Social media didn’t make people stupid; it just exposed how stupid most people already were

Before platforms gave everyone a microphone, ignorance, bad reasoning, and extreme opinions were mostly private or limited to small circles. Now they’re visible, viral, and rewarded with likes and attention.

So the real question isn’t whether social media made people less intelligent, but whether it simply revealed what was always there. Did technology create stupidity—or did it just expose how little critical thinking existed beneath the surface of everyday conversation?