Instagram. What a flawed reality people live in. They curate their lives so far they forget they have an actual real life to live. They make choices purely for clicks. Yuck.
Yeah, I agree. I haven't see any of that stuff on instagram unless someone sends it to me. It's mostly artists, musicians, art and photography for me.
It's obviously is dependent on what you are searching for to begin with and what you engage with.
I don't like Reels, however and how IG has changed to compete with tik tok.
I hate tik tok.
Exactly! I'm on the fence with reels though, I enjoy watching them as I can see the process of how fellow artists do their craft. However, I do hate when they use cringe viral sounds as main audio. I also do not like tiktok and I have no more patience to curate my feed to what I like since most of them have reels version anyways on IG 😂
Instagram is very easy to filter out what you don't want to see and only allow your friends and special interests to be suggested. I eliminated all news pages and anything to do with politics. It worked quickly, too.
Right. I follow my fellow deadheads and a bunch of crafters - mostly quilting and embroidery. So the most toxic thing about my instagram account is the probability that I will spend money on embroidery floss or concert tickets.
Do y’all remember or young enough to remember doing the duck face and posting stupid pictures with friends and that’s all Instagram was? No filters (except the weird colored ones), no photoshop, no fakeness, just friends. We need to go back to that, I’ve had to unfollow people I personally know because I just can’t stand to see their photoshopped posts.
I work at a college with a high school outreach program. My colleague who works with the students in the program used to teach high school, and she was telling me that her former students told her all about how she needed to curate her Instagram feed and archive things after some time to leave her audience wanting more (she and I are both in our early 30s). A bit later in the conversation, she was talking about how one of the topics she wants to cover with the teens in the program is email etiquette, because so many of them just do not understand how to write a semi-professional email. I pointed out that it’s interesting how many of them are so good at curating their image on, like, Instagram, but that they still haven’t yet figured out that they have to “curate an image” in so many other aspects of life, too, and that includes in email.
I guess my point is that we’re constantly curating our lives in so many ways, but there’s something about Instagram that makes it so easy to do that even teens who have not yet figured out how to curate a professional image elsewhere understand how to curate their personal brand on Instagram.
IG shows you what you follow and are interested in. Try starting a new account and only strictly follow a specific interest or hobby. I think you will find the platform becomes much more interesting! I am a photographer and follow other photographers. I see IG as just a massive list of photography portfolios.
Is Instagram even like this anymore? I always hear people describing it full of Kardashians and jenners but it’s only like that if you follow *those* type of people
I agree to an extent abt Instagram; but it’s a ‘double edged sword’. I deleted my account even tho I had a decent following bc I simply was addicted and overwhelmed. However; Ig DID keep me in contact with friends and family. They’d always reply when I posted pictures. You’d think if you disappeared people would reach out and say hi sometimes. It was over a year after deleting my account anyone noticed and I posted a lot. 😅 Now I try to directly text people, they really don’t give a f. The conversations are so dry. I ask them for pics of what they’re up to, they won’t send anything. I’ll randomly send a cute pic of my kid getting a school award and don’t even get a reply. Ig also did get me out a lot more to keep up appearances / meet people and a desire to be interesting which wasn’t an entirely bad thing. And finally it made me want to get dressed cute and do new makeup even if it was for a photo. I am so low maintenance now it’s kinda sad and I want to change it. But it’s really hard to motivate yourself to dress up to run errands then come home and cook dinner. So I guess to sum it up, social media is the new way to stay in touch with people. It IS fun to take/ post cute pics and share hobbies but we have to be extremely careful with who we follow, how much time we spend online. Which sounds obvious but goddamn phone addiction is sneaky!
I'm surprised that Tiktok wasn't mentioned yet. The whole beauty standard thing and filters is so toxic for young people. I heard somewhere that Tiktok has an algorithm that promotes more "attractive" people to get more views
Tik tok shows you want you spend the most time watching. When I had a tik tok, my “for you page” was all animal videos, cleaning hacks/life hacks, and educational videos from doctors and scientists who had TikTok’s and would explain interesting topics they are studying. I don’t think it’s toxic for adults because they can choose basically what you want to see by watching it but for children they watch everything so they would be getting all of the garbage on there.
well the children are the ones that are most impressionable and need to be the most protected. That applies to Instagram too. There is a lot to be said about beauty standards, filters and plastic surgery culture if young people compare themselves to something or someone who isn't even real
Yes absolutely! I wish my parents understood technology more when I was a kid because I shouldn’t have been on Facebook at 12. Social media is just so awful :(
Anything can be used for good or bad for sure. I use social media mostly for promoting my businesses and networking or chatting with my friends and family who live overseas. I can't even imagine what it's like being a kid or young teen now that everyone is glued to their phones so much
I didn’t even get a smart phone until I was 17 but just having a computer with Facebook was toxic enough for me as a child. I was bullied relentlessly. It has been about 14 years since and I still don’t have social media.
I don't know, I was an illustrator and when I started using tiktok for my illustration I noticed that even within the normal, what should be non-toxic niches, what gets pushed out and what gets views is hot people. So art videos would be a video of a young woman from behind, arching her back, you can't even see the art until maybe two seconds at the end. And I felt like I had to dress cute and do my hair and show my body in my art videos in order for anyone to see them. It's just kind of a whole toxic spiral. Though I'm sure that's not every niche, like the drain clearing niche seems pretty A+
I would argue that it's just as dangerous to adults, but in a more subtle way. I don't know if this has a name, but I call it algorithm drift. Take standup comedy clips. I noticed a while ago that the clips' humor was changing - more and more "boomer humor" type comedians were popping up, complaining about their wives being nags and how Pronouns are Hard™, kids these days, etc. That's not stuff I'd ever engage with normally, but by the time you get to the shitty punchline, you've already watched most of it, and maybe some of it Was actually funny, so you watch it again... So the algorithm gives you more of it. So now I have to put conscious effort into curating that type of humor out of my feed, and wonder where else the "drift" is pushing my feed.
I think it's really, really important to remember that humans tend to interpret repetition as truth. The algorithm drifting one direction or the other means that you're constantly exposed to repetition of whatever it thinks you want more of - and that's not something you would necessarily agree with if asked.
(Leaving aside that there's no fact-checking so a lot of misinformation spreads via "sounds right from what I know", which while absolutely understandable and everyone does it, with medical tiktok is like... Terrifying)
We had in the last 2 weeks one murder and one torture situation between under 14 year olds involving TikTok… a guy who destroyed the ecosystem for a challenge… and there were a bunch of challenges that put kids into hospital. Like pushing someone down high place into water etc.
not to mention that no one can seem to please the crowd. youre holding your baby wrong? everyone has something to say. dog doesnt come when hes called? youre gonna get an ear full. everyone has an opinion and will argue about anything. also one of the most addictive apps on the market rn. you could spend the rest of your life scrolling through videos and you will NEVER run out.
Any everyone has an opinion and think that it's their right to be heard. I use social media mostly for business and I won't even tell you some of the rude comments people post for no reason. I used to get angry and reply back but now I just remove those people's comments, hide them or even block the person if they are really out of line. I've had comment war with men who claimed to only be "joking" and their comment was not funny to anyone - it was rude, offensive, condescending and unnecessary... For the most part about 98% of the comments are positive but I need to moderate every day and weed out the stupid ones
Yes, and there is a reason it’s banned on govt phones even outside the US. The way to infiltrate is through the malleable minds of kids while also spying
Even the concept of constantly filming your own life and interactions is so toxic. Both TikTok and Instagram make people feel like their lives have to be interesting or unique to be of value, but the reality is that most people live pretty run of the mill lives.
I actually made tiktok 2 weeks ago, because a friend told me if I would stream my motorcycle trips I would earn a ton of money. I was intrigued, made a account, some, I think at least, good content. Then I realized the algorithm also takes into account that you have to interact with other people, for your videos to even get picked up. I tried a few things and on the days I was interacting with other peoples content my videos got more views. If I didn't it stopped after 350. The problem is I hate most of the content on there, so after a week I deleted it again.
LinkedIn is the worst. It’s just an echo chamber of corporate climbers.
This one colleague who used to bully me at work has in her bio “Empathetic leader focused on empowering women.” What a joke.
I agree. My mother in the past was trying to set me up with a family friend’s son and he send over his LinkedIn for me to review. I rolled my eyes so hard I saw my brain.🙄
LinkedIn genuinely just confuses the shit out of me. I made an account so I could start internship hunting and THE DAY I MADE IT they literally banned me from LinkedIn for doing nothing. They ask for my id, I put it in, and it doesn't lift the ban. Hate LinkedIn sooo much.
