Stop blaming them and help them embrace change

I like LBC radio. I am a big fan. I watched a clip recently and it provoked a very considered response from me. So, here I am, writing it down in my blog...

Here is the clip I watched:
http://www.lbc.co.uk/radio/presenters/ian-collins/social-media-damaging-young-mental-health/ 

Now, I appreciate that I may be taking Ian Collins' comments out of context because frankly the clip is less than 2 minutes long and I didn't listen to the entire show...  But then, isn't that the nature of media these days? - short soundbites designed to create a reaction; to encourage engagement and ultimately drive traffic that results in advertising revenues.


The irony flowing through all of this is incredible by the way and it is not lost on me.

*deep breath in*



We have a 'media' outlet acting like a social media platform but blaming social media for 'social' problems and suggesting that the cause is too much 'advertising' around how lives could be... wait, didn't the media start this?

Yep, there is more, and this is me completing the irony loop by 'engaging' - using a blog that is monetized through Google's advertising platform...

*and breath out*

Too much irony. Head. Exploded. Anyway, moving on...

The headline that pulled me into Ian's clip was a post on Facebook: 

Putting social media aside for a moment, can we consider a few other contributing factors please? I promise I will loop back to social media later...

So why are young people experiencing increased rates of anxiety and depression? (putting social media aside for the moment)

Getting an Education and a Job...

Let’s begin by thinking about the cost of education and the mountains of debt a young person needs to accrue before they can even begin to compete in today’s job market... Higher and Further education is no longer free or financially encouraged like it was for people born in the 60s and 70s. Also, what does a young person study these days? Digital transformation, AI and automation is creating a very uncertain employment landscape. Jobs we never imagined would be automated are being well and truly automated out of existence. Yes, new jobs are being created but what skills do you need for them? This unprecedented pace of change is evidenced in the average employment tenure rates which have dropped from a plump and very certain 10+ years to less than 2 in most industries and even less in others (take the gig economy as an example). Previous generations, simply put their tie on (or steel toe cap boots) and went to the same place everyday and did that job until they got bored or dropped dead (or both - I must admit, I have no imperical proof that boredom causes death but... I reckon it could).

So, as a youngster, you know you need to get qualifications in order to compete in an increasingly competitive and transient job market. You also know that these qualifications will likely see you build up a significant debt, but the job you need (in order to pay off the debt) is extremely transient and you have no idea what skills you will likely need in 2 years time let alone the 5 years that FE and HE takes in order to secure the job in the first place...

(phew... still with me?)

Next Up - Finding somewhere to call home...

Now, let’s talk about where to live. Let’s say you manage to get an education and find a way to thrive in this increasingly transient job market... no matter how hard it is, it is entirely possible :-) As a young person, you are however still probably in debt from your student fees/loans. This debt is probably because you are now paying off the mortgage for the place that you rent from some capitalist who owns several homes (probably born in the 60s, 70s - possibly 80s). (Great huh?)

What if you want to buy a property? Ah, House prices are the highest they have ever been - EVER. We are not looking at £10k -all in- for a flat anymore... That’s the deposit for a shoebox where the kitchen, toilet and bedroom are the same room (100+ miles outside of London). Long gone are the 60's and 70's where smart students could buy property with their student grants... (an extreme case I admit, but indulge me the 'soundbite' to illustrate a very valid point - stick it on my irony tab... ;-)

If youngsters want a house today, they are looking at hundreds of thousands of pounds of debt for even the most depressing living conditions. Debt, which is inevitably secured by the bank against a risk profile that factors in things like... job tenure. 

You see, most people don't have rich parents with a spare £100k kicking around to buy them a flat in London (or any other major city with good employment prospects for that matter) so the bank is their only option... yep, these are also the same banks that betrayed our trust and required a taxpayer bailout (but we don't have time to go into all of that)

The reason most young people grow up poor is that the distribution of wealth in this country is quite frankly embarrassing for a mature democracy that calls itself civilised. Ever increasing amounts of wealth is being funnelled toward the tax dodging upper echelons of society where the super-rich collect money like trophies to fuel their heightened sense of self-worth and entitlement. Combine this with the fact that the UK and the US are led by a bunch of socially regressive conservatives pursuing policies of isolation, austerity and international dissonance and you have a the perfect recipe for anxiety. 

Yep. If I were a youngster growing up today, I’d be quite anxious looking at these 'simultaneous equations' (putting it politely) and wondering how on Earth I balance them.

Wouldn't you? 

Now, back to social media... 
If the above didn’t give you anxiety, this should. Without dropping into the detail and just staying at a high level, the problems with social media are really rather scary. Facebook, Google and Snapchat (to name a few) are employing hundreds of phds around the world in order to work out how to keep you on their site. Netflix's CEO even admitted that their biggest challenge is humans requiring sleep :-!

These companies are gathering mountains of data about you and selling it to the highest bidder so that they may better target you with 'adverts' or make sure that you renew your subscription (as is the case with Netflix). These internet giants, understand how to make their products addictive and they understand how to optimise their platforms in order to tap into your strongest emotions (anxiety, outrage, etc) so that they can extract the highest possible levels of engagement from you. You are the product, make no mistakes about that, but you see none of the proceeds... just the so called ‘value’ of using their honeypot platform. 

Sucks to be young... or does it?

Every generation has its BIG challenge and each challenge is unique (as is the generation that faces it) and this generation's challenge is about working out what role technology plays in the building of human societies. Technology is thrusting itself into our lives and the rate of change is out of control. 

I am not suggesting we need to slow down, I am suggesting that we need to be more thoughtful about what we are building and why we are building it. Right now, we run the risk of raising a generation of people with no real identity other the digital footprint that has been generated around them in order to drive more targeted advertising - depressing right?

Technology is breaking/disrupting pretty much every business model we know of, who is to say that capitalism itself is immune? Do we need to revisit our assumptions around this economic philosophy? Big questions right? They define a generation... 

And, change is a very much afoot because our youngsters -disempowered as they are- won’t put up with this sh*t for too much longer and it’s only a matter of time before the backward thinking of old crony capitalists gets brushed aside and a new fairer model ushered in. They won’t live forever- at least I hope not. 

Moreover, whilst social media may well need to change or be subjected to some form of regulation, the internet itself is perhaps the greatest and most liberabing invention of all time. Yes, our youngsters may find it tough to get on with their lives in the social/economic conditions we have left for them, but the internet is perhaps the most powerful tool any generation has had at their disposal - it just needs wielding properly. 

So, rather than looking at new things to blame, perhaps we should be embracing change and helping our younger generations figure out how to make the most of it. 

Thanks for Reading,

Chancey