Instagram. Snapchat. Twitter. Facebook.
All of these things are revolutionary discoveries and inventions. Everyone has always been secretly dying to see what their friends and family (or that random person in your English class) do in their free time. Social media has become a driving force in our society since Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook. Everything seemed to fall in place when people began to update us with pictures and statuses showing us how they are living their life.
I remember when I was in middle school Facebook was the thing to have. Updating your profile picture was a big deal. People are going to deny it but it was a pretty big deal. When a person hit "like" on that new picture of you without your braces on, it sent shockwaves up your spin and immediately gave you a boost of confidence. Life was measured on how many likes you got on Facebook or how many friends you had. And nowadays this sad truth has unfortunately gotten a lot worse.
With Instagram, twitter and snapchat everyone is constantly putting things out there that they want people to see. Everything that I post on my Instagram or my snapchat stories are things that I want everyone else to see me doing. Obviously I am not going to post a selfie of me crying my eyes out after a funeral because I don't want people to see that side of me. Social media has made it easier for people to create the perception that people are living better lives then they actually are. No one wants you to see the hard parts or the true parts. Everyone cares about the likes and the shares because for just a second those 100 likes on Instagram distract you from your reality and make you feel just a little bit better. I'm not gonna lie it's a huge confidence booster when a hot guy likes my Instagram picture.
The truth is there is always something else going on in someone's life that they don't post on their profile. Social media has become away for people to manipulate their image and status, instead of leaving it up to society to decide. Society has always created stereotypes and categories for people to some how try and fit themselves into. I think that people are always searching for their identity because they need to figure out where they fit in life. Social media makes it easier for an individual to create the perception that they are what their profile is, and that they have as many friends in real life as they do on Facebook. The reality is that you don't know who a person really is until you actually get to know them. We are not just a compilation of likes, statuses, and followers. We are actual human beings with real life feelings. Social media is drowning our realities in false friends and confidence. Don't get me wrong I love my Instagram and Snapchat, but I think there is something to say about a society run on false perceptions.