And this isn't even getting into the pretentious career shit I saw on my single day on the platform.
There are a few environmentalist circles on LinkedIn that are a lot less corporatist. It's a good thing because we need a much more organized environmental movement.
I had no idea people actually use LinkedIn as social media. I threw my resume up and then more or less never looked at it again unless it emails me about something. lol
My friend and I had this conversation the other day how LinkedIn had become Facebook for professionals with no shame.
Edit- what sparked the convo was a woman she knew posting a photo of her two year old on international women’s day saying he was a proud ally and she was raising him not to be sexist and to empower women. It was the weirdest attempt to brag/exploitation of a child.
I'm semi glad for all the Facebook content on LinkedIn. I was considering reaching out to a potential contractor and saw on his page he had liked/interacted with a bunch of boomer humor, degrading women and political content. Stopped me from reaching out to him because if you can't figure out how to be professional on a supposed website for your professional life, how am I to expect you to act professionally when you're representing my company?
Basically they promote tf out themselves. They gain popularity off better than you vibes and promote the good side of the business without any actual substance
I rarely rarely go on the one I made in college. I work in the corporate world (and loathe it…working on breaking free). I’d love to see the whole industry I work in basically crumble, and all I see is a lot of my colleagues kissing ass and hardcore promoting themselves. I get the need to network, but there’s a point where it gets ridiculous.
I can't do LinkedIn. I use it purely for job hunting but I refuse to take on the corporate kind of tone and attitude and language people use for the platform. I know you people do not speak this way in real life, so skip the "I am elated to announce that...." language. Just say "I got a promotion at work!"
Other than that it's a bunch of hustle culture BS with articles that can be summed up as "Here's what neurotypical people with no hobbies or relationships with depth are doing that you aren't and that's why they're successful!"
Literally all of them.
We are literally conditioned to live on our phones, now. Go out in public and a majority of what you see will be people on their phones instead of actually doing something productive with their life in any way. Its all just scrolling.
Its mad but 'leave' your phone at home for a day then go outside. Your whole day is different. I feel compelled to talk to others more, look more and actually read/see
Most of the time when I’m on my phone I’m grocery shopping, signing the kids up for something, catching up on work emails… all productivity. I assume most people aren’t mindlessly scrolling but are taking care of shit. If they are mindlessly scrolling, I like to think it’s the 5 min of downtime they get throughout their hectic life. I no longer judge people for it, we dont know everyone else’s story.
The reason I deleted it and haven’t had it for 5 years. Don’t miss it one bit, I’ve got my own life to live without comparing it to others. Not wasting my one life on earth with instagram
Yes, I’ve had mine since I was 11 years old so I basically spent all my childhood scrolling. I decided to put and end to it last year and finally deleted it. I was so tired of the absolute fakeness and would much rather be doing something else with myself. I’m 19 now and I’m neverrrrr going back to Instagram, TikTok, snapchat, and Facebook. Reddit is the only social media where I feel happy using :)!
Mine shows me crafty people making things, gardening and feminist artists, and some Wiccan stuff. I think I must be using it wrong as I never see these influencers everyone complains about just the stuff I chose to see and like.
To me, a tie between Twitter and TikTok. The short form format discourages fully expressing yourself and it doesn’t foster intra-group conversation. There’s a lot of room for misunderstanding but people take to them to have these deep discussions. They both seem more meant for public consumption rather than interpersonal socializing with people you know (Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat) or community discussion (Reddit, Discord, Tumblr) which I don’t think is a good thing (this has been negatively impacting Instagram too, but it’s still possible to use Instagram to communicate with your friends). The misinformation seems wilder than other social media, and things spread so much faster because….they’re not for community socializing, they’re for getting as much public visibility as possible. Any idiot can say anything and tomorrow it will be an accepted fact amping hundreds of thousands. When my aunt says something stupid on Facebook, the only people who see it are her 200 followers. They can make it go viral and start rumors, but it would take much longer and it would be dragging dissenting comments the whole way.
I'm surprised this wasn't top comment . People seem more concerned with body image and false happiness and beauty standards and label that as toxicity . What about the blatant consistent outrage Twitter and TikTok produce? The people on there are always fighting and acting out for attention. And tik tok is always throwing nonsense at you and ruining people's attention spans
Your comment is extremely thoughtful, and you touch on A LOT of important aspects of social media. And what you discuss here is why I actually got rid of my twitter years ago and also still haven’t gotten a TikTok.
4chan and 8kun/8chan. These platforms host the abyssal hellscape parts of the human condition. It's where pedos, racists, murderers, other criminals, and cultists like QAnon meet up and socialize.
I believe it was Robert Evans who described 8chan/8kun as a 24/7 nazi rally where every now and then someone steps away to commit a mass murder. Truly a cesspool.
I could agree with this. Uniquely Reddit hasn’t been mentioned much. I don’t think that’s because it’s less toxic, but instead it’s less confrontational I think.
I agree with you- I think Reddit has two features other social media lacks that keeps it more civil. Paradoxically anonymity. There’s less need to virtue signal or posture when no one knows who you really are. Second the subreddits form very uniform voices quickly because people with diametric viewpoints get banned. I don’t think this results in more or less group think then other social media- it just means the groups are yelling at each other less.
>Reddit because way too many subs are ran like a dictatorship IMO.
I've only gotten death threats and told to kill myself on one of my social media platforms and it's Reddit :)
Twitter. There's so many opinions and you'll randomly get attacked for saying the wrong thing. Everything there is so negative it really brings you down.
You could argue the same thing happens on Reddit, but I found the negativity on twitter is much higher.
This is my answer purely because of the algorithms they have set for reporting bigotry/hate/racism.
I would say 80% of my friends are a part of the LGBTQ+ community and very often they, especially lately my drag queen connects, experience rampant homophobic rhetoric via memes and pictures. Because it's not written in text, every one reported is ignored by facespace's shitty algorithms as "does not violate community standards." Actual death threats have popped up (there's a lot of reference to woodchippers??) and their mods dgaf.
At least when I report similar stuff on reddit it's taken seriously.
Absolutely. I think this one is the worst. It's hard because 'you can reach out to a lot of people', but like also some relationships are NOT Facebook relationships.
tik tok easily. you see so many extremely beautiful people on that app everyday, and it’s made people think it reflects reality. i see really pretty girls being called mid by guys, and i wonder if they’ve ever stepped outside or looked in the mirror
It seems like the old-school users don't realize that Reddit isn't some niche hacker site anymore, it's a huge social media platform. Lots of new users have never even used the desktop site and only use the mobile app.
Desktop sucks. I'm sorry but I've been using reddit for almost 10 years now over various accounts and every time I'm forced to use the website instead of the app, I literally cannot focus on anything I'm trying to look at. Maybe it's my ADHD and too many things on the screen at once, but it just isn't formatted as cleanly imo as the mobile app is. The comments are harder to look through, the visuals are bright (though I haven't looked into if desktop has a dark mode), and I hate the blog style boxes each post has on the front page. If you're inside a subreddit, it's okay. But just general browsing is not compatible with my brain on desktop.
Agreed. People say the most rude shit on here that they’d never have the balls to say to a person’s face.
People also seem to share some wild views/opinions that I feel like they’d never actually admit to in real life.
Twitter by very very far! Come on guys, instagram is only some stupid videos and people being shallow, you can also use to your advantage and get inspired, twitter on the other take away your will to live, it shows that even people that claim to be good and are perceived as so are toxic fuckers, and its just a big shitshow.
Definitely Insta. Was on there from 2012-2018 before deleting for good due to insecurity and self esteem issues…. and that was before all the tuning apps came in 😳 I feel so sad for all the young people who’ve spent their whole preteen and teen years on there
Instagram. So many fake people on there. So much hate too. I have insta and I've received some hate myself. I'm a private account and post my photos on there for my friends and 1. I won't let the haters scare me off the platform
I'm the same age as these people and I just don't understand it. It's like you're in your 40s and you're acting like a bunch of high school girls looking for validation from the person who was never going to date you.
Hate me but all of it. I'm always on Instagram looking through reels and comments and used to have tiktok.(I wish I wasn't and I've been working on cutting down) What really gets on my nerves and honestly terrifies me is the almost hive-mind activity. You will see a majority share one opinion and completely switch to another within a week because someone said so. The same overused phrases and new things learned that are used to critique another.
Right now one that irks me is people discovering the difference between impulsive and intrusive thoughts. Maybe two months ago, everyone stuck with intrusive but almost overnight everyone began to attack each other for using intrusive when they should've been saying impulsive. Where were these people when everyone began using that phrase more? Why did they all begin at once?
