There are plenty of distopian SF societies that are wonderful from an economic basis, but horrific from another basis (Brave New World is the most famous, but by far not the only example).

I think the biggest issue here is the normal headline/article disagreement.

Edit to add:

As for "objective data":

Social: The collapse of friendships and group activities. https://www.americansurveycenter.org/research/the-state-of-a...

Environmental: Things have improved in some respects compared to the smog and burning rivers of the 60s. But in other respects we now have historic droughts, historic wildfires, increasing frequency of cyclones, sea-level increases, decreases in green spaces, climate change, and still a variety of pollution events (which get more airplay than in previous years).

Sexual: Incel communities. Breakups by text and ghosting. Finding partners online balanced out by not having the support of shared communities with sexual partners.

This is just conveniently redefining what most people mean when they talk about objective factors.

I tend to agree that this ability to broadcast doom is an explanatory factor and it makes life worse, but to claim this is an objective explanatory factor is problematic I think, at least without drawing a distinction between this factor and those traditionally considered "objective".

But setting aside arguments about semantics, I think the deep seated stigmas around mental health that have only recently started to fade are a huge factor in the language we use to describe these issues, and I would argue seem to influence many people's perception of the importance of "subjective" factors (i.e. they deprioritize these factors or think they are not as "real" as objective factors).

People tend to think of issues that impact mental health as somehow less objective, because mental health is itself subjective. While it's objectively true that if I do not have enough money to buy food and don't find some other way to acquire it, I will die, it is not objectively true that two people experiencing the same social media environment will be impacted by it the same way, and yet this is an experience that can also lead to death.

But even if we accept that subjective factors are the primary issue, we can still trace those back to objective causes, it's just that we cannot use the same mental models of understanding "objective quality of life". We could find that social media is objectively the cause of degraded mental health (and studies are confirming this), but the impact itself is still subjective, unlike traditional economic indicators.

In other words, subjective experience could be just as critical to understand and explore as objective factors, and that subjectivity does not in any way reduce the importance or validity of such exploration.

I disagree. People have complained about the increase in television channels and shows leading to a breakdown in the cohesiveness of society. Broadcast technologies (along with the related rabbit-hole and bubble effects) are definitely an aspect of "objective factors" that people talk about.

> People tend to think of issues that impact mental health as somehow less objective, because mental health is itself subjective.

Personal mental health is subjective in much the same way that personal ability to find a place to sleep (from couch surfing to buying a mansion) is subjective (and becoming harder due to demographics and new construction deficits).

Social mental health (sociology) is an objectively measurable criterion. As indicated by the link in my edit to the post you are responding to.

(Pardon the tense disagreement in the third sentence.)

Is it possible that dividing GDP by population isn't a good indicator of whether "life got objectively worse" for people living in conditions of increasing inequality?

Perhaps the prospect of juggling three gig jobs that can disappear in an instant, while still not being able to pay for rent and healthcare, isn't an ideal "employment prospect".

Or perhaps the data cited in the article isn't granular enough to point at root causes. Yes, young people are depressed and anxious. But when we understand that persistent sadness and hopelessness is far more prevalent among teen girls than teen boys, now we can look at what's different for girls than boys.

One hint is that among teens, the vast majority of minutes spent on Instagram are by girls, not boys. Boys are online a lot too, but gaming is a different social and behavioral animal.

And most studies looking for correlations between social media usage and mental health are flawed, because they are typically dose-response studies. If individuals who consume 15 meals a week of fast food have greater rates of diabetes than individuals who never eat fast food, then that's a good correlation (though not necessarily causation)!

But that method fails for social media, because social media is a collective activity. Girls who spend five hours a day on Instagram are mediating relationships through the app and neglecting in-person social activity, and we know that's unhealthy.

But girls who stay off social media are out of the loop, socially isolated, probably ostracized for being weird, because their friends are still on it for five hours a day.

High rates of social media usage damage both frequent users and infrequent users, so it's hard to see that in dose-response correlations.