Parents, do not stress about your kids' social media usage

OPINION: I waded toward the sun-kissed glass and looked into the setting Hawaiian sun and inhaled the deep smell of urine. The metalic stench was so strong that I could as well as stairwell.

I was at the hotel because I've been promised that it was the most Instagrammable pool in Hawaii. So here I was. This was it. Ahhh, the urine-soaked serenity.

A used Elastoplast bobbed past me in the wake of a farting middle-aged Chinese man's breast-stroke. It was at that moment, as a forlorn forgotten french fry sailed past behind the Elastoplast, which I had my instagram awakening.

This' gram business really was not all it was cracked up to be. Which seems painfully clear to the over-30s, but is the big coming-of-age moment for all mid-90s babies like me.

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It's the moment every parent is worried teenagers do not have. Everybody is ready to bust-a-yoga move Images of real life are not, well, there is an understandably a great concern that young people are growing up being social feeds, unaware that the always tanned, real

Not only that, but that social media presents overly sexualized or outright dangerous content to young people, such as the "cutting circles" in the media.

So it has culminated in a thoroughly modern moral panic.

And I get it. Not only is social media used to be related to any of the young people who are experiencing the catastrophic anxiety levels among Kiwi teenagers. But also, from the outside, it looks like it's happening at the worst possible time for young people.

But I promise parents that it's actually not as bad as it looks ….

For a start, social media follows the same obsession / repulsion cycle that other hyper-realities follow – just like porn. You start off being infatuated with Instagram and the endless shiny baubles of brunch, beaches and borderline manic smiles that drapes around life like a particular skinny, paleo Christmas tree.

It's new and exciting and overwhelming, and you'll spend hours scrolling through your phone. (Who knew you were excited about grazing platters and lesbian threesomes?)

But as you get progressively more obsessed, you also realize that it's progressively less rewarding. It's not really so much fun to spend four hours painting your face for the perfect selfie every day. And you also realize that the perfect moments that you see on the 'do not exist in real life. And actually, it's getting kind of boring talking about grazing platters all the time anyway. In fact, it feels like the whole thing has become one giant superficial snark-fest designed to make you feel like you're an underachiever because you can not make olive tapenade.

So you back off, you can delete the Facebook app and only scroll through IG stories while you're on the loo. Young people, just like their parents, start to self-moderate.

And this is OK. It's the natural cycle of hyper-reality use, and there's nothing wrong with letting us know what we do and do not like. Admittedly it's a risky strategy with things like porn, but it still works. At the same time, when I was thirty, I did not watch this stuff anymore, Miss it done me feeling bad. "

You have just got to trust that young people have enough self-awareness and real life experiences that help expose hyper-reality as the sham that it is. Whether it's the epiphany of getting a sodden french fry stick in your bikini or because you're a wise old bird who shows you how the real world is, young fledgling.

The beauty of this is that, when you've been through this realisation, it's inoculates you against the depressing facts of what social media is really.

We know now that it's largely just a huge, boring, shallow void of people howling in endless narcissism, insecurity and vanity. Susan who's forever one-upping your stories, you know it's going to make you feel awkward, like reading a woman's mag or spending time with your cousin.

So all the while ignoring Susan's snaps with her new laptop with unnecessary pillows.

And yes, it's rather depressing to realise one of the humanity's favorite pastimes are bragging about their lounge suite. But in some ways, young people are realizing this. We're already realizing the truth about your IRD login details and nailing it to the wall. We can take this in our stride.