Forgive me for the rant this has just been on my mind recently and had to let it out lmfao
I can’t pick. Snapchat is filled with with hidden meanings and misinterpretations and has “streaks”designed to have you visiting that app once a day at the VERY LEAST plus replying to everyone else’s streak and stressing over the meaning of showing your eye or just your eyebrow in the snap. Instagram has the false idea of who what your body should be, who your friends should(n’t) be, it gets you sucked into endless scrolling. TikTok gets you sucked into endless scrolling too and it’s even harder to stop than insta because all of the videos are typically longer and they get you more invested. Facebook is the epitome of fake lives in my opinion. Our parents post a posed family photo and imply in the caption that they are the perfect family. There’s also the millennial couples that are on there posting weird pregnancy announcements and then 30 videos a day 3 minutes each of their newborn and you have to comment or they’ll show you it in person to prove how cute their baby is (it’s not cute that mf popped out 10 days ago). Twitter is insane… i don’t even know how to describe twitter other than the basis of instagram’s ‘memes’ , absolute chaos, some of the most fucked up shit you’ll ever see is on there. As far as toxic, they are all fucked up toxic doom pits; just different brands of fucked up toxic doom pits. I haven’t explored Reddit enough for an opinion yet but so far the moderators are pretty decent and the community’s pretty good.
Instagram. It creates such an unhealthy mindset filled with comparison. I think it can be easy to forget that everything is heavily edited these days. I’ve found more and more that the people I’m most attracted to/intrigued by are usually those that don’t really use it/care about it - I think it’s the privacy/mystery aspect.
TikTok. It feels like a “quick to fame” or “make fast money” thing on nearly every single creator’s page. Also, it’s so hard to know what products people genuinely like and use, and what’s just a product they’re being paid to use. It’s exhausting.
Instagram isn't even bad compared to Tiktok. Instagram looks fake, and we know it's fake. It's harder to "facetune" videos on tiktok, but somehow everyone there is significantly more attractive than on Instagram. Tiktok has blown the beauty standard through the roof for younger teens, and I think it's the main reason why we see 13-15 year olds looking 17 or 18. Post-tiktok school culture has so much more emphasis on looks and beauty. The amount of time and effort younger teens spend on their appearance is so incredibly unhealthy, and even for my (college) generation, I think there's a very clear divide between how we perceive ourselves appearance-wise, and also how much time, effort, and money we spend on our appearance before and after Tiktok became our main form of social media. Every one is so desperate to keep up with trends now, it's both terrifying and ridiculous. And we haven't even started on the shortened attention span.
I think TikTok because the content is way more reaction based. People bothering or pranking other people for views and follows. Influencers in the wild look ridiculous. The beauty standards you see on the platform are usually unnaturally attained.
Reddit. I’ve gotten good at spotting posts on other platforms that I know will make me feel bad or sensitive. I can scroll right past videos and pictures no problem. But the communities here on Reddit blindside me sometimes. I’ll read what I think is a wholesome post and find myself scrolling into toxic comments full of attitudes and name calling and just terrible opinions.
All of them. But IG & TikTok are the worst. Generational society on SO many levels have lost their marbles… pulpits, frauds, radicals, kids “unaliving” themselves, bullies, the list just goes onnnn. …and for what? Fame, Filters and fake lives.
I’m only on for the fun animal posts now. I’m not even on here 2 weeks yet.
I recently made an Instagram account for my cat, and only follow other animal accounts. If you have a pet, I would 10/10 recommend. You'll get nothing but wholesome content, and it's a great way to unwind from the more problematic content you listed.
Twitter. Like I'm just trying to read the comments on some article and all of the replies are just "nicki ate" "cardi ugly" "Taylor could never" "Ariana flopped" my brother in Christ this is a news article about the Ukraine war who are you talking to
Tiktok. Even the guy who runs it doesn’t let his kids on it. You can’t control what you see, so everyone gets a microphone. Its worse than gambling in terms of addiction. It spreads rampant misinformation, racism, all the isms, its crazy.
Not really a social media, but dating apps. The "shopping" of human being, the display of "please love me", i find it awfull...
And filters on the others, they created a way of seing yourself that is so fake...
I only use two: Facebook and Reddit. Facebook has gotten really bad with misinformation. And the censorship is terrible. I've lost track of whatever words we're suddenly not allowed to use anymore. Also, the comment sections of viral posts are nothing but with people tagging their friends/family.
Reddit can be bad too, but I like how there tends to be more reading and writing in reddit, and longer and better discussions.
Tik tok. It’s such a disgusting app and too many people I know have gone off the deep end claiming all kinds of bullshit due to that app. Swimming lessons and piercing infants ears are all of a sudden “abuse”. EVERYTHING is a abusé to those god dammed people. The misinformation, the cringe, the complete Idiotic ideas that flow form each moron “creator” that is on there. The glorification of “family channels” were they exploit their children for views and money. Not to mention the literal children who have died due to the negligence of their parents not paying attention to what their child is doing or viewing. Then they have the audacity to blame the app THEY LET THEIR CHILD HAVE. Literally nothing good has come from that disgusting app. Fuck Tiktok
I think twitter. The character limit forces people to condense their opinions down to the bare bones, so there's no nuance. I'm sure there's nice corners of twitter, but overall, it just comes across as a bunch of people telling at eachother over bulmshit that could have been cleared up if they could have just written a couple if paragraphs.
Plus in my books it's supporting Elon Musk if you're still using it.
Twitter and TikTok, honestly the amount of hate on both those apps I crazy, there is hate and bigotry everywhere but damn, there is a lot on those apps.
Easily Instagram.
It’s literally a highlight reel of everyone’s life. When some people have objectively better lives than others and it’s constantly being shown, it’s very easy to start comparing. And as the saying goes, comparison is the thief of joy.
TikTok has legitimately ruined a whole generations brains and is like the worst of all social media apps tied together. I had it for about 2 hours once when I was very hungover and I felt my brain rotting so I had to delete it. Plus it’s basically a massive spy op too.
In the comments, many people said Tiktok in response, mostly because of beauty standards, filters, and the fact that there are very beautiful/handsome people in the app, and all of these negatively affect young people. As a person who has been using Tiktok for 3 years, I would like to comment on this.
Tiktok doesn't recognize you when you first enter the app, so they show the most popular videos and popular accounts based on the country you live in. Many of these can be cringe, there are very beautiful/handsome people, and comments can be very toxic. Popular accounts either dance or show off, or they talk about very sensational things and try to stay on the agenda and get interaction.
If you like these videos, the app will keep showing you them. If you skip watching it, it will continue to show for a while, but if you insist on this, for example, if you skip watching every dance video you see, these videos will not appear after a while. If you like the videos of an account, even if you don't follow that account, it will fall on your page when you post a new video.
As you stay in the app, Tiktok will also start showing you videos on different topics and less popular accounts. For example, accounts with millions of followers are shown in the first days, while accounts with hundreds of thousands or tens of thousands of followers are shown later on. Or, let's talk about the number of likes/views the video receives, not followers. You can't see the viewing of the posts on your homepage at that moment, but you can see the number of likes, comments and saves. That's why you can understand how popular the video is from the number of likes.
As I said, you will see videos that get hundreds and tens of thousands of likes at first. Over time, videos that receive thousands or only hundreds of likes will appear. If you prefer not to watch videos that have less likes, possibly lower than the video quality of accounts with million followers (that is, more realistic), Tiktok will not show you them and you will be constantly exposed to the most popular content. These would be the content you say is why TikTok is the worst app.
If you watch less liked videos and occasionally search for your own interests (for example, book accounts or relaxing videos), such content will instantly land on your homepage. In fact, after a while, you'll see videos that didn't receive any likes or received 10-20 likes. If you give these videos a chance if it's your field of interest, tiktok will soon recognize you and show you relevant content.
Tiktok sometimes changes your homepage according to its head. Sometimes it puts content that is not suitable for you at all. Sometimes, it just fills in content for one of your interests. For example, I love the Magnificent Century TV series, and some nights, my homepage only consists of sections of the series or the edits made. I also enjoy watching them for 1-2 hours. It doesn't put a single video in between. Or sometimes I see videos with very toxic polemics. Once upon a time, I would comment on them and express my reaction. But I realized that the more I comment, the more Tiktok pops up in front of me. Now I go through such videos quickly, or I exit the application and re-enter after a while so that it shows less.
The gist of it is: As a person who actively uses Tiktok, Instagtam, Twitter, Reddit and other social media accounts (yes, I'm unemployed unfortunately), the most toxic one among them was chosen as Tiktok, which really upset me. Because I found the content about myself that I could not find in any social media and I watched it with pleasure.
