England rugby player Maro Itoje offered such simple yet sage advice to sportspeople of all disciplines – as well as the fans who follow them – during the week when discussing the often-troubling world of social media.
Limit it. Maybe stop it altogether. Definitely don’t live your life by it. It feels like a sound way forward and his words and warnings should resound throughout wider society as discussions continue ad infinitum over potential bans for under-16s and what levels of responsibility tech firms should carry for comments carried on their platforms.
‘I would advise all top-level athletes not to spend too much time on social media because it is really corrosive – both from the negativity that is on there, but as well as what it does to our brains,’ said Itoje.
‘I think we are going to see, in the coming years, a huge amount of damage that has been done to us as humans and as a society as a result of social media in terms of brains and brain development.’
England rugby captain Maro Itoje believes sportspeople are best to avoid social media
Ireland rugby star Edwin Edogbo was subjected to online racist abuse
His remarks came in the wake of the IRFU disabling comments on social media accounts because of abuse levelled at Edwin Edogbo. In Scottish football, Raith Rovers manager Dougie Imrie and his family have been forced to deal with an ‘abhorrent’ comment made online by some brain-dead scumbag.
It happens every week. Up and down the country. Over and over. And it’s becoming ever clearer that the best thing you can do is find a way to distance yourself from it all or, at the very least, use it with due care and attention.
It isn’t getting banned. It’s going nowhere. But it’s important to bear in mind that no one forces you to look at it. And that life does go on out there without it.
Sadly, some on the receiving end of abuse seem a little too keen to flag it up, possibly for publicity reasons. The media, too, should be a little more careful in giving some of this stuff oxygen as well.
Yes, there’s a case to be made for talking about abusive behaviour online in an attempt to thwart it, but do we really want to keep handing over power to pitiful characters who get their kicks from tapping out venom that says much more about their own inadequacies than those of anyone else?
Raith Rovers manager Dougie Imrie faced despicable abuse online
There are other sinister issues to consider, too, though. Over and above the doomscrolling, surely the most effective form of non-surgical lobotomy, is anyone else out there seeing the effects of social media on acquaintances in the real world?
It might be previously mild-mannered people now becoming radical political activists thanks to five bots they follow.
It could be folk at your work deeply convinced the lizard illuminati are about to reveal themselves. Or maybe even that loony faction in the darkest corners of the interweb stating that Celtic’s interim financial results show the Parkhead board aren’t the dozy dolts the tennis-ball chuckers say they are.
‘It is really important for athletes, as well as ordinary people, not to live their life based on what social media says about them,’ added Itoje. ‘It will just be a horrible way to live your life.’
It’s hard to disagree. And something to bear in mind during those moments of reflection on how you are consuming it yourself.