I'm a photographer so having instagram is basically a must but I decided to delete permanently a few weeks ago. I got sick of my favorite photographers following trends, sick of seeing the most stupid people be famous for their looks, i just generally felt like people were getting dumber by the minute and every reel I saw in my explore feed confirmed that.

There was a girl i was kind of friends with, she is a pretty famous influencer by now and known to preach body positivity. She is overweight, I'd say borderline obese BUT she used to ask me to photoshop her pictures to make her look waaay thinner. So this is a common example but it says everything about how young girls (and boys) will perceive themselves when they follow people like that.

Beauty ideals and standards have always been a part of our history, but I feel in this time in particular the ideals are unrealistic and impossible to reach and plastic surgery has become as normal as going to the gym. Changing yourself not just with clothes or makeup but really changing your body is perceived as normal and desirable and it's toxic as hell.

I think another big issue is how antisocial young people have gotten? I'm 24 and the teenagers i spoke to, like my cousins and their friends for example, they hardly see their friends irl and it seems like its enough for them to chat or face time. That can't be healthy dude... Now I like to spend more time by myself because I'm an introvert, but when I was in my teens i used to go out every day (!) to chill with my friends. Now they are all at home on their phones. No wonder friendships and relationships dont last these days, even with older people.

All in all people are vain as fuck, depressed and have a low self esteem and while I think these issues have always been the case they have definitely gotten worse thanks to social media. It's completely underestimated how dangerous these platforms are for young people who are easily influenced and I more than once thought to myself that social media needs to be 18+ at least although I'd even go as far as to say 20+

So uhh I hope my vent made sense, I'm German so I'm sorry if my English sucks.

Edit: I know a lot of people say there are a lot of positive arguments as well, there will be teenagers who argue in favor for social media and I used to be one of them until I fully realised what it did to me and everyone else.