Disconnect to Connect
February 24th, 2025
Writer: Miranda Jefferds
Editor: Alexa Kessler
It was a Sunday evening when my roommate slammed the door to our small room, looking at her phone in disbelief, her face etched with indignation. The world around us hummed with the typical sounds of a sorority — distant chatter from the hallway, faint music, feet thundering up and down the stairs — but in our room, everything was quieter, a little less vibrant.
It was rumored that TikTok, the incredibly popular app we’ve all spent countless hours scrolling on, was facing a potential shutdown. These rumors had circulated multiple times over the past few years, but nothing ever happened. Today, however, as each person tried to open up the app, a warning message stopped them from scrolling. As silly as it sounds, the news hit us harder than expected.
“I’m going to miss it,” she said. “It’s not even about the videos. It’s actually the people. There’s a community. I can find literally anything. It’s better than Google.”
TikTok wasn’t just a platform for entertainment; it was a space where you could belong. Over the years, I had discovered a niche community of people who shared recipes, consolidated digestible information about politics and current events, and shaped my sense of humor. It wasn’t just about watching videos — it was about interacting with people, seeing familiar usernames pop up in the comments, laughing at inside jokes, and feeling part of a digital family.
This wasn’t an isolated sentiment, I realized. A growing number of people have turned to social media platforms to create meaningful connections, especially in the isolation of the digital age. The internet, despite its reputation for breeding loneliness, has also fostered a new kind of community — a community where you can simultaneously be anonymous and incredibly seen. For so many of us, platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and Twitter have become a space where we share our thoughts, struggles, and celebrations with others who “get it.”
But there’s a downside to this connection. We might find our people online, but in doing so, we risk disconnecting from the world around us. In many ways, the internet has become a double-edged sword — it draws us closer to like-minded individuals while pushing us further apart from the communities that physically surround us.
In the hours following the ban, my roommates and I sat in bed, texting the rest of our house. Messages and jokes rolled in about the emptiness people already felt without TikTok. Each of us joked about the astounding number of times we went to click on the app before remembering it was gone. As I sat there, I realized how much we had relied on our online networks to fill the spaces left behind by the disconnection we felt in our offline lives. It was easier to engage with a screen than it was to step outside, to talk to strangers, to form real-world bonds that felt just as real.
We all crave community, connection, a place where we’re not just observers but participants. The internet may have given us the tools to find that (sometimes with strangers across the world),but it also created a space where we could hide from the discomfort of face-to-face interaction. Humans gravitate towards spaces where they can create profound bonds with others, no matter the platform. Connection can happen anywhere. The challenge, perhaps, is finding a way to blend the connection we build online with the real-world relationships that are more difficult, but also more rewarding.
Photo Credits: Danielle Bellamy
