Andres Ramos

IGCSE Writing to Respond. 

Dear Ms Samantha Taylor,

 

I am writing this letter with regards to your article presenting the way in which social media is taking over the younger generation. I strongly agree with your judgement concerning teenagers and the way social media’s affecting them and believe your statements, as well as views, are correct. Social media is growing and it’s population is increasing rapidly. However, Social media is holding young people back and not allowing them to progress to the best of their potential. I feel the need to speak about teenagers, due to them being portrayed as addicted, so I am writing this as a response to your article.

 From observing your article, Civil Thompson stated that the digital age is making teenagers uniquely shallow, and that kids are unable to form meaningful relationships. With this statement I strongly agree as upon you asking a teenage girl how often she texts, the response was a shocking “250 times a day” – it is clear that teenagers may easily be described as “addicted” to social media. Personally, as a teenager myself, I would acknowledge on this statement due to me experiencing something quite similar. In ‘our’ point of view, as teenagers, we don’t calculate how much times spent using these electronic devices, and we may get out of hand as many may say.

Furthermore, Jonathan Franzen declared that kids are “unable to socialise face to face because of the online temptations”. As a teenager myself, I can relate to the judgments made. However, I strongly believe there’s a place and time for everything but teenagers are devoting too much of their time to social media. Worryingly, there are many dangers involved with social media.  With just a picture and a name it’s enough to be used for fraud or danger to a kids personal life.Most young people are unaware of the dangers social media can cause and so freely post their personal information online. As teenager, this comes as no surprise, as i am a prime example whereby in the past i too, have posted personal information without giving it a second thought. In distinction to your article, Jonathan Frazen fears our more meaningful relationships will be weakened because of the affect social media has, he declares it is taking too much of our physical energy on these less meaningful online relationships. For example, all the countless hours glued to Facebook has turned teenagers into screen – enslaved social inadequates. For him to describes us as ‘’ enslaved social inadequates’’. As a young teenager myself, I would take offence on this judgement, but it is overall true. He also states that while us kids are busy tweeting, texting and spending, the world is drifting towards disasters.   I strongly believe in this accusation That us, as a young society, we do not know our everyday problems and social media has us under its control.

 The American comedian Louis CK proclaimed on the TV that he would not give his daughters a mobile phone due to him thinking they wouldn’t be able to develop any empathy.We can relate this to what Jonathan Frazer said because he stated that the younger generation cannot socialise face to face so therefore with this theory, most parents as well as adults would be worried of the dangers of what social media brings when in possession of a mobile phone. I strongly believe that this is true due to the fact that me as a teenager knowing one another and I know for a fact that teenagers, have developed more confidence over social media and therefore they seem to reject the face to face communication. Not only is it changing the social skills, but it’s also changing their brains and its resulting in selfish and attention deficient young people. A scientist Susan Greenfield, says that this electronic addiction is leaving a generation characterized by short attention spans, sensationalism, inability to emphasise and a shaky sense of identity. In my opinion I believe this judgement is true due to most teenagers suffering from lack of appreciation as well as manners. They also couldn’t care less of what’s happening around them. I’m saying this from experience because of me being one of the teenagers that suffer from this addiction that social media brings.

Well… newspapers are constantly filled with frightening imagery of pornography. They claim aggression is caused supposedly by violent video games. Now that Grand Theft Auto has hit the shelves. It has been affecting us mentally and physically. Mentally in terms of aggression. Believe it or not video games, brings us frustration. The reason for this would be due to technology taking over our thoughts, if we don’t get it our way it will lead us to aggression. Physically… we tend to spend more time on this modern technology and as a result we don’t have enough time to keep fit. All we do is : eat, sleep and use the toilet. Technology is affecting our health and we can’t take control. However, I disagree in the point made where newspapers claim that us teenagers are influenced by pornography. I strongly disagree with this judgement made due to me, as a teenager my self, not experiencing this.

In conclusion, I strongly agree with all the judgments made towards the way teenagers are misusing technology overall and the behavior there portraying. However, as a teenager my self I disagree with a couple judgments that were made, but overall I respect this article and I will take all this information into consideration and hopefully we’ll all take control and not let technology take control.

Your Sincerely,

Andres Ramos