I'd imagine an increasingly hostile world economy coupled with a then-looming but now beginning climate crisis might have a huge impact there.

There are multiple possible explanations for that. I don't see any direct link between the kind of content we millenials consumed in our childhood and the apparent rise in the number of mental health cases. I'd be willing to bet that the time spent consuming said content plays a much bigger factor.

Hard to believe this isn't simply due to improved detection, reporting and treatment options.

It's not obvious to me why the non-human origin matters here. Eventually AI will get so good that you can't even tell the difference, or if you can, it's because it's so high quality.

In my mind the meat of the issue is the amount of time we spend watching that content, and less so who made it.

But guess I miss the racist candy?

I don't know it either, but I feel like when someone clarifies, I'll be like "Oh... OHH! That."