It definitely seems like social media is a net negative to society
Discussion
Facebook launched when I was 10 years old so its all I have ever know.
Wish I was born 10-20 years earlier tbh.
I'm a few years older (though not ten) than you and remember myspace, aol forums. There was a lot more honesty just because it was a smaller subset of the population who were computer literate enough to use social media. Generally a different demographic. Myspace was I think the first that became mostly young adults. Facebook brought grandma on. Really hyper censorship didn't begin till around 2014. I deleted Facebook around then because I was tired of it. Really AI had just started to be good enough to really piss you off the last few years. Can't upload anything without AI labeling it missinformation.
I would not say it's a net negative. It's just that far too many users utilize it in a irresponsible manner. This attention seeking behavior gets old fast! People need to realize that you don't need validation from others. Very grateful that I ignored social media for all these years.