Nancy Jo Sales -- American girls: social media and the secret lives of teenagers
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This is a especially fascinating book about social media addicts.

There are several main topics covered in this book: (1) Online
social media and how it's used, what the online social sites are,
what the apps are, and how they're used.  (2) The lives and social
styles of American girls, and especially, how those lives are
affected by smartphones and social media.

This is not a survey or research book.  It does not do that much in
the way of facts and figures, percentages of users and average times
of smartphone use etc.  Sales has done extensive interviews with
teenage girls and small groups of teen girls who are friends, then
reports on these conversations.

Some of it reports the loves and friendships and relationship
problems and so on of teenage girls.  There's a awful lot of this
kind of person stories in "American girls", more than I found I
wanted.  So, you may want to filter out some of it, although it does
make for entertaining stories.

While reading this book, I find myself thinking how outrageous and
bizarre and strange these stories are.  And, then I began asking
myself why this seems so strange, even shocking to me.  I suspect
there are a number of reasons:

- I'm way beyond my teenage years when being popular, having the
  right clothes, talking with my friends was a more central part of
  my life.

- I'm a heavy computer user; I spend most of each day at a computer.
  But, the idea of typing for an extended period of time on my
  mobile phone seems tedious and annoying to me.

- The ways I communicate are simple and retro.  I use email and I
  have a static Web site where I've made articles and computer code
  I've written available.  Using Twitter and Facebook and Instagram
  etc. does not fit my needs at all.

Still, the stories Sales tells and the teenagers that these stories
are about do seem extreme.  I cannot remember that I or any of my
friends obsessed about Elvis Presley or the Beach Boys as much as
some of Sales's subjects obsess about the Kardashians.  Maybe the
Beatles?  Yes, but surely those teens that screamed and swooned when
seeing the Beatles in person were paid to fake that, weren't they.
They were not from *my* high school.

And, even talking with my friends, as a teenager, was something I
wanted to do during lunch-time at school or during breaks between
classes.  I wasn't something I wanted to do for hours after class
and in the evenings.  I had a life of my own; there were things I
wanted to do.  Or, maybe I was the loner and the freak, even as a
teenager.

Sales claims that she had a similar reaction of shock at some of the
behavior of teens on social media, in particular teen girls (and
boys, too) posting nude pictures of themselves, and also because of
the calm acceptance of the attitudes and interactions that seem
shocking to Sales.  The shaming and bullying and mean treatment on
social media are especially hard to understand and accept.  But,
some of Sales's interviewees do accept these behaviors as the new
normal.

If you are interested in this topic, you may also want to read:

- Jean M. Twenge; Have Smartphones Destroyed a Generation?; The
  Atlantic; 9/2017.

- John Lanchester; "You are the product"; "London review of books";
  8/17/2017; p. 3.

Twenge reports on studies and surveys of the frequency and amount
and styles of smartphone use by teenagers.  She also reports on the
effects that this smartphone use, which has been increasing
dramatically in recent years, is having on the lifestyles of
teenagers and how the relate to friends and family and how they
spend their time etc.  Emotionally, it's not a cheery picture.
Teens who use their smartphones a lot, and increasingly many of them
do, are becoming lonely, depressed, and unhappy.

This is the first generation in which so many have had a smartphone
since such a young age.  The next cohort will have had a smartphone
all their lives; they will not know life without one.  They actively
explore new uses for smartphones, especially those uses related to
social media.  They're the pioneers and early adopters of those new
uses.  We will, I think, in the future, see new and innovative uses
for smartphones because of the demands they make on the smartphone
and software and social media industry.  But, as with other kinds of
pioneers, they may be making sacrifices during this process.

I keep wishing that these teens would stop, put down their
smartphones, and ask themselves whether they are getting something
that they want from life.

Twenge, by the way, discusses in her article how difficult it might
be for those, parents for example, to limit and reduce the amount of
time teenagers spend staring at a smartphone screen, especially
given that those teens will have had a smartphone from such an early
age.  I'm wondering whether a better and more hopeful strategy might
be to attempt to alter the kinds of uses teens make of their
smartphones, attempting to encourage them to engage in activities
other than obsessive texting, seeking more likes and popularity,
attempting to post pictures to make their friends and followers
jealous, etc.  And, why do they want their friends to be constantly
judging them, anyway.

I should explain my own interest in this book.  I initially was
attracted to and started reading "American girls" because I wanted
to find out what new and innovative uses teenagers were finding and
developing for smartphones.  I found two things: (1) "American
girls" is much more interesting on several other issues, especially
those related to sociology, for example, the life-styles of teenage
girls in the U.S. and what social and psychological problems teens
are bothered by.  (2) The uses that teens put smartphones to are not
particularly innovative in the sense that they (teens) are not doing
the innovating themselves: they can be more accurately described as
being attracted to, sucked in by, and becoming addicted to
smartphone apps that are provided by large providers of social media
Web apps such as Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat, and more.
Obsessively seeking the approval of your peers does not seem like
something that will lead to new and useful ways to use a smartphone.

I'm saying that they are being sucked into or lured into such use
because it is not the case that they have a need or a use and go
looking for a tool or Web site that satisfies that need and provides
that use.  They don't have a need. These Web sites are creating the
need, and it's an artificial need that teenagers would be better off
without.  Teens are attracted to these Web sites usually because
their friends and other are using them, and not because they have a
problem that the Web site or app solves.  And, I'm saying that it's
an addiction, after reading Sales's book and Twenge's article,
because of their heavy and obsessive use and because it does not
make them happy.  They are drawn to use these social media sites,
and they seemingly cannot stop using them, even though they (the
teens) become more unhappy, more stressed, and even depressed from
using them.

After reading "American girls", I find that I want someone to tell
these teenage girls to sit down, put your fingers to your chin, and
think about whether you are really getting anything you want from
this activity.

In Sales's last chapter "Conclusion", she wonders about what is
different about being a teenage girl now from her own experiences as
a teen.  Part of it, she seems to think is just the same
difficulties of being a teen that she had, but perhaps more extreme,
and amplified by the stress of interacting on social media.  But,
the one thing that she is sure is different is the amount of porn,
in particular porn videos that teenage boys watch.  That, she says,
changes the way boys view and treat girls, and it's definitely a
change for the worse.  To a significant extent, these changes
involve what is now considered normal behavior.  When sexting by
teens and boys asking girls to send nude pictures of themselves
comes to being viewed as normal, even if only by teens, we know that
we're viewing a big and a negative change.

Sales recognizes and one of her interviewees reports on how
important it is to teenage girls to be "cool", "with it", to have
and use the latest and newest of everything, including Web apps.
Tech and Web companies are very aware of this attraction, and they
use it to attract girls to their Web sites and apps.  Sales believes
that tech companies are preying upon and exploiting teenage girls by
attracting them in this way.  Moreover, Sales feels that because of
this, those tech companies have an obligation to treat their users,
especially teenage girls, with respect.  In particular, they have an
obligation to police and prevent cyberbullying, to reduce the
degradation of teenage girls, to monitor and stop the harassment of
teenage girls and children, and to prevent girls (and boys, too)
from posting nude pictures of themselves.  Given the amount of money
these companies are making off teens, it is not too much to ask that
they do the right thing.

08/28/2017

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