Three seconds. Only three seconds is how long it takes to load … Instagram/Twitter/Facebook/Snapchat. Users send out 58 million tweets per day, with 9,100 happening every second but there are over 222 million Twitters who just watch other people’s tweets. People are spending 1 out of every 7 minutes on Facebook when online. Instagram has already had more than 16 billion photos uploaded since debuting in 2010. Five million photos are uploaded daily. Each click to refresh incessantly chipping away at the fragile ice-block that is our society’s self-esteem. That addictive convivial click always takes more than it gives. It is a relentless cycle; people are bored, they check their social media sites, they see all their friends having fun, and it hits them – “but I’m just sitting here alone, lol gonna go cry now.” It’s a monster disguised as an easy-access amenity. So much time, so much emotional energy, and so much life just wasted on a screen. Comparing yourself to your friend in a swimsuit AND they are with friends/crushes? It echoes, the daunting scream of everyone’s personal insecurities with a twisting of the knife that’s already jabbed in everyone’s side. Just three seconds.
Forrest Sullenbarger is a student at SJSU.
The Bolt Magazine 