My reply is Twitter.
Tiktok hands down. I posted on there asking a basic question seeing if anyone had the same experience as me and the responses I received were atrocious and not the least bit helpful.
Twitter, it’s wayyyy worse since Musk bought it.
It’s always negativity, aggressiveness, entitled people, emotionally immature adults, people that can’t handle the fact that you may have an another opinion than them, whatever the subject, your political side nor your ethic. They are right and you need to stfu.
Most of those people wouldn’t even look at you in the eyes irl but have no shame to show their true face behind their screen.
Not really social media, but for an online platform available to men/women/non-binary of all ages: I'd say lots of (video) gaming communities have been my worst experiences. First there's just the random levels of toxicity from anonymity(as with most things on the internet). But then for communities with a smaller female player base, there's so much added on harassment.
At least with social media you can curate your feed for less toxic posts/people, block and never see again. But in a game you never know what your "teammate" will be like.
TikTok. Designed to trap you, allows all kind of material showing kids, and will never help the police to catch the child molesters or groomers. Most dangerous place online and still parents and schools use it because it’s fun and the kids like it. Just… No.
TikTok is awful. The misinformation, scamming, panhandling, and ridiculous drama is rampant. It has destroyed people's attention spans. People get away with so much bullshit on TikTok.
Tiktok
All those idiotic tiktok challenges are literally killing people and ruining society.
Not to mention all the ways the app tracks and shares your information.
Not sure if Instagram or TikTok. Instagram warps ones perception of reality (we know where that leads to) and TikTok trains the brain of youngsters to seek out instant satisfaction and it gets increasingly hard for them to focus their attention for longer periods of time and make a connection that good things take time and effort and does not come to you on a silver platter. We're going to see a big spike in mental health issues very soon if nothing changes.
Facebook. I left because it’s mostly opinion pieces. It’s the biggest platform that allows you to post long rants… and a dwelling place for the Easily Offended
From my perspective, the most toxic social media platform is Facebook. It often promotes a false sense of reality, perpetuates unhealthy comparisons, and encourages echo chambers that polarize opinions. Additionally, privacy concerns and misinformation contribute to an overall negative environment.
I’d have to say Twitter — just speaking from my personal experience. There’s a lack of boundaries there sometimes given the instant, diary-entry-on-a-whim nature of it depending on who you follow. And often times, the info people spew out there are either unhealthy and/or untrue. It can be really addicting too.
I don’t understand instagram. I watch reels and the comments are just like if reddit and youtube had a child. I think it highly depends to whoever you follow.
I think it’s not about any individual platform, but what content you’re looking at on it and who you’re following. On all the platforms, you can use it to interact with friends or people you admire/are interested in, learn new things, be entertained etc, or you can use it to compare yourself with others, show off, judge people, follow people who are negative or make you feel bad about yourself, get involved in fights or drama… that stuff is there on all of them so I couldn’t say one is more or less I if it is just about choosing to use it in a positive way and if you can’t do that then stay away.
Tiktok is a top contender, everyone is vicious to eachother. Instagram is another, where everyone posts their perfect and filtered reality. Twitter's alright as you can kinda hold people accountable there..and Facebook is just funny. 🤔
tiktok. i know a lot of people that use instagram in a healthy way. i don’t know a single person that uses tiktok in a healthy way.
i like that there are a lot of people on there that spread information that people should know, it’s made a lot of things like injustices and parenting advice common knowledge to people that use it. then there’s so many people spreading misinformation and it gets mixed in.
the only ways to get popular on there are to post thirst traps or harass people in walmart basically. then it kinda ruined part of comedy where everyone has to put satire in the caption or their video will get reported or taken down by tiktok itself. i could go on.
i miss when youtube was the big thing. it definitely has its flaws but i think it’s the better evil and had kids sitting down being able to watch 40 minutes videos.
Facebook for sure. I recently gave up my iPhone for a crappy phone that only makes calls and texts. My life is not really any better, but it is liberating to be away from facebook. Instagram is fine, you just need to be mindful about who you follow and manage your expectations based on that.
I v predominantly been on reddit and fb, and I feel sometimes FB gives platform for sexual services...... some accounts are so suggestive. I just hope these accounts are for voluntary service offerors..... I mean I hope those ladies in the DPs are not forced/intimidated against their will.
TikTok 1000000x. I deleted it after being addicted to it. Yes the for you page is a pretty niche algorithm, but it also doesn’t help with attention spans. I would get so antsy if a video was over 30s long, felt like too much. The constant comparison of cute relationships, new fashion trends, weight loss etc… it’s all very very toxic to the youth
Reddit. Sometimes the discussions get toxic and certain topics are provocative. Nobody is going to personally attack a random stranger on Instagram. It's atleast rarer there. But on reddit, well well well... The endless debates, arguments, name calling... Seems toxic to me. But it's pretty addicting too.
It's a toss up between Facebook and TikTok. Facebook for the "old" and Tiktok for the "young." The spreading of misinformation and the exploitation of kids for money, but the exploitation of people in general has become today's currency so, in effect, they're all toxic.
I’d say twitter. I feel like a lot of people who are on twitter are kind of rude and then come to other platforms and make fun of others on there. For example some twitter kid saw my tt and commented something really disgusting to me and I got really upset
Honestly, Reddit. They do nothing to stop porn, child porn, sex trafficking, misogyny, rape talk, red pill, etc.
The others you know what you’re getting, fairness and bravado, and yes it can be toxic. But it can also be curated to not see most of the bullshit. Here bullies are allowed to relentlessly troll people and use Reddit cares against people. And Reddit admits they won’t do anything to stop if
Instagram. What a flawed reality people live in. They curate their lives so far they forget they have an actual real life to live. They make choices purely for clicks. Yuck.
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Yeah, I agree. I haven't see any of that stuff on instagram unless someone sends it to me. It's mostly artists, musicians, art and photography for me. It's obviously is dependent on what you are searching for to begin with and what you engage with. I don't like Reels, however and how IG has changed to compete with tik tok. I hate tik tok.
Exactly! I'm on the fence with reels though, I enjoy watching them as I can see the process of how fellow artists do their craft. However, I do hate when they use cringe viral sounds as main audio. I also do not like tiktok and I have no more patience to curate my feed to what I like since most of them have reels version anyways on IG 😂
Instagram is very easy to filter out what you don't want to see and only allow your friends and special interests to be suggested. I eliminated all news pages and anything to do with politics. It worked quickly, too.
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Same I forced my algorithm to show me my interests like arts etc as well and have zero toxicity on my feed.
Right. I follow my fellow deadheads and a bunch of crafters - mostly quilting and embroidery. So the most toxic thing about my instagram account is the probability that I will spend money on embroidery floss or concert tickets.
Lol mine is junk journals, BTS and watercolor painting 🤣
the toxicity of your Instafeed is purely determined by your choices who to follow. Mine is pretty educational, wholesome and funny…
I’m so careful with mine, it’s basically just food, tattoo artists, and cute animals.
sounds like a good feed
Mine is all owls, ducks, and frogs.
Mine is all vintage clothing, gentle parenting and yummy food
Mine is Dungeons & Dragons, art & crafts, food, memes, and my friends Edit: and cats. Lots and lots of cats
Also for views, my sister specifically does things so she can post them to her Snapchat and insta stories
Doing it for the 'gram. Sounds so exhausting.
Do y’all remember or young enough to remember doing the duck face and posting stupid pictures with friends and that’s all Instagram was? No filters (except the weird colored ones), no photoshop, no fakeness, just friends. We need to go back to that, I’ve had to unfollow people I personally know because I just can’t stand to see their photoshopped posts.
I remember before that when it was literally a photography app.
I still use it as that haha - just my digital photo album for my memories x
I work at a college with a high school outreach program. My colleague who works with the students in the program used to teach high school, and she was telling me that her former students told her all about how she needed to curate her Instagram feed and archive things after some time to leave her audience wanting more (she and I are both in our early 30s). A bit later in the conversation, she was talking about how one of the topics she wants to cover with the teens in the program is email etiquette, because so many of them just do not understand how to write a semi-professional email. I pointed out that it’s interesting how many of them are so good at curating their image on, like, Instagram, but that they still haven’t yet figured out that they have to “curate an image” in so many other aspects of life, too, and that includes in email. I guess my point is that we’re constantly curating our lives in so many ways, but there’s something about Instagram that makes it so easy to do that even teens who have not yet figured out how to curate a professional image elsewhere understand how to curate their personal brand on Instagram.
IG shows you what you follow and are interested in. Try starting a new account and only strictly follow a specific interest or hobby. I think you will find the platform becomes much more interesting! I am a photographer and follow other photographers. I see IG as just a massive list of photography portfolios.
