Since 2010, data show a steady rise in suicide rates and anxiety among young people.It’s hard to ignore that this timeline aligns closely with the social media boom, especially the emergence of Facebook.
Mark Zuckerberg created the Facebook in 2004, likely without anticipating the massive popularity it would achieve in the years to come, or the lasting impact it would still have on our daily lives. Then came Instagram and WhatsApp—both later acquired by Zuckerberg—followed by Twitter, TikTok, and the rise of likes, reels, tutorials, Get Ready With Me videos, and everyday life itself, now filtered through a screen.
Social media today spans all age groups. Parents who once scolded their kids for using their phones at the dinner table now send them reels on WhatsApp, stirring a pot with one hand while scrolling through TikTok with the other. Kids who used to play outside now often connect over Discord while shooting opponents in Counter Strike or spending entire nights listening to other young people talk on livestreams.
In the span of just twenty years, reality has shifted dramatically. And the consequences of that shift—perhaps long hidden beneath the excitement of new technologies—are only now beginning to surface.
The Case That Could Change Everything: Meta and YouTube Found Liable for Addictive Design
In March 2026, a Los Angeles jury found Meta and YouTube liable in a case involving alleged mental health harm suffered by a young woman who developed a social media addiction from an early age, after beginning to use YouTube at age 6 and Instagram at age 9.
The ruling determined that the issue did not lie in the content itself, but in the platforms’ design, pointing to features like infinite scroll, autoplay, and constant notifications as mechanisms that encourage compulsive use.
As a result, the court …
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Author: Camila Berriex / High Times
