OP-ED: Social Media is Making Girls Grow Up Too Fast

 Social Media is Making Girls Grow up Too Fast: Op-Ed 

Have you ever been scrolling on your phone and seen a video of a girl who is dressed to the nines, full face of makeup, tall heels, dancing like nobody else is watching. You then look at her bio and find out that she is just a teenager who looks like a 25 year old. Half of the comments praised her, calling her beautiful. Half of the comments tell her she is trying too hard and she should go play outside. Unfortunately, this is very common on social media. Young girls trying to look older than they actually are for views and attention. Twelve and thirteen year old girls, in some cases younger, are dressing up and enhancing their womanhood for an invisible audience behind the screen. Why is this such a big issue, and how has social media made girls grow up too fast? 

Social media, and especially TikTok, has created a blurry line between childhood and adolescence. Girls are facing the stronger end of this, where boys do not care as much about looks, and find it easier to “keep up with the Joneses”. Social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram have glorified and rewarded girls for looking desirable and being confident. But what does this mean for young girls? They have begun to try to emulate the way the adult influencers look, talk, and act. Their lives revolve around fashion, boys, makeup, and curating the perfect aesthetic for the outside world. Instead of going outside and creating skits with your friends, or playing jump rope, preteens are now making videos doing 15 step skincare routines and buying the newest lululemon leggings.                                                                                                                  

It is not a new concept that young girls are exposed to such unrealistic beauty standards. But something is new in this modern age. The difference between now and even just ten years ago is the speed and scale in which girls are exposed to “growing up”. Social media is always pumping out content to them, showing pictures of perfectly airbrushed influencers and essentially giving the picture the label “you should look like this too”, or “how to look like this”. The thing that these young girls are struggling to understand is that it is okay that they do not look like this, in fact, it is impossible for them to look exactly like Alix Earle. Most of these influencers are over 21 years old, and normal everyday 13 year olds question why they do not look like that. 

The modern day pressures to grow up fast aren't just purely for aesthetic reasons. They are ingrained in the social media generation, making the pressure more emotional and psychological. They have been programmed to market themselves in a desirable way that goes along with the trends that are happening online. They believe that their self worth can be measured in likes and followers versus the type of grades they get in middle school or how well they get along with their friends. Because they measure their worth in attention and validation, it becomes hard to separate their worth from what is going on behind the screen. 

What is the impact of all of this? Rising rates of depression, anxiety, and body-image issues amongst the teen and tween population. In a 2023 CDC report, 3 in every 5 teenage girls felt “persistently sad and hopeless”. This was the highest rate in over a decade. The CDC along with other valid resources conclude that this is for the majority due to social media. Others argue that social media gives girls a platform to express their confidence and creativity. But even with these positive outlets come the pressures from society and older women. Confidence can turn performative, and creativity turns into comparison. A space that once empowered girls ends up harming their self-worth and leaving them feeling drastically worse about themselves. 

Another side effect of the social media age is that these girls' childhoods are being ripped away. Times when girls would be playing outside, creating skits, playing dress up, they are now doing makeup routines and vulgar dances for the camera. They will never understand the childhood and innocence that they are missing out on. This isn't to blame them, they do not know what it was like for older generations. But it is still sad that what they don't know is still being ripped away from them. 

So what do we do about this problem? We have to ditch the narrative that this is not harmless. Social media is not “just for fun”, when a ten year old is worrying about her followers or like counts. There needs to be a bigger push for parents and educators to treat what their children are doing online just as seriously as what they do offline. There needs to be a space online created for girls that is age appropriate. They need to find a place that allows them to just be kids and not feel a strong pressure to grow up too fast. 

Though social media is here to stay, we do not have to accept the fact that it is fast tracking young girls' adulthood. Childhood is a time for exploration and adventure, and not to be facing these expectations. In order to take care of these girls' well-being, we have to rethink the way these platforms shape their lives and think of better ways to make it better.