In the current era of advanced information and technology, people have easy access to a vast amount of violent content, and social media platforms are also promoting violence. Experts believe that this is distorting people’s attitudes towards violence, and this issue is difficult to solve through automation.
Violence has always been a part of human experience, but experts point out that violence is now emerging as a form of entertainment, unlike before.
Unlike the fictional violence in movies and electronic games, social media allows anyone to witness real violence, often presented in an entertaining manner and filled with frivolous, vulgar, or misanthropic comments, as well as numerous random content labeled as “brain rot” by internet slang.
Meanwhile, Jeffrey Blevins, a professor of media and journalism at the University of Cincinnati, specializing in social media content, explains that violence on social media is often presented in an entertaining form, filled with frivolous, vulgar, or misanthropic comments and mixed with numerous random content labeled as “brain rot” by internet slang.
Moreover, Andrew Selepak, an associate professor of media and communication studies at the University of Florida, specializing in research on social media, points out that political divisions lead to a large part of society being perceived as sub-human, implying that these individuals should be subjected to violence.
Although most social media platforms restrict bloody or violent content, some content can still bypass the filtering mechanisms, and the content that falls within the boundaries of what the platform allows can still continue to spread.
According to a survey conducted by the 2024 Youth Endowment Fund on teenagers in England and Wales, about 70% of teenagers aged 13 to 17 have witnessed real-world violence on social media. In the past 12 months, TikTok users had the highest exposure to violent content at 44%. Following closely were X platform users at 43%. However, less than a quarter of the respondents reported using the X platform. Social media platforms like Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram also showed concerning statistics, with teenage users exposed to violence content ranging from 31% to 33%.
Blevins mentioned that the recent stabbing incident involving the conservative activist Charlie Kirk was “regretfully becoming an intriguing case study.” He noted that despite platforms having restrictions on violent content, millions of people still watched the extremely bloody videos of the stabbing incident on social media.
For years, academia and the news industry have been discussing the issue of desensitization resulting from repeated exposure to violent content in digital media.
Selepak believes that Americans are generally fortunate to only occasionally encounter violence at a personal level in real life.
“In the real world, we do not experience multiple violent events every day. However, on social media, especially when people spend a lot of time browsing these platforms daily, you may come across violent content repeatedly each day,” he pointed out.
He added, “Apart from war participants, history has never witnessed such a situation.”
Even those who encounter violence most frequently in real life, such as emergency responders, often do so only after the violence has occurred, and this experience makes them aware of the destructive consequences of violence.
In the online world, Selepak pointed out that people easily get addicted to watching almost endless real-world violence scenes without realizing the consequences.
Experts unanimously agree that the problem lies in social media platforms using algorithms to provide personalized content to each user. Once a user accidentally discovers a few specific types of videos, the algorithm captures this clear preference and offers more similar videos. Even if the platform limits violent scenes, there is still a lot of content on the fringe that can pass through the review process, although this content remains unbearable to watch—and it is precisely this type of borderline content that often goes viral online.
“We tend to spend more time consuming, commenting, and engaging with content that makes us angry, upset, or irritated. However, according to the algorithms of social platforms, such content is more likely to be seen by more people because it receives a lot of engagement,” Selepak explained.
He pointed out that restricting such content would impact the profits of social media platforms.
“The way platforms make profits is by having users spend time on the platform watching advertisements,” he stated.
In reality, violent content has genuine informational value in certain situations, making the problem more complex.
Unfortunately, algorithms lack the ability to distinguish valuable information because they inherently lack the human perception ability.
Note: “Platform-Promoted” includes “Newsfeed” or “For You” content, in which such content expands coverage through algorithms to enhance user engagement.
“Algorithms are indeed good at handling content, but they clearly cannot deal with contextual and ethical issues,” Blevins stated. “They may not necessarily have the moral guidelines needed.”
Selepak concurred with this statement, saying, “Algorithms do not necessarily care about what content we are viewing. They just want us to spend time on them.”
Social media not only exposes people to violence but also provides a platform for promoting violence.
In a survey conducted in the UK, 16% of respondents admitted to engaging in violent behavior over the past 12 months, with approximately two-thirds attributing social media’s role in these incidents, including escalating face-to-face violence due to online arguments, escalating conflicts through comments, and children saying things online that they would not say in person.
A study titled “Small becomes big, fast: Adolescent perceptions of how social media features escalate online conflict to offline violence” based on interviews with dozens of predominantly Black youths found that the “small” and “petty” arguments on social media easily escalate into severe conflicts and physical altercations in real life.
The study highlighted, “Adolescents are keenly aware that the social media environment intensifies interpersonal conflicts between peers.”
“Adolescents go online not necessarily to argue with others. Instead, they are acutely aware that social media is a unique environment that can magnify and alter the experience of conflict,” the study indicates.
Apart from visually graphic violent scenes, social media also provides a platform for propaganda that indirectly justifies violence. While experts did not name any specific political groups, they emphasized that despite platforms enacting various regulations against violent content, such content remains abundant.
“If you are interested in a specific ideology, a particular group, or a particular phenomenon, try creating a new account… Enter these keywords and see what the algorithm pushes to you,” Professor Blevins said. “The content you see may surprise you.”
Experts warn that as algorithms constantly recommend more similar content, users of these platforms are easily misled into believing that extreme or fringe views are normal and widely accepted.
Professor Blevins pointed out that there is now a new phenomenon where artificial intelligence chatbots adept at flattery are reinforcing users’ beliefs to an unhealthy extent.
In addition, while some content on social media does not directly advocate violence, it indirectly provides legitimate reasons for violence.
Professor Selepak believes, “If you use Meta, YouTube, X, and TikTok, you will always hear this discourse—one side is fascist, they are Nazis, they are the most evil beings among humanity in our eyes.”
“This dehumanization phenomenon, along with the constant presentation of this dehumanizing behavior, makes people more likely to resort to violence against those groups, or accept violence directed at those groups,” he added.
More and more research is uncovering the negative effects of social media (at least in its current form), and public perceptions of social media are changing.
According to a survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) titled “Frequent Social Media Use and Experiences with Bullying Victimization, Persistent Feelings of Sadness or Hopelessness, and Suicide Risk Among High School Students — Youth Risk Behavior Survey, United States, 2023”, nearly 80% of American high school students reported using social media multiple times daily, with about one-third stating that they use social media more than once per hour.
A survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in Washington, D.C., titled “10 facts about teens and social media” revealed that nearly half of teenagers admitted to spending too much time on social media, compared to around a quarter of teenagers in 2023.
Moreover, Americans overall seem to be increasingly inclined to believe that children should not use cell phones, not only in the classroom but also throughout the school day. A Pew Research Center poll showed that in 2024, 36% of Americans supported a ban on cell phone use all day, a figure that increased to 44% earlier this year.