Social Science

July 3, 2025

Brian Phillips

For over a decade, Brian Phillips has helped policymakers and political candidates develop effective messages and communication strategies. Phillips is a veteran of presidential, congressional, and gubernatorial campaigns, and has extensive experience working in the United States Congress and public policy think tanks. Previously, he served in a senior communications role as the Director of Rapid Response for Senator Ted Cruz’s presidential campaign. Prior to joining Cruz, Phillips worked as Communications Director for U.S. Senator Mike Lee of Utah, who has played a role in nearly every major policy debate since joining the Senate in 2011, including Obamacare repeal, fighting Obama’s unconstitutional executive orders, protecting Americans’ Second Amendment rights, as well as promoting numerous innovative policy reforms. Before going on to hold several senior positions in House, Senate and gubernatorial campaigns, Phillips worked for the highly-respected conservative Heritage Foundation as a Media Adviser promoting conservative policy reforms.

Monday was National Social Media Day. This is one of those random days you’re supposed to celebrate like National Hamburger Day (May 28) or National Dog Day (August 26).

That might have been the case 15 years ago when National Social Media Day was created by online tech news outlet Mashable, but today you rarely hear anyone extolling thevirtues of regular social media use.

Instead, June 30 should be renamed National Social Media Addiction Awareness Day.

The overwhelming evidence shows that people who constantly use social media have higher levels of anxiety, depression, loneliness, dissatisfaction with their life, obesity, sleep problems, attention disorder, addiction, and suicidal ideation. The effects are even more pronounced – and shocking – among young people.

What started as a promising way to connect and build relationships has, in many people’s experience, devolved into a tragically efficient way to divide and attack one another. Thealgorithms feed us content that trigger anger and shock in search of “engagement” that advertisers value. So in other words, the harms of social media are a feature, not a bug.

The public policy discussion around social media is rarely about how it can be used to improve humanity, but rather how to end social media addiction. Social scientists and policymakers are investigating ways to encourage people to drop the phones and get back to friends and family in person.

Texas and several other states have banned the use of cell phones in classrooms. That’s a great start but experts like Johnathan Haidt warn that’s not enough to fully protect kids. Texas has a strong movement in favor of banning minors from having social media accounts at all.

Senator Adam Hinojosa filed SB 2232 to designate “the third Monday in October of each year is Unplug Texas Day to encourage Texans to unplug from their electronic devices and plug into play, creativity, friendship, adventure, and family.”

This is a day we should all celebrate by putting our devices down and spending time with loved ones.

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Brian Phillips

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