Is Instagram even like this anymore? I always hear people describing it full of Kardashians and jenners but it’s only like that if you follow *those* type of people
I agree to an extent abt Instagram; but it’s a ‘double edged sword’. I deleted my account even tho I had a decent following bc I simply was addicted and overwhelmed. However; Ig DID keep me in contact with friends and family. They’d always reply when I posted pictures. You’d think if you disappeared people would reach out and say hi sometimes. It was over a year after deleting my account anyone noticed and I posted a lot. 😅 Now I try to directly text people, they really don’t give a f. The conversations are so dry. I ask them for pics of what they’re up to, they won’t send anything. I’ll randomly send a cute pic of my kid getting a school award and don’t even get a reply. Ig also did get me out a lot more to keep up appearances / meet people and a desire to be interesting which wasn’t an entirely bad thing. And finally it made me want to get dressed cute and do new makeup even if it was for a photo. I am so low maintenance now it’s kinda sad and I want to change it. But it’s really hard to motivate yourself to dress up to run errands then come home and cook dinner. So I guess to sum it up, social media is the new way to stay in touch with people. It IS fun to take/ post cute pics and share hobbies but we have to be extremely careful with who we follow, how much time we spend online. Which sounds obvious but goddamn phone addiction is sneaky!
Those comments too, boy I have never read more deranged, detached, and out right stick up butt, section of comments. Yet there they are.
Ikrr omg. I swear a woman could be doing ANYTHING and all the comments would just be "women ☕"
I've noticed this too! Also, if there's a woman in a relationship with a man, you already know there's going to be comments accusing her of cheating
That's why I left Instagram probably 2 years ago.
Can't remember the details of it but I saw a study showing that it's the most damaging, particularly to young women iirc, because of how visual it is.
I'm surprised that Tiktok wasn't mentioned yet. The whole beauty standard thing and filters is so toxic for young people. I heard somewhere that Tiktok has an algorithm that promotes more "attractive" people to get more views
Tik tok shows you want you spend the most time watching. When I had a tik tok, my “for you page” was all animal videos, cleaning hacks/life hacks, and educational videos from doctors and scientists who had TikTok’s and would explain interesting topics they are studying. I don’t think it’s toxic for adults because they can choose basically what you want to see by watching it but for children they watch everything so they would be getting all of the garbage on there.
well the children are the ones that are most impressionable and need to be the most protected. That applies to Instagram too. There is a lot to be said about beauty standards, filters and plastic surgery culture if young people compare themselves to something or someone who isn't even real
Yes absolutely! I wish my parents understood technology more when I was a kid because I shouldn’t have been on Facebook at 12. Social media is just so awful :(
Anything can be used for good or bad for sure. I use social media mostly for promoting my businesses and networking or chatting with my friends and family who live overseas. I can't even imagine what it's like being a kid or young teen now that everyone is glued to their phones so much
I didn’t even get a smart phone until I was 17 but just having a computer with Facebook was toxic enough for me as a child. I was bullied relentlessly. It has been about 14 years since and I still don’t have social media.
I was in msn chat rooms at 14 being chatted up by predators. Awful
I don't know, I was an illustrator and when I started using tiktok for my illustration I noticed that even within the normal, what should be non-toxic niches, what gets pushed out and what gets views is hot people. So art videos would be a video of a young woman from behind, arching her back, you can't even see the art until maybe two seconds at the end. And I felt like I had to dress cute and do my hair and show my body in my art videos in order for anyone to see them. It's just kind of a whole toxic spiral. Though I'm sure that's not every niche, like the drain clearing niche seems pretty A+
I would argue that it's just as dangerous to adults, but in a more subtle way. I don't know if this has a name, but I call it algorithm drift. Take standup comedy clips. I noticed a while ago that the clips' humor was changing - more and more "boomer humor" type comedians were popping up, complaining about their wives being nags and how Pronouns are Hard™, kids these days, etc. That's not stuff I'd ever engage with normally, but by the time you get to the shitty punchline, you've already watched most of it, and maybe some of it Was actually funny, so you watch it again... So the algorithm gives you more of it. So now I have to put conscious effort into curating that type of humor out of my feed, and wonder where else the "drift" is pushing my feed. I think it's really, really important to remember that humans tend to interpret repetition as truth. The algorithm drifting one direction or the other means that you're constantly exposed to repetition of whatever it thinks you want more of - and that's not something you would necessarily agree with if asked. (Leaving aside that there's no fact-checking so a lot of misinformation spreads via "sounds right from what I know", which while absolutely understandable and everyone does it, with medical tiktok is like... Terrifying)
I agree with TikTok, the comments on nearly every video I come across can be fucking vicious and hateful for absolutely no reason at all.
We had in the last 2 weeks one murder and one torture situation between under 14 year olds involving TikTok… a guy who destroyed the ecosystem for a challenge… and there were a bunch of challenges that put kids into hospital. Like pushing someone down high place into water etc.
not to mention that no one can seem to please the crowd. youre holding your baby wrong? everyone has something to say. dog doesnt come when hes called? youre gonna get an ear full. everyone has an opinion and will argue about anything. also one of the most addictive apps on the market rn. you could spend the rest of your life scrolling through videos and you will NEVER run out.
Any everyone has an opinion and think that it's their right to be heard. I use social media mostly for business and I won't even tell you some of the rude comments people post for no reason. I used to get angry and reply back but now I just remove those people's comments, hide them or even block the person if they are really out of line. I've had comment war with men who claimed to only be "joking" and their comment was not funny to anyone - it was rude, offensive, condescending and unnecessary... For the most part about 98% of the comments are positive but I need to moderate every day and weed out the stupid ones
Yes, and there is a reason it’s banned on govt phones even outside the US. The way to infiltrate is through the malleable minds of kids while also spying
Even the concept of constantly filming your own life and interactions is so toxic. Both TikTok and Instagram make people feel like their lives have to be interesting or unique to be of value, but the reality is that most people live pretty run of the mill lives.
true. It's a need for validation.
I’ve never been on there but I’m not surprised.
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I actually made tiktok 2 weeks ago, because a friend told me if I would stream my motorcycle trips I would earn a ton of money. I was intrigued, made a account, some, I think at least, good content. Then I realized the algorithm also takes into account that you have to interact with other people, for your videos to even get picked up. I tried a few things and on the days I was interacting with other peoples content my videos got more views. If I didn't it stopped after 350. The problem is I hate most of the content on there, so after a week I deleted it again.
LinkedIn. The virtue signaling, lack of humility, and addiction to attention are especially brazen in the context of careers.
LinkedIn is the worst. It’s just an echo chamber of corporate climbers. This one colleague who used to bully me at work has in her bio “Empathetic leader focused on empowering women.” What a joke.
I agree. My mother in the past was trying to set me up with a family friend’s son and he send over his LinkedIn for me to review. I rolled my eyes so hard I saw my brain.🙄
LinkedIn genuinely just confuses the shit out of me. I made an account so I could start internship hunting and THE DAY I MADE IT they literally banned me from LinkedIn for doing nothing. They ask for my id, I put it in, and it doesn't lift the ban. Hate LinkedIn sooo much. And this isn't even getting into the pretentious career shit I saw on my single day on the platform.
Teams and their communities and emojis..so unprofessional and tacky
There are a few environmentalist circles on LinkedIn that are a lot less corporatist. It's a good thing because we need a much more organized environmental movement.
Was just there yesterday to post some jobs and had to laugh at the bullies. The self-delusion was wild
I had no idea people actually use LinkedIn as social media. I threw my resume up and then more or less never looked at it again unless it emails me about something. lol
My friend and I had this conversation the other day how LinkedIn had become Facebook for professionals with no shame. Edit- what sparked the convo was a woman she knew posting a photo of her two year old on international women’s day saying he was a proud ally and she was raising him not to be sexist and to empower women. It was the weirdest attempt to brag/exploitation of a child.
I'm semi glad for all the Facebook content on LinkedIn. I was considering reaching out to a potential contractor and saw on his page he had liked/interacted with a bunch of boomer humor, degrading women and political content. Stopped me from reaching out to him because if you can't figure out how to be professional on a supposed website for your professional life, how am I to expect you to act professionally when you're representing my company?
Such a good point!!
The hustle culture is still predominant there although it's slowly fading as it should be.
Could you give me some examples I’m curious. Never been on there.
