I mentioned earlier the prominence of mental health issues deriving from a person’s self-image and sense of self-worth. This is where we see the conflict of youth culture arising, as individual inner conflicts occur when young people fail to achieve perfection. As we can see in the case of Essena, the culture of social media and ‘perfection’ is not a small proclivity, it is an all-consuming infatuation that is indoctrinated into the minds of all millennials growing up within this era. The hysterical frenzied attitude of ‘fangirling culture’ expresses an overwhelming urge to admire perfection. These excessive emotional outbursts can also be negative in tone, creating the mind-set for depression when the image of perfection cannot be achieved. Consumerism and culture plays a big part in creating this ever-growing amount of depression and anxiety cases in youth. All consumerist industries encourage perfection and strive to impress upon young developing teens the importance of appearance. However, as we’ve discovered, this ‘perfection’ is impossible to achieve and thus teens believe they are inadequate and can end up falling into depression and even suicidal tendencies. The evidence of this situation being particularly prominent in todays youth culture can be seen in the statistical figures of cases of depression.
As of 2016, every 1 in 10 people aged 15-24 experience depression, and suicide is the third leading cause of death for this age group as well. This rate of depression has doubled over the last 30 years, suggesting that todays culture is much more conducive to causing depression than ever before. This rise in mental illness is one of the largest conflicts present in todays youth culture as it is such a prolific problem that affects a large percentage of young people. Some people, seeing the link between the rise in rates of depression and the rise of technology and social media, may see a correlation between the two. As previously seen in the case of Essena O’Neill, it does seem that social media has a negative influence on teenage mental health, however, as Geraldine Bedell writes in her article ‘Teenage mental-health crisis’ for Independent, ‘the trouble with seeing social media as the problem is that it's the technology that then gets addressed rather than the underlying issues.’ The conflict is not derived directly from social media, rather this is a tool for amplifying the already present issue in todays youth culture: the impossible need to be perfect and to be seen.
"Some of the energy adults spend worrying about technology would be better spent worrying about the world that creates and shapes both social media and the psyches of our children."
Millennials.