Attention to Intention

Most of us view social media as a place to scroll, interact with our friends, wind down from the day, or stay informed with what is going on in the world. We commonly refer to it as a “tool” because of all the different needs it can fulfill for us. However, tools are typically meant to be harmless and helpful when utilized. But this notion was challenged this past week.

 

A California jury found Meta and Google responsible in a landmark case regarding the harms of social media, ruling that Instagram and YouTube contributed to a young woman’s mental health struggles (Chmielewski et al., 2026). It was found liable because they did not warn users about the potential risks of using their platforms, that it can quite powerfully disrupt and alter someone’s reality. At a time when society is so dependent upon its virtual connections, I found this to maybe be a turning point for how we look at and utilize social media as a means of connecting with each other in society.

 

While I believe social media can be such an incredible tool for staying connected, collective action, and increasing awareness about important subjects, it is these exact same factors that also make it so easy to cause harm. While these companies are rewarded for the amount of time and attention we give them, they learned to prioritize factors that make them addictive. It is easy to understand why a platform would want to increase engagement, they make more money! Unfortunately, outrage and anxiety keep us glued to our screens more than the happy content does. We’ve been confronted with questions like, where should we draw the line between protecting free speech and holding platforms accountable when that speech spreads disinformation and promotes polarization? Who is holding these platforms morally accountable? Who is paying the price for this?

 

The youth are. Public health is. Our collective sense of reality is.

 

BUT this is why social media activism is so complicated. Social media may distort reality, but it can also expose it. Imagine if a video would have never been captured of George Floyd’s or Alex Pretti’s murder? When you’re a small fish in the large pond, it’s easy to feel like the system has all the power. Social media offers the opportunity to flip the script. It gives ordinary people the ability to make enough noise that even the big guys, governments, corporations, institutions, have to pay attention.

 

I do not mean for this to sound overly cynical. I use social media too, and I understand why it is so appealing. It connects us, informs us, and makes us feel seen. I think that is why it is worth being honest about what it asks from us in return. I don’t have the answers to these big questions, but I do feel optimistic that we are heading in the right direction after the decision this week to hold these large corporations accountable. The more we understand about how these platforms are built and what they are designed to do, the more intentionally we can choose how to use them, on our terms.