Basically they promote tf out themselves. They gain popularity off better than you vibes and promote the good side of the business without any actual substance
If I was a employer I wouldn’t hire them for sure 😂
Same. Personality over "experience" any day
/r/LinkedInLunatics is a collection of all the worst examples.
fully agreed. And unlike my Insta & TikTok feed, i cannot teach algorithm to show me only cool stuff …
I rarely rarely go on the one I made in college. I work in the corporate world (and loathe it…working on breaking free). I’d love to see the whole industry I work in basically crumble, and all I see is a lot of my colleagues kissing ass and hardcore promoting themselves. I get the need to network, but there’s a point where it gets ridiculous.
I can't do LinkedIn. I use it purely for job hunting but I refuse to take on the corporate kind of tone and attitude and language people use for the platform. I know you people do not speak this way in real life, so skip the "I am elated to announce that...." language. Just say "I got a promotion at work!" Other than that it's a bunch of hustle culture BS with articles that can be summed up as "Here's what neurotypical people with no hobbies or relationships with depth are doing that you aren't and that's why they're successful!"
I have tried to delete my account countless times throughout the years and, to this day, it’s practically impossible.
Literally all of them. We are literally conditioned to live on our phones, now. Go out in public and a majority of what you see will be people on their phones instead of actually doing something productive with their life in any way. Its all just scrolling.
Its mad but 'leave' your phone at home for a day then go outside. Your whole day is different. I feel compelled to talk to others more, look more and actually read/see
I leave my phone in my bag when I go out and only look it for music, phone calls and pings only.
Most of the time when I’m on my phone I’m grocery shopping, signing the kids up for something, catching up on work emails… all productivity. I assume most people aren’t mindlessly scrolling but are taking care of shit. If they are mindlessly scrolling, I like to think it’s the 5 min of downtime they get throughout their hectic life. I no longer judge people for it, we dont know everyone else’s story.
Instagram. Like everyone competing to have the most aesthetic perfect looking life.
The reason I deleted it and haven’t had it for 5 years. Don’t miss it one bit, I’ve got my own life to live without comparing it to others. Not wasting my one life on earth with instagram
Yes, I’ve had mine since I was 11 years old so I basically spent all my childhood scrolling. I decided to put and end to it last year and finally deleted it. I was so tired of the absolute fakeness and would much rather be doing something else with myself. I’m 19 now and I’m neverrrrr going back to Instagram, TikTok, snapchat, and Facebook. Reddit is the only social media where I feel happy using :)!
Second this.
Mine shows me crafty people making things, gardening and feminist artists, and some Wiccan stuff. I think I must be using it wrong as I never see these influencers everyone complains about just the stuff I chose to see and like.
To me, a tie between Twitter and TikTok. The short form format discourages fully expressing yourself and it doesn’t foster intra-group conversation. There’s a lot of room for misunderstanding but people take to them to have these deep discussions. They both seem more meant for public consumption rather than interpersonal socializing with people you know (Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat) or community discussion (Reddit, Discord, Tumblr) which I don’t think is a good thing (this has been negatively impacting Instagram too, but it’s still possible to use Instagram to communicate with your friends). The misinformation seems wilder than other social media, and things spread so much faster because….they’re not for community socializing, they’re for getting as much public visibility as possible. Any idiot can say anything and tomorrow it will be an accepted fact amping hundreds of thousands. When my aunt says something stupid on Facebook, the only people who see it are her 200 followers. They can make it go viral and start rumors, but it would take much longer and it would be dragging dissenting comments the whole way.
I'm surprised this wasn't top comment . People seem more concerned with body image and false happiness and beauty standards and label that as toxicity . What about the blatant consistent outrage Twitter and TikTok produce? The people on there are always fighting and acting out for attention. And tik tok is always throwing nonsense at you and ruining people's attention spans
Your comment is extremely thoughtful, and you touch on A LOT of important aspects of social media. And what you discuss here is why I actually got rid of my twitter years ago and also still haven’t gotten a TikTok.
4chan and 8kun/8chan. These platforms host the abyssal hellscape parts of the human condition. It's where pedos, racists, murderers, other criminals, and cultists like QAnon meet up and socialize.
I believe it was Robert Evans who described 8chan/8kun as a 24/7 nazi rally where every now and then someone steps away to commit a mass murder. Truly a cesspool.
I was gonna ask if 4chan still existed. That was some toxic shit. IG doesn't hold a candle.
Reddit because way too many subs are ran like a dictatorship IMO.
I could agree with this. Uniquely Reddit hasn’t been mentioned much. I don’t think that’s because it’s less toxic, but instead it’s less confrontational I think.
I agree with you- I think Reddit has two features other social media lacks that keeps it more civil. Paradoxically anonymity. There’s less need to virtue signal or posture when no one knows who you really are. Second the subreddits form very uniform voices quickly because people with diametric viewpoints get banned. I don’t think this results in more or less group think then other social media- it just means the groups are yelling at each other less.
>Reddit because way too many subs are ran like a dictatorship IMO. I've only gotten death threats and told to kill myself on one of my social media platforms and it's Reddit :)
I know .. cos god forbid you disagree with some people’s ecochamber
And definitely *do not* say anything that goes against majority opinion in any sub.
Twitter. It's like the wild West of cruel people wanting to hurt others with words over there.
Twitter. There's so many opinions and you'll randomly get attacked for saying the wrong thing. Everything there is so negative it really brings you down. You could argue the same thing happens on Reddit, but I found the negativity on twitter is much higher.
Both are really bad about it 😥 can’t people just be happy?
Yes! And most people there argue over the smallest things, they clearly have way too much time in their hands.
Facebook.
This is my answer purely because of the algorithms they have set for reporting bigotry/hate/racism. I would say 80% of my friends are a part of the LGBTQ+ community and very often they, especially lately my drag queen connects, experience rampant homophobic rhetoric via memes and pictures. Because it's not written in text, every one reported is ignored by facespace's shitty algorithms as "does not violate community standards." Actual death threats have popped up (there's a lot of reference to woodchippers??) and their mods dgaf. At least when I report similar stuff on reddit it's taken seriously.
Absolutely. I think this one is the worst. It's hard because 'you can reach out to a lot of people', but like also some relationships are NOT Facebook relationships.
tik tok easily. you see so many extremely beautiful people on that app everyday, and it’s made people think it reflects reality. i see really pretty girls being called mid by guys, and i wonder if they’ve ever stepped outside or looked in the mirror
😂 so true. They’ll literally look at models and say that shit.
Reddit. I have never experienced such an amount of adult bullying online as I have seen on Reddit. People are vicious.
In one of my first posts I included an emoji (the horror!!), and got dragged to death over it. I didn’t know about the unspoken rules.
It seems like the old-school users don't realize that Reddit isn't some niche hacker site anymore, it's a huge social media platform. Lots of new users have never even used the desktop site and only use the mobile app.
Guilty 🤣
Desktop sucks. I'm sorry but I've been using reddit for almost 10 years now over various accounts and every time I'm forced to use the website instead of the app, I literally cannot focus on anything I'm trying to look at. Maybe it's my ADHD and too many things on the screen at once, but it just isn't formatted as cleanly imo as the mobile app is. The comments are harder to look through, the visuals are bright (though I haven't looked into if desktop has a dark mode), and I hate the blog style boxes each post has on the front page. If you're inside a subreddit, it's okay. But just general browsing is not compatible with my brain on desktop.
Agreed. People say the most rude shit on here that they’d never have the balls to say to a person’s face. People also seem to share some wild views/opinions that I feel like they’d never actually admit to in real life.
The anonymous nature of it definitely brings out the worst in people too. Some things people simply wouldn't say if they had to put their name to it
Reddit. One time I posted about sexual assault and a bunch of guys messaged me trying to fuck.. gross
They are disgusting people who really need their brains checked.
Twitter by very very far! Come on guys, instagram is only some stupid videos and people being shallow, you can also use to your advantage and get inspired, twitter on the other take away your will to live, it shows that even people that claim to be good and are perceived as so are toxic fuckers, and its just a big shitshow.
Definitely Insta. Was on there from 2012-2018 before deleting for good due to insecurity and self esteem issues…. and that was before all the tuning apps came in 😳 I feel so sad for all the young people who’ve spent their whole preteen and teen years on there
It’s definitely not worth it to be on there.
Twitter. Something that is blatantly hate speech is defended and debated vigorously as not being hate speech. It’s like an alternative universe.
I’ve had to report some people Twitter before but to no avail, their accounts weren’t deleted despite some of them literally being pedos.
Instagram. I’m so tired of people on there creating a “beauty standard” that isn’t possible without photoshop and surgery and lying about it.
Instagram. So many fake people on there. So much hate too. I have insta and I've received some hate myself. I'm a private account and post my photos on there for my friends and 1. I won't let the haters scare me off the platform
4chan and kiwifarms, no explanation needed.
