In Bo Burnham’s recent Netflix stand-up comedy special “Make Happy,” the comedian delves into many topics, including the ways in which millennials crave and manifest their inherent desires for self-expression and performance. He proposes social media is a platform that has been created by the market in an attempt to answer these desires of young people. In an introspective, vulnerable moment Bo says to his massive live audience, in a moment of patent irony, “If you can live your life without an audience, you should do it.”
Without being fully aware of it, I have fallen into what Burnham deems as the “prison,” that is, broadcasting my life for an audience. However, unlike an audience attending a concert or play, the audience I am “performing” for is made up of friends, acquaintances, and those few strange people from my job/family/middle school who somehow found my Instagram account. These are not people who bought tickets to see talented actors or an artistic production but, instead, they’re also fellow “performers,” who both create and consume simultaneously on these same social media apps and websites.
Like many young people, I utilize many social media platforms including Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter on a semi-daily basis. I think I have a pretty healthy relationship with these apps compared to some. I’m no Vine star who considers “likes” to be a form of sustenance, and I don’t depend on subscribers to make a living like many YouTube influencers. I think of social media as a fun form of self-expression, and I fully realize that social media allows people to portray an edited, approved version of themselves that may differ from how they are in real life. Despite this attitude, I sometimes feel myself getting a little too caught up in the “performance” aspect of it all.
When I really stop to think about it, which I rarely do, on each of these platforms I’ve subconsciously adopted a different “persona.” My Snapchat, for example, is something I use mostly to broadcast my social interactions (when I’m not sending ugly selfies to my best friends). I take a lot of pictures with and of my friends and post them on my Snapchat story for my followers to see. It’s basically my way to show the world that I have people who want to hang out with me, as cringeworthy as that is. When I view other people’s stories most of what I take away is how fun-filled and friend-filled their lives are. In just a few seconds, I am able to portray a social version of myself that sometimes conflicts with my real-life antisocial tendencies.
Another app I use is Instagram. I post less frequently on Instagram than I do on Snapchat, and I use it as a platform to show my followers the best, edited version of myself. With the Valencia filter (as if I don’t have a separate folder on my phone just for photo editing apps) and a somewhat witty caption that took embarrassingly long to brainstorm, I can portray myself as being happy and photogenic in a totally natural #nofilter kind of way. On my Instagram feed, I see similarly edited pictures of people’s gross-looking Chipotle burrito bowls, people looking their best, posing in front of art, and laughing “candidly” with their friends at parties.
Twitter is perhaps the medium where I express myself most genuinely, as most of my friends do not use the website. For me, Twitter is a place to post stream-of-consciousness thoughts and retweet articles or jokes that appeal to me. However, something I’ve heard articulated by some of my friends who tweet and something I’ve felt myself is that there's a pressure to be as witty and clever as possible on Twitter. While I enjoy challenging myself to drop some truths and produce some #relatablecontent in 140 characters or less, there’s still a strange internal pressure I feel to present myself a certain way for the people who are seeing my tweets.
Thinking realistically about how I use social media is super-uncomfortable for me, and also a bit disturbing. I’d like to think that most of the time I live my life for myself without caring much about what people think. But for me, and for several of my friends, there is a pressure to create a certain online persona. This pressure to look attractive, seem popular, or document original and witty thoughts are validated by follows, likes, views, and retweets from fellow creators. As much as I would like to say I don’t care about how many likes I get, I do feel a sense of satisfaction when a picture I post gets 100 likes. Because of this, I've learned that if I'm feeling insecure or critical of myself, I can always rely on social media for instant validation from people who "care."
Social media can also be destructive in the way it breeds competition and comparison based on what is oftentimes a facade. It’s easy to say that social media is fake and doctored, but I can’t say I haven’t ever stalked someone’s Instagram account and wondered why their life looks more glamorous or put together than mine. This kind of comparison can kill happiness and self-confidence.
Social media is something pervasive and seemingly harmless, but it’s also something that has the ability to alter perception. Even as someone who sees the absurdity in putting a lot of weight into the amount of followers I have on any social media website, I can sometimes find myself getting wrapped up in the compulsion to document moments of my life that are truly unimportant for the world to see.
I don’t think social media is inherently evil or harmful. In fact, I think it can serve as a breeding ground for creativity and inspiration. But, it is undoubtedly powerful, and it’s something that has somewhat of an effect on me and everyone around me. While I probably won’t delete my social media anytime soon, or at least as long as D.J. Khaled keeps posting on Snapchat, I do strive to be more aware of the image I’m creating for myself online, my personal longing for online validation and affirmation, and the ability for anyone to depict themselves any way they chose online.
Now until I get to that point of awareness, I'd really appreciate if you could swing me a new Twitter follow.
