Todd Sampson Wants Us to Take a Good, Hard Look at the Internet’s Impact on Our Lives

By: Ben McEachen

I love the ambition of Todd Sampson’s second season of documentary series Mirror Mirror.

In short, advertising guru and Gruen mainstay Sampson takes on the internet.

“This second season focuses on how the internet is fundamentally changing us and what it is doing to our minds,” Sampson said of the new series, released on Channel 10.

“It’s part warning but I like to think it’s also part practical ‘what we can do as parents and individuals’.”

In case you missed Mirror Mirror Season One, Sampson’s brief but revealing documentaries exposed us to body image dissatisfaction.

It was quite the eye opener, even if you have stopped to consider the ramifications of our online, image-obsessed age [Warning: some of the footage and subject matter in Mirror Mirror will be too challenging for some].

The mix of real people and their experiences, as well as credible studies, statistics and Sampson’s own insights, forge Mirror Mirror as confronting testimonies to our times.

The mix of real people and their experiences, as well as credible studies, statistics and Sampson’s own insights, forge Mirror Mirror as confronting testimonies to our times.

Sampson warns us about the intense start to Season Two, showing a chatroom conversation between a sexual predator and police officers.

But without looking to totally scare us off, he said that while Mirror Mirror can be intense, it’s not all negative viewing.

Sampson presents the humanity in people pursuing augmented relationships, or listens to his teen daughters instruct him about what’s happening in their digital lives.

Relatable moments, even as the darker edges of the internet have the light shined upon them.

An advocate for regulation and limiting our notifications, Sampson thinks “we need to take a stand” against the destructiveness and power imbalances on the internet.

“[But] that is not to get rid of the internet,” he said. “All the goodness that it brings; please, let’s keep that. But we can have a safer space.”

Article supplied with thanks to Hope Media.

Feature image: Todd Sampson. Supplied