If social media has yet to negatively impact your life in some way, it will eventually. Whether it is because your ex posted a picture with his new girlfriend, your best friend uploads that embarrassing video of you at a party last weekend, or someone you dislike posts something rude about you on Twitter for everyone to see, an experience similar to this is bound to happen. Issues from social media can be severe, which causes greater issues in life. We as a generation need to realize that, whether we like it or not, our lives are public for everyone to see once something is posted on the Internet. Adolescents are so obsessed with advertising everything that they do, where they are, and with whom minute-by-minute, that they almost forget to simply live their lives. Especially in today's world the problems of social media become more prevalent; therefore adolescents especially need to be well aware of what is posted online. Social media has not only been proven to cause minor problems, it also is the leading cause for depression and anxiety for adolescents in today's world ("What's Social"). One wrong post has enough power to ruin an entire reputation and future, which is why social media has the potential to be detrimental to our society. Our generation has become solely reliant on checking different news feeds religiously, which makes trying to lower the amount of people who use social media in their daily lives impossible. When people post all about their lives and document the things they do this causes an increase of other people judging and criticizing the person's post, which causes self-development problems for adolescents ("The Negative"). More problems than expected arise from the use of social media, such as sexting and cyber-bullying (Gabriel). People live for that Instagram like, or that Twitter favorite, but is one inappropriate caption worth not being able to qualify for your dream job? Social media negatively impacts our society in multiple ways including, causing depression and anxiety, if one's not careful it can jeopardize future opportunities, and unrealistic depiction of life that could lead to low self esteem problems.

Sreedhar Potarazu is a well-known man who studies social concepts of society, such as the affect of social media on our society. Social problems such as depression and anxiety have been directly linked to social media usage, and in Sreedhar's article he found that 54% of students reported that they are "experiencing overwhelming anxiety in the past 12 months and that 32.6% felt so depressed that it was difficult to function"("Is Social"). These statistics display a frightening trend, but we can only blame ourselves. Depression can arise from social media in different ways such as cyber-bullying or even just feeling bad about your image because of how others portray themselves. This past March over 1.4 billion people worldwide joined Facebook, and in June 316 million people were on Twitter ("The Positive"). The obsessive amounts of people who are active on these sites have increased depression levels. The more popular these social media sites become, the higher risk of people who will soon be affected by the negative results to being a part of social media. The term "social media depression" comes from being so involved and obsessed with what people are posting, that one forgets how unimportant it actually is (Spoon). Getting easily caught up in what others post, one becomes consumed with the Internet and moving farther away from reality. Not only does seeing a good picture of someone make one jealous, but it makes one question one's own looks, which leads to a lower self-confidence and can trigger a less intense form of depression ("Social Media and"). There have been studies done that try to reduce the amount of time people spend on these sites in order to lower the statistics of people affected by depression and anxiety, but it the end it resides within our power to control our levels of usage. Health professionals in an article by Marianne Spoon have done research that has proven that children and teens are more sensitive to media influences, and even though depression affects both sexes, women are more commonly diagnosed with the condition than men (Spoon). Social media obviously does not discriminate based on sex, but girls find themselves more susceptible to fall into the trap of how social media has the ability to negatively portray who they actually are ("Social Media and"). Filters, editing apps, and whatever else there could possibly be normally create the most insecurities in girls, but this could vary depending on the situation. Social media allows insecure people to hide behind their phones and use filters, or certain apps to convert the way they look into something they are not. The ability for one to hide behind one's phone allows there to be a higher risk of cyber-bullying and doing whatever else on the Internet that people would be too afraid to do in real life. An article called "The Negative Effect of Social Media on Society and Individuals" by Brian Jung is broken into four different sections: a false sense of connection, cyber-bullying, decreased productivity, and privacy. The article stresses that the more time and energy spent on social media, the more our important relationships and connections will weaken (Jung)."According to Cornell University's Steven Strogatz, social media sites can make it more difficult for us to distinguish between the meaningful relationships we foster in the real world, and the numerous casual relationships formed through social media" (Jung). This can become a problem, if our society starts to value online relationships over real world ones. Under the category of cyber-bullying, Brian Jung argues that "[t]he devastation of these online attacks can leave deep mental scars. In several well-publicized cases, victims have even been driven to suicide" (Jung). Cyber-bullying is a real problem that happens every single day; a survey taken by the CBS news states that 42% of kids have reported being cyber-bullied. "While many businesses use social networking sites to find and communicate with clients, the sites can also prove a great distraction to employees who may show more interest in what their friends are posting than in their work tasks"(Jung). This quote demonstrates problems that our generation faces in their distraction with online use during work. Social media should be used to enhance work productivity, but instead it causes distractions and decreases levels of productivity for businesses.

