SPOILER ALERT: If you haven’t seen the Netflix Original Black Mirror episode “Nosedive” (S3, E1), there are spoilers revealed below that will ruin the episode for you. Continue reading at your own risk.

I’ve often thought that in this day and age we put too much of our self-worth and value into what others think of us. We get some sort of high when we see over 100 of our friends liked our new profile picture on Facebook or our crush becomes mutual best friends with us on Snapchat. When I recently watched an episode of Netflix’s Black Mirror, my sentiments were confirmed – almost confirmed too well.

Season 3 episode 1 is entitled “Nosedive.” (I’m still trying to figure out why it’s called that, so if you know, please tell me!) A young woman named Lacie Pound lives in a world where your social status is entirely dependent on your “rating.” People in this world constantly have their phones in their hands and rate anyone and everyone they interact with on a scale of 1 to 5 stars. For example, you would rate me based on this article or on my social media posts or if we had an in-person conversation. The sum total of the ratings is made into an overall rating, and your overall rating is what gets you places. You must be a 4.5 rating or higher to get into a specific restaurant or to live in a certain apartment complex. Anyone who is a 4.5 or above is considered to be upper class. In the episode, Lacie does everything in her power to get her rating to a 4.5 because, to her, ratings are everything.

As she climbs the social ladder, Lacie’s childhood friend Naomi, a high-class woman who hasn’t spoken to Lacie in years, wants Lacie to be her maid of honor. After a lot of bad things happen, Lacie’s rating drops down below a 3.0 which is considered lower class, and Naomi no longer wants Lacie to be in her wedding. Naomi was only using Lacie to show her highly rated friends how sympathetic she is to the middle class. But when Lacie drops below a 3.0, Naomi thought having Lacie at her wedding will become pathetic instead of sympathetic. Lacie learns to care less about what others think and to focus on whether or not she likes herself by the end of the episode.

I see cases where people rely so heavily on others’ approval on the daily. We live in a day and age where a “Nosedive” situation is not unimaginable. I have seen countless friends become upset by things people have commented on their Facebook page or posted on their Snapchat stories. When other people disapprove, take away their praises, or even just neglect us online, we are crushed because so much of our happiness and self-worth is placed in the way other people view us.

What can we do to avoid “Nosedive” becoming a reality? It’s one thing to say, “We should just stop caring about what other people think!” and another thing to put that kind of mindset into practice. It’s almost impossible to completely stop taking what other people think of us to heart, but the more we value our own opinions of ourselves over others, the more we can be freed from the snare of outward approval. Paying attention to the sort of warnings in television shows like Black Mirror can help us be more aware of what’s going on in our world today and begin to become proactive in preventing any “Nosedive” disasters.