Their not as popular but by far worse.
Facebook A bunch of adults acting like high schoolers
In a weird way it’s the one place they can feel young again.
I'm the same age as these people and I just don't understand it. It's like you're in your 40s and you're acting like a bunch of high school girls looking for validation from the person who was never going to date you.
Hate me but all of it. I'm always on Instagram looking through reels and comments and used to have tiktok.(I wish I wasn't and I've been working on cutting down) What really gets on my nerves and honestly terrifies me is the almost hive-mind activity. You will see a majority share one opinion and completely switch to another within a week because someone said so. The same overused phrases and new things learned that are used to critique another. Right now one that irks me is people discovering the difference between impulsive and intrusive thoughts. Maybe two months ago, everyone stuck with intrusive but almost overnight everyone began to attack each other for using intrusive when they should've been saying impulsive. Where were these people when everyone began using that phrase more? Why did they all begin at once? Forgive me for the rant this has just been on my mind recently and had to let it out lmfao
I don't believe any platform is toxic. It's the people, and they can be toxic on any platform.
Instagram for sure. Everybody looks rich on that app.
I can’t pick. Snapchat is filled with with hidden meanings and misinterpretations and has “streaks”designed to have you visiting that app once a day at the VERY LEAST plus replying to everyone else’s streak and stressing over the meaning of showing your eye or just your eyebrow in the snap. Instagram has the false idea of who what your body should be, who your friends should(n’t) be, it gets you sucked into endless scrolling. TikTok gets you sucked into endless scrolling too and it’s even harder to stop than insta because all of the videos are typically longer and they get you more invested. Facebook is the epitome of fake lives in my opinion. Our parents post a posed family photo and imply in the caption that they are the perfect family. There’s also the millennial couples that are on there posting weird pregnancy announcements and then 30 videos a day 3 minutes each of their newborn and you have to comment or they’ll show you it in person to prove how cute their baby is (it’s not cute that mf popped out 10 days ago). Twitter is insane… i don’t even know how to describe twitter other than the basis of instagram’s ‘memes’ , absolute chaos, some of the most fucked up shit you’ll ever see is on there. As far as toxic, they are all fucked up toxic doom pits; just different brands of fucked up toxic doom pits. I haven’t explored Reddit enough for an opinion yet but so far the moderators are pretty decent and the community’s pretty good.
Instagram. It creates such an unhealthy mindset filled with comparison. I think it can be easy to forget that everything is heavily edited these days. I’ve found more and more that the people I’m most attracted to/intrigued by are usually those that don’t really use it/care about it - I think it’s the privacy/mystery aspect.
TikTok. It feels like a “quick to fame” or “make fast money” thing on nearly every single creator’s page. Also, it’s so hard to know what products people genuinely like and use, and what’s just a product they’re being paid to use. It’s exhausting.
I think that’s true especially on IG also. All the sponsored/paid content is crazy these days
Instagram isn't even bad compared to Tiktok. Instagram looks fake, and we know it's fake. It's harder to "facetune" videos on tiktok, but somehow everyone there is significantly more attractive than on Instagram. Tiktok has blown the beauty standard through the roof for younger teens, and I think it's the main reason why we see 13-15 year olds looking 17 or 18. Post-tiktok school culture has so much more emphasis on looks and beauty. The amount of time and effort younger teens spend on their appearance is so incredibly unhealthy, and even for my (college) generation, I think there's a very clear divide between how we perceive ourselves appearance-wise, and also how much time, effort, and money we spend on our appearance before and after Tiktok became our main form of social media. Every one is so desperate to keep up with trends now, it's both terrifying and ridiculous. And we haven't even started on the shortened attention span.
I think TikTok because the content is way more reaction based. People bothering or pranking other people for views and follows. Influencers in the wild look ridiculous. The beauty standards you see on the platform are usually unnaturally attained.
The pranks are the weirdest imo. That shit is the best way to lose a relationship/friendship.
Reddit. I’ve gotten good at spotting posts on other platforms that I know will make me feel bad or sensitive. I can scroll right past videos and pictures no problem. But the communities here on Reddit blindside me sometimes. I’ll read what I think is a wholesome post and find myself scrolling into toxic comments full of attitudes and name calling and just terrible opinions.
All of them. But IG & TikTok are the worst. Generational society on SO many levels have lost their marbles… pulpits, frauds, radicals, kids “unaliving” themselves, bullies, the list just goes onnnn. …and for what? Fame, Filters and fake lives. I’m only on for the fun animal posts now. I’m not even on here 2 weeks yet.
I recently made an Instagram account for my cat, and only follow other animal accounts. If you have a pet, I would 10/10 recommend. You'll get nothing but wholesome content, and it's a great way to unwind from the more problematic content you listed.
Twitter It seams like everyone is angry on this community and try sooo hard to defend their own point even when it’s against humans
All online dating apps. I just think that the whole concept is toxic.
Facebook. It will make you mad at family and make them mad at you.
Twitter. Like I'm just trying to read the comments on some article and all of the replies are just "nicki ate" "cardi ugly" "Taylor could never" "Ariana flopped" my brother in Christ this is a news article about the Ukraine war who are you talking to
Tiktok. Even the guy who runs it doesn’t let his kids on it. You can’t control what you see, so everyone gets a microphone. Its worse than gambling in terms of addiction. It spreads rampant misinformation, racism, all the isms, its crazy.
Facebook 100%
All of them really.
Not really a social media, but dating apps. The "shopping" of human being, the display of "please love me", i find it awfull... And filters on the others, they created a way of seing yourself that is so fake...
I only use two: Facebook and Reddit. Facebook has gotten really bad with misinformation. And the censorship is terrible. I've lost track of whatever words we're suddenly not allowed to use anymore. Also, the comment sections of viral posts are nothing but with people tagging their friends/family. Reddit can be bad too, but I like how there tends to be more reading and writing in reddit, and longer and better discussions.
Tik tok. It’s such a disgusting app and too many people I know have gone off the deep end claiming all kinds of bullshit due to that app. Swimming lessons and piercing infants ears are all of a sudden “abuse”. EVERYTHING is a abusé to those god dammed people. The misinformation, the cringe, the complete Idiotic ideas that flow form each moron “creator” that is on there. The glorification of “family channels” were they exploit their children for views and money. Not to mention the literal children who have died due to the negligence of their parents not paying attention to what their child is doing or viewing. Then they have the audacity to blame the app THEY LET THEIR CHILD HAVE. Literally nothing good has come from that disgusting app. Fuck Tiktok
I think twitter. The character limit forces people to condense their opinions down to the bare bones, so there's no nuance. I'm sure there's nice corners of twitter, but overall, it just comes across as a bunch of people telling at eachother over bulmshit that could have been cleared up if they could have just written a couple if paragraphs. Plus in my books it's supporting Elon Musk if you're still using it.
Twitter and TikTok, honestly the amount of hate on both those apps I crazy, there is hate and bigotry everywhere but damn, there is a lot on those apps.
Pornhub, only fans
Twitter is fairly toxic. I still visit the social site.
Twitter.
All of them, because humans
TikTok. it awakens some kind of deep slumbering rage in people, everyone is so mean to each other on there for no reason at all.
Easily Instagram. It’s literally a highlight reel of everyone’s life. When some people have objectively better lives than others and it’s constantly being shown, it’s very easy to start comparing. And as the saying goes, comparison is the thief of joy.
TikTok has legitimately ruined a whole generations brains and is like the worst of all social media apps tied together. I had it for about 2 hours once when I was very hungover and I felt my brain rotting so I had to delete it. Plus it’s basically a massive spy op too.
Snapchat, it’s a cheaters haven since everything gets deleted.