The consequences and power that a social media site contains can reverberate if one is young and naive and thinks that posting a picture with a beer underage will not affect one's future in anyway. Lack of parenting could be an excuse for this problem, but even other inappropriate pictures posted could affect a person in the future when it comes time to interview for jobs. Social media for business owners allows them to stalk. This term is not literal stalking, but online stalking can be extremely helpful when trying to learn the reputation of a possible future employee. The ability to just search someone's name can be amazing and terrifying. Anything that was once posted online can still be found even if it is deleted right away (Iwanski). This must be taken seriously, especially for adolescents who actually want to have a successful future. All it takes is one poor judgment to end up online for the entire world to see and have access to. Nothing is private once posted to Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, and so forth. Although one may think because a friend's account is private that no one else will be able to see or have access to it, which is entirely false and can still be traced.  "Sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+ allow employers to get a glimpse of who you are outside the confines of a resume, cover letter, or interview -- while they offer job seekers the opportunity to learn about companies they're interested in; connect with current and former employees; and hear about job openings instantaneously, among other things. That's probably why half of all job seekers are active on social networking sites on a daily basis, and more than a third of all employers utilize these sites in their hiring process" (Forbes). This excerpt from Forbes magazine discusses exactly what employers do when they are scouting out future employees. Cautious actions should be taken when posting any status such as making sure there are no inappropriate objects in the picture, or opinion on any social media site, because people form judgments based off of those choices. An excerpt from The Carolina Rhetoric contains an article called "The Web Means the End of Forgetting" which talks more about how critical it is to watch what is posted online. "Four years ago, Stacy Snyder, then a 25-year-old teacher in training at Conestoga Valley High School in Lancaster Pa., posted a photo on her MySpace page that showed her at a party wearing a pirate hat and drinking from a plastic cup, with the caption "Drunken Pirate" (Rosen 51). Her supervisor found this photo and said Snyder was "promoting drinking in virtual view of her underage students"(Rosen 51). This one photo caused Stacy Snyder to not be able to graduate and earn her teaching degree just days before she was suppose to. This passage demonstrates how one poor decision online can lead to an entire future ruined. 

Jealously is prevalent in everyone, but social media sites make it easier to envy everything that others have, and everything that we do not have. Hiding behind a computer screen or phone allows people to be whoever they wish, the problem with this is that someone can make their life seem perfectly fine, when in reality that person has struggles and problems just like everyone else. This causes major self-esteem problems, and can lead to unrealistic expectations of life. Not everyone can get a brand new car as their first car, or have the perfect body to be able to flaunt to their followers. The idea of "perfect" is formed based off of who gets the most likes on their picture, and our society lets this determine who we are and how we view others. Social media is known to cause depression and anxiety, and in this article it is further proven, "Nicky Lidbetter, CEO of Anxiety UK, noted in a 2012 article that for those already prone to anxiety, it seems that the pressures from technology act as a tipping point, making people feel more insecure and more overwhelmed"("Social Media And Insecurity"). For people who are already prone to having anxiety social media acts as an assistant that adds to the additional stress. Lidbetter goes on to say "social media is now a breeding ground for distrust in relationships" which is not an uncommon thing to hear for today's society. ("Social Media and Insecurity"). Not only does social media make our generation question our own personal appearance and self-esteem, it makes people question everyone else around them. This issue cannot be fixed, because jealousy and insecurities are a natural part of life, but social media enhances the ability of people to have insecurities. When adults and people of the older generations think of Facebook and other social media sites they may use, most of the time they have good intentions for using those apps, such as keeping in touch with family members and great ways to communicate. Social media should be used for this purpose, but sadly it has turned into chaos. Every moment of one's life can be recorded and posted online for the world to see, which is unnecessary. Social media allows people to feed off of each other and become so wrapped up into other people's lives and business that people should not care about or even be interested in. 

Like any argument there is always another side. There are positive aspects to social media, which can actually be beneficial to people of all ages. Some advantages include, guaranteed meeting places, keeping in touch with family, professional networking, and staying informed about the world (Jackson). Social media offers more than the bad articles and pictures that are posted. Social media is a great way to be informed about the news, since newspapers are on the decline, and we cannot always watch TV and wait for the nightly news to air. The most common form of social media is staying in touch with family and friends and social media is a great way to do so. Catching up with family online is less personal, but if it is the only opportunity, than it is a great way to feel as if you are not even missing that person. One of the biggest advantages of social media is the connection it provides, whether it is job opportunities, or promoting your own business, it is an effective way to reach out to people and grasp people's attention. Businesses thrive off of and rely on social media in order for their companies to do well. Without social media it would be harder to advertise events, and spread the word about certain things that need to be known by large groups of people. Communication is key in our society, and it is so important that we maintain the capability to communicate with each other properly. Without certain social media sites it would make communicating more difficult. In Dave Parrack's article he stresses how social media sites acts as a "speedy" way to communicate and pass along information ("The Positive Impact"). We as a generation rely heavily on having these forms of communications that without them we would struggle adapting. Social media serves as a great tool, but sadly our generation has abused it into causing more harm than good. All forms of social media were created to be beneficial for communication such as Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, but the users have created the problems. For any problem that is prevalent with an issue there is not always a clear-cut solution. Dr. Duke and her colleague suggest a solution that parents should monitor their children's time spent on social media, in order to prevent problems in their adolescent lives (Northenor). The more that Internet usage is monitored at a younger age, the better off the child will be in the future. Learning how to control the amount of time spent on Social Media sites will help solve multiple problems such as, how much we as a generation rely on those networking sites. Solutions are difficult involving social media because it would almost require the elimination of the sites completely, which will not happen. Problems that affect large amounts of people do not have simple solutions, especially if not everyone sees a problem with it to begin with. Social media causes more harm than, good. Although a great idea, we as a generation have abused its convenience and made it into something that can do more harm. If social media users better controlled the usage then our society would not be struggling so badly with the repercussions that come from the abuse. People should reevaluate the way they use social media in order to prevent problems from arising. 

