Social media and the internet. Two revolutionary aspects of human interaction which have impacted our everyday lives. Since the conception of the World Wide Web in 1990, humans have increasingly been involving the internet in our everyday lives and activities. It seems like everywhere we look our society completely depends on the internet to give us meaning and direction. No longer do we read maps for navigation, we simply ask Google Maps to tell us where to go. No longer do we depend on face to face interaction, we simply put our words down on a screen and hide behind a phone. Don't get me wrong, the internet definitely has impacted our lives in very positive ways by making everyday life overall much more navigable and easier. However, the internet has also revealed deeper and darker aspect of each and every one of us. Social media has shown the world how incredibly obsessed we are with ourselves and how we portray our life to society at large.
Go look at any number of sorority girl/ fraternity guys Instagram page. Go look at any number of fitness model, beauty model, Hollywood actor or public figures and realize just how full everyone is of themselves.
As this is a matter of opinion, one must question themselves and ask the question of whether this is a problem or not. Social media is a tool with which the world communicates. It is the doorway into another reality through which everyone in the world is connected. We live double lives through social media, posting pictures for our “followers” to like. We post pictures which fit the “theme” of our profile, creating a belief that anyone really gives a shit about how we look.
Social media has become a pile of garbage, with pages and pages of the same old photos. Selfies after selfies just reinforce not how pretty one believes they are, but how deeply self-conceited one really is.
If social media is a tool to reach the world, shouldn't it be used more responsibly to educate the world, instead of corrupt it? Teenagers spend their adolescent years idolizing and comparing themselves to the lives of the “Instagram famous.” Is there harm in this? Yes.
These people are not real. Everything seen on social media is just a projection of how a person wants the world to see them, but pictures only go surface deep in showing the world who we are. Woman post pictures showing off their body and wonder why they can’t find a "decent guy who treats them right." Guys post pictures of them getting fucked up over the weekend and wonder why “these hoes ain’t loyal.” Social media has put a real life “filter” over our eyes, it has “photoshopped” our reality into a different one.
So how do we change this issue? I recognize the fact that people are who they are, and selfies are forever going to be a thing, but shouldn't social media be used as more of a tool to educate the public? Why are we so obsessed with how we look, who we were with or where we were. Is it asking too much to just be in the moment without having to take a picture, or were you really there if you don't have an image to capture later for everyone else to see? Do we really need likes on an Instagram page to give us high self-esteem, or should we be able to find that through the fruits of our actions?
Get off of social media people, we are wasting our lives away. Ask yourself how many hours a week you spend staring at a screen, “entertaining” but really distracting yourself from living here and now. Success is not given, it is earned. Focus on your dreams, what you have and where you're going. Quit looking at everyone else like their lives are so important. Your voice matters, your actions matter. Be the change you want to see in the world, and be the realist version of you that can be. Nothing in life is more important than doing you, without the influence of others.
To conclude, social media is a nice way to stay “in touch” with others around you, but do we lose being “in touch” with ourselves in the process?
