If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a goose in a clever disguise.

Or perhaps just one using an Instagram filter.

Because thanks to the plethora of digital effects made popular by social media platforms, it’s become increasingly unreliable as of late to take content and people at face value. 

And with such a significant chunk of users being at a young and highly impressionable age — 95% of teenagers aged 13 to 17 and 63.8% of children below the age of 12 report being regularly active on at least one social network — this unfortunate reality is definitely a cause for concern.

It seems our generation might just be overdue for a switch to filtering users instead of selfies and vacation photos.

But the issue of digital deception is merely the tip of the iceberg, for hidden beneath the surface lurk countless dangers — ones that have only recently begun to create ripples in the idealized world users have built around themselves.

Social media poses a threat to consumer privacy through extensive data collection. It fosters a mindset rooted in the fear of missing out that breeds social comparison, attacks self-esteem and encourages risky behavior. Anxiety and depression are on the rise. Inappropriate content runs rampant, disseminated to the most vulnerable victims by twisted algorithms.

Social skills have taken a significant hit as well. Spatial awareness, eye contact, body language interpretation, conversation initiation and overall interpersonal engagement seem to be concepts of the past, and I mourn their loss.

When did #livelaughlove become #diecryhate? 

I was never allowed to have social media accounts when I was younger, and I always felt out of the loop because of it. I wasn’t aware of the latest celebrity gossip that everyone in school seemed to gush about; I faked my reactions to hearing that so-and-so was pregnant, or that such-and-such couple had broken up; I missed out on attending events of which the details were only circulated through Instagram posts.

At the lunch table, while my friends bent their heads over their phones to reply to a friend of a friend’s Snapchat streak or stay up to date with a cousin’s husband’s sister’s story on Instagram, I would often busy myself by aimlessly swiping back and forth across my phone’s homescreen, oscillating between looking over my Canvas assignments, skimming through my photo albums, checking that the weather predictions hadn’t changed since my last sojourn on the app mere minutes prior or just shamelessly people-watching.

Frankly, I felt increasingly isolated as those around me seemed to grow increasingly interconnected. 

Undoubtedly, this pity-party-of-one, woe-is-me attitude seems quite petty and childish. In retrospect, I agree. 

And that’s exactly the point: Our perspective shifts as we age, as our frontal lobes develop and, lo and behold, so does our ability to regulate our emotions and exhibit wiser judgment. For the better, we lift the veil created by those oh-so-wonderful rose-tinted glasses.

As adolescents, however, we constantly seek external validation and become overdependent on instant gratification, all “necessities” that social media is most assuredly not in short supply of. 

And so begins the downward spiral into building relationships with electronics through digital forums as opposed to communicating sincerely with real, tangible people.

And yet, more and more children are being exposed to and immersed in this superficial world at younger and younger ages.

Now, I’d be flat-out lying if I said I never yearned for the day I’d have full autonomy over joining the social web. 

But when I was old enough to make the decision for myself, I realized that I should really be grateful for my parents’ diligence, because it most definitely allowed me to develop certain skills and habits that likely would’ve been stunted by social media.

Although my lack of experience may have kept me from appreciating the benefits social media has to offer, I can definitely vouch for how great and how freeing it is not to have been subjected to its shackles.

And I’m not denying that my screentime isn’t just as high as many of my peers; I’m no saint — that goes without saying — but I am a student in an academic landscape determined to go digital. 

But social media is a whole other beast that feeds on insecurities and sinks its claws into our idea of what it means to be a child. I think we can all agree that the formative years of “Sephora kids” are drastically different from our own, and I don’t envy them one bit.

I’d actually venture to say I pity them.

So I challenge anyone who’s willing — or simply feeling overstimulated — to disconnect from the reel world and reconnect with the real world. Social media may have hijacked your childhood, but don’t let it commandeer your adulthood.

Lift your nose out of your phone when you cross the street, start up a conversation as you wait for the lecture to begin, walk up to someone and ask them out to dinner rather than exchanging Instagram handles or sliding into their DMs. It may not be a scroll in the park, but it’ll be worth it. 

After all, when life gives you lemons, there’s no need to post a 15-second TikTok about it with the caption #blessed in hopes that a follower will send you sugar to make lemonade. 

Just appreciate the free lemons.

Maeva Elizabé is a neuroscience junior and chemistry minor and opinion writer for The Battalion.