Social Media Pressures Are Killing Teens in New York City

By Michael Ye

According to the NPR article, young adults and teens used social media platforms such as Instagram and YouTube to grab attention and engage in reckless endangerment, such as subway surfing, causing many fatal accidents in 2023. In a Daily News article, some teenagers involved with reckless endangerment may also be involved in gang-related incidents, causing other commuters to be in the crossfire.

• In the first six months of 2023, there were four teenage deaths related to subway surfing compared to 5 deaths in total from 2018 to 2022. Subway surfing dramatically increased from over 200 instances in 2021 to over 900 instances in 2022.
• Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murphy stated that social media can cause great harm to children and teenagers to their mental health.
• According to a New York Post article in 2022, there was an increase in teenage gun violence in New York City.

Subway Surfing

In a New York Times article, the term viral is used when the content is spread and multiple people see it. The article mentioned a YouTube video that had caught a group of teenage boys making noise on top of a moving No. 7 train when one of the boys, whose name is Rey, almost fell into the tracks, and he heard about another boy who fell and died. Rey stated after that, he now surfs once every couple of weeks. Despite learning that surfing can be dangerous, he would still go surfing.

    Professor Jacob Apkarian, a York College sociology professor said, “I feel YouTube or Instagram or Facebook is responsible for many different trends, like the ice water challenge from five years ago. And there’s all these different types of things, and some of them can be harmless, but some can be more dangerous.“    In response to the 14-year-old boy’s death from subway surfing in Brooklyn in June, New York City Major Eric Adams called out social media platforms to ban videos regarding this dangerous trend. It was reported that TikTok had stated that the trend started before social media and that safety professionals are working to remove harmful content.    

    A York College student, Rudy Garnier, 53, a Business major said, “It’s because of boredom, looking for excitement, looking for thrills. I think they’re young, and they don’t care about consequences.”

    A New York Times article reported that Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murphy stated that social media can be harmful to children and adolescents’ mental health and well-being. He further urged tech companies to put minimum age limits on social media and also to set default settings for age appropriateness. There were also recommendations for families to have more gatherings for dialogue and bonding.

Brian Hu, 20, a Finance major at York College, said, “They should just use it to communicate with each other instead of making everything a competition about who’s more popular.” When asked about subway surfing, Brian called it “really dumb” and said people shouldn’t risk their lives just to get attention on social media.

Teen gun violence

    Besides subway surfing, teens are joining gangs to feel secure in New York City, and occasionally, rival gangs see each other on the subways, leading to gun violence. In an article from the Daily News, a sixteen-year-old was involved in a subway shooting incident on the 4-train Mt. Eden subway station platform and had killed a 35-year-old man, an innocent bystander in the chest in a crossfire against a rival gang member who is 14-years-old. In the New York Post, another teen in the Bronx who is also 14 years -old was arrested eighteen times for gang-related activities. It was reported that the suspect arrested had prior arrests since he was ten.
    Professor Apkarian said, “One of the big trends in recent criminal justice reform is for a restorative justice approach, which is less punitive. The argument is that if you try to punish people, especially young people, it doesn’t seem to work. So there has to be a different approach.”
    He talked about how juvenile detention centers are run, and that it actually can make it worse for teens, not having a supportive and loving environment, likely causing them towards bad behavior. He said, “There’s a sociological theory of crime called labeling theory, that once they view themselves as problematic to society, they just come to understand themselves as that’s who they are, that there’s no way I can change, and they will lean into that kind of criminal activity even more.”

A solution to the problem

    A recent New York Times article discussed how parents can help their children cut back on social media by promoting boundaries and forming good habits. Physical activity and in-person conversations are some examples that are recommended in the article for teens and parents.
    Professor Apkarian said, “There are programs that provide social services that keep them active and programs that have been successful where they’ll institute nighttime basketball leagues in rougher neighborhoods, and it has been shown to reduce crime amongst young folks in those neighborhoods.”