Social Media, Screwtape-Style

I know I just posted something by my daughter Laura, but then she came to me with this. She had to read C. S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters for a class she’s taking and her assignment was then to write her own similar entry. What follows is a letter from one demon to another. 

Folks, Laura is fifteen. This is some timely stuff and needs to be shared. I’m doing my part.

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Dear Viperweed,

Your last letter concerns me considerably and part of me hopes it was one of those jokes you love to play. It seems you have forgotten your duties and instead have decided on doing whatever you wish with your patient, not thinking of the consequences. So, I will educate you. You are to cure your human, that’s why we call them patients. We are to rid them of the sickness that consumes them and instead inject sin, our golden ticket to power. Once sin overrides the love and kindness we can destroy the enemy. But do not let all this go to your head, that’s the big picture, you need to focus on the small things, everyday happenings that can be twisted towards our cause.

You say she loves people of cultural influence, the people who she sees on TV and in magazines. Make them a main focus. Have her thoughts about a certain person or group of persons consume her thoughts. She needs to know every little detail about them and make sure images of them are always present in her mind. She needs to start out with a fairly good role model and then slowly pull her towards ones who are progressively more and more vile and provocative. If you do this soon they will be her idols and their thoughts and opinions will become her own. She will clothe herself to please their taste and speak their words.

To do these things she will need social media. Make this another idol, a part of her. The connections to her idols through Twitter and Instagram need to be vital to her mental health. Selfies and inward focused texts need to be part of her daily life. Make her self-esteem rest in the hands of strangers who in reality don’t care about her the way her real family and friends do. The influence they have on her thoughts need to be able to make or break her. Texting needs to be her chief means of communication, without it she is lost. Her involvement and emotions towards the people in her real life needs to be put on hold. The people in her second life, the one on her phone, need to be the focus.

Since these actions will push her family and friends away she will become lonely. Though she has hundreds of “friends” and followers on social media websites the lack of emotional and physical support from people she sees every day will wear on her and cause her to dive deeper into meaningless, unhealthy obsessions and selfishness. All humans have this crippling need for each other that if not satisfied, weakens their mental health. Work with other patients’ mentors (for that’s what you are) and make it seem as if her family and friends are against her so she is truly alone. She needs to doubt her purpose and meaning in life. These thoughts may lead her to consider another option of escape: death. Suicide is the lowest of selfish actions. This will help us out tremendously for she will be ours and her evil essence will be added to the many others we have reaped and result in more power. Follow these instructions and you are sure to succeed.

With the most evil of intentions, yours truly,

Onyxrose

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