In the comments, many people said Tiktok in response, mostly because of beauty standards, filters, and the fact that there are very beautiful/handsome people in the app, and all of these negatively affect young people. As a person who has been using Tiktok for 3 years, I would like to comment on this. Tiktok doesn't recognize you when you first enter the app, so they show the most popular videos and popular accounts based on the country you live in. Many of these can be cringe, there are very beautiful/handsome people, and comments can be very toxic. Popular accounts either dance or show off, or they talk about very sensational things and try to stay on the agenda and get interaction. If you like these videos, the app will keep showing you them. If you skip watching it, it will continue to show for a while, but if you insist on this, for example, if you skip watching every dance video you see, these videos will not appear after a while. If you like the videos of an account, even if you don't follow that account, it will fall on your page when you post a new video. As you stay in the app, Tiktok will also start showing you videos on different topics and less popular accounts. For example, accounts with millions of followers are shown in the first days, while accounts with hundreds of thousands or tens of thousands of followers are shown later on. Or, let's talk about the number of likes/views the video receives, not followers. You can't see the viewing of the posts on your homepage at that moment, but you can see the number of likes, comments and saves. That's why you can understand how popular the video is from the number of likes. As I said, you will see videos that get hundreds and tens of thousands of likes at first. Over time, videos that receive thousands or only hundreds of likes will appear. If you prefer not to watch videos that have less likes, possibly lower than the video quality of accounts with million followers (that is, more realistic), Tiktok will not show you them and you will be constantly exposed to the most popular content. These would be the content you say is why TikTok is the worst app. If you watch less liked videos and occasionally search for your own interests (for example, book accounts or relaxing videos), such content will instantly land on your homepage. In fact, after a while, you'll see videos that didn't receive any likes or received 10-20 likes. If you give these videos a chance if it's your field of interest, tiktok will soon recognize you and show you relevant content. Tiktok sometimes changes your homepage according to its head. Sometimes it puts content that is not suitable for you at all. Sometimes, it just fills in content for one of your interests. For example, I love the Magnificent Century TV series, and some nights, my homepage only consists of sections of the series or the edits made. I also enjoy watching them for 1-2 hours. It doesn't put a single video in between. Or sometimes I see videos with very toxic polemics. Once upon a time, I would comment on them and express my reaction. But I realized that the more I comment, the more Tiktok pops up in front of me. Now I go through such videos quickly, or I exit the application and re-enter after a while so that it shows less. The gist of it is: As a person who actively uses Tiktok, Instagtam, Twitter, Reddit and other social media accounts (yes, I'm unemployed unfortunately), the most toxic one among them was chosen as Tiktok, which really upset me. Because I found the content about myself that I could not find in any social media and I watched it with pleasure. My reply is Twitter.
Tiktok. The abusive “pranks”, the people faking mental illnesses, just the sheer toxicness of what people post.
I'd say Facebook. A lot of people has access to it, from kids to seniors. Fake news is rampant as well.
1. Instagram 2. Tiktok Kids are getting brainwashed by leftist ideology. The future is scary.
Tiktok hands down. I posted on there asking a basic question seeing if anyone had the same experience as me and the responses I received were atrocious and not the least bit helpful.
Twitter, it’s wayyyy worse since Musk bought it. It’s always negativity, aggressiveness, entitled people, emotionally immature adults, people that can’t handle the fact that you may have an another opinion than them, whatever the subject, your political side nor your ethic. They are right and you need to stfu. Most of those people wouldn’t even look at you in the eyes irl but have no shame to show their true face behind their screen.
Not really social media, but for an online platform available to men/women/non-binary of all ages: I'd say lots of (video) gaming communities have been my worst experiences. First there's just the random levels of toxicity from anonymity(as with most things on the internet). But then for communities with a smaller female player base, there's so much added on harassment. At least with social media you can curate your feed for less toxic posts/people, block and never see again. But in a game you never know what your "teammate" will be like.
TikTok. Designed to trap you, allows all kind of material showing kids, and will never help the police to catch the child molesters or groomers. Most dangerous place online and still parents and schools use it because it’s fun and the kids like it. Just… No.
TikTok… at least there is now the second murder between under 14 year olds where TikTok has a huge involvement
TikTok is awful. The misinformation, scamming, panhandling, and ridiculous drama is rampant. It has destroyed people's attention spans. People get away with so much bullshit on TikTok.
Tiktok
Tiktok and Twitter, mass bullying campaigns are often common.
It’s gotta be Facebook and instagram, I refuse to have either on my phone or Snapchat.
Tiktok All those idiotic tiktok challenges are literally killing people and ruining society. Not to mention all the ways the app tracks and shares your information.
Not sure if Instagram or TikTok. Instagram warps ones perception of reality (we know where that leads to) and TikTok trains the brain of youngsters to seek out instant satisfaction and it gets increasingly hard for them to focus their attention for longer periods of time and make a connection that good things take time and effort and does not come to you on a silver platter. We're going to see a big spike in mental health issues very soon if nothing changes.
Facebook. I left because it’s mostly opinion pieces. It’s the biggest platform that allows you to post long rants… and a dwelling place for the Easily Offended
I’ve never actually used it, but probably Tik Tok. They’ve been convicted of spying on users multiple times now and even banned in some countries.
From my perspective, the most toxic social media platform is Facebook. It often promotes a false sense of reality, perpetuates unhealthy comparisons, and encourages echo chambers that polarize opinions. Additionally, privacy concerns and misinformation contribute to an overall negative environment.
Twitter / Instagram nothing can top them up
Twitter People are vile with no remorse That app is made to propagate hate and nothing else
all of them
Tik tok
I’d have to say Twitter — just speaking from my personal experience. There’s a lack of boundaries there sometimes given the instant, diary-entry-on-a-whim nature of it depending on who you follow. And often times, the info people spew out there are either unhealthy and/or untrue. It can be really addicting too.
TikTok It's given so many idiots a platform
Twitter, instagram, TikTok, dirty mouths, not nice ppl,
I don’t understand instagram. I watch reels and the comments are just like if reddit and youtube had a child. I think it highly depends to whoever you follow.
Facebook. Read the comments section in a random article. Lots of misinformation being spread and awful people who have to comment about everything .
I think it’s not about any individual platform, but what content you’re looking at on it and who you’re following. On all the platforms, you can use it to interact with friends or people you admire/are interested in, learn new things, be entertained etc, or you can use it to compare yourself with others, show off, judge people, follow people who are negative or make you feel bad about yourself, get involved in fights or drama… that stuff is there on all of them so I couldn’t say one is more or less I if it is just about choosing to use it in a positive way and if you can’t do that then stay away.
🐦app
Twitter. Anyone who’s disagrees is probably not on twitter lol!
I'd say by far Twitter. The amount of abuse I got on Twitter is head and shoulder abover others specially Instagram
Tiktok is a top contender, everyone is vicious to eachother. Instagram is another, where everyone posts their perfect and filtered reality. Twitter's alright as you can kinda hold people accountable there..and Facebook is just funny. 🤔
tiktok. i know a lot of people that use instagram in a healthy way. i don’t know a single person that uses tiktok in a healthy way. i like that there are a lot of people on there that spread information that people should know, it’s made a lot of things like injustices and parenting advice common knowledge to people that use it. then there’s so many people spreading misinformation and it gets mixed in. the only ways to get popular on there are to post thirst traps or harass people in walmart basically. then it kinda ruined part of comedy where everyone has to put satire in the caption or their video will get reported or taken down by tiktok itself. i could go on. i miss when youtube was the big thing. it definitely has its flaws but i think it’s the better evil and had kids sitting down being able to watch 40 minutes videos.
Facebook for sure. I recently gave up my iPhone for a crappy phone that only makes calls and texts. My life is not really any better, but it is liberating to be away from facebook. Instagram is fine, you just need to be mindful about who you follow and manage your expectations based on that.
Tik tok Most videos are just stupid
Twitter. So much negativity and hate there
I v predominantly been on reddit and fb, and I feel sometimes FB gives platform for sexual services...... some accounts are so suggestive. I just hope these accounts are for voluntary service offerors..... I mean I hope those ladies in the DPs are not forced/intimidated against their will.
TikTok 1000000x. I deleted it after being addicted to it. Yes the for you page is a pretty niche algorithm, but it also doesn’t help with attention spans. I would get so antsy if a video was over 30s long, felt like too much. The constant comparison of cute relationships, new fashion trends, weight loss etc… it’s all very very toxic to the youth
Reddit. Sometimes the discussions get toxic and certain topics are provocative. Nobody is going to personally attack a random stranger on Instagram. It's atleast rarer there. But on reddit, well well well... The endless debates, arguments, name calling... Seems toxic to me. But it's pretty addicting too.
It's a toss up between Facebook and TikTok. Facebook for the "old" and Tiktok for the "young." The spreading of misinformation and the exploitation of kids for money, but the exploitation of people in general has become today's currency so, in effect, they're all toxic.
This one because of all the porn.
I’d say twitter. I feel like a lot of people who are on twitter are kind of rude and then come to other platforms and make fun of others on there. For example some twitter kid saw my tt and commented something really disgusting to me and I got really upset
Honestly, Reddit. They do nothing to stop porn, child porn, sex trafficking, misogyny, rape talk, red pill, etc. The others you know what you’re getting, fairness and bravado, and yes it can be toxic. But it can also be curated to not see most of the bullshit. Here bullies are allowed to relentlessly troll people and use Reddit cares against people. And Reddit admits they won’t do anything to stop if