It was when Mehret Biruk lost two hours of her life to Instagram that she knew the time had come to escape. What had she been looking at? She couldn’t even remember in the moments immediately afterwards. Instagram, she recalls thinking, was “winning the war on my attention”. The irony was that Biruk had returned to the photo and video-sharing platform only some months earlier, after a three-year break. And she had only returned to promote her website and newsletter, in which she writes about the benefits of spending less time online. She hoped to reach the people who might want help. Instead, she found herself getting sucked back in. “That’s the scary part to me. It was just instantly back to scrolling, and waiting for the likes and comments.”
In August, the actor Tom Holland posted a video on Instagram saying he was taking a break from the platform and Twitter, because he found them overstimulating and overwhelming. “I get caught up and I spiral when I read things about me online and ultimately, it’s very detrimental to my mental health,” he said. Others, such as the singer Lizzo and actor Selena Gomez, have previously announced breaks.
