just press it again without actually making the decision to do it in my head.” Albert continues about how when using social media, there isn’t even a thought process occuring.

75% of people check their phones before falling asleep, according to a recent study. 60% of people feel uneasy when their phones are left at home, 77% of parents and teens have had arguments over phone usage, 64% of teens admit they are addicted to their phones and social media, 26% of car accidents are caused by phones, and 89% of teens have more than one social media app that is used on a daily basis

Cornell University’s Steven Strogatz , “Social media sites can make it more difficult for us to distinguish between the meaningful relationships we foster in the real world, and the numerous casual relationships formed through social media. By focusing so much of our time and psychic energy on these less meaningful relationships, our most important connections, he fears, will weaken.

He stresses that the lines of what kind of relationship you have with someone can get blurred due to the confusion of social media. It creates fake friendships and it is hard to distinguish who are your real friends online.

Social media first began as a harmless way to keep in touch with others, keep one’s lifestyle updated, and simply post “cool” pictures. However, now it has turned into much more than an app. It hooks people in, makes them obsess, takes them to the extreme. Now, people will do anything for followers, likes, comments, retweets, or republishes. Social media has taken over the minds of society and potentially the world.