Picture this: You’re at dinner with a group of friends. You all have placed your orders and exchange small talk until the food gets there. And then, the phones come out. One person is taking a picture of the food, another’s Snapchatting, someone’s texting, whatever it may be. So it starts, the dinner conversation is targeted around the latest thing you saw on Instagram or Tumblr, or that sub-tweet you couldn’t believe someone wrote. You’re talking about how different an old colleague looks based on their recent Facebook pictures. And before you all go, just about you all makes sure to get a photo for Snapchat/Insta, and everyone’s on their way. Isn’t that a bit ironic--that everyone arranged to meet in person so they can look at their smartphones??
Maybe this doesn’t sound exactly like your “squad," but it’s obvious this happens on a regular basis. The phone don’t even have to be out, the whole conversation is based on social media. But these are your friends because they’re the people you tag on Insta- right? Today’s generation is obsessed with social media. It’s as if every post, tweet, status update, or whatever matters not only to yourself but to the 100+ friends/followers that might read it. People used to say don’t judge a book by a cover, but modern day society tells us you can know everything about a person via their social media. After all, Snapchat stories don’t lie--right? We also live in one of the most judgemental societies. The more hype social media gets, the younger people begin to use it. A 12-year-old requested to follow me on Instagram the other day. The problem really wasn’t the age, though, the real issue was the content. In her pictures, the people were all wearing more makeup than I do on a daily basis, posing with the infamous “duck lips," or their tongues out, or whatever, and some of them wearing clothes I’m pretty sure my mom would yell at me for leaving the house in. But can you really blame them when everybody's doing it? Without that certain look, would these people fit in at school? Would they still be friends with the same people without the followers or the latest iPhone?
It got me to thinking about how genuine certain friendships are. If in person, we hardly talk unless it’s about whatever popped up on your Facebook newsfeed the last few hours then that doesn’t say much about how close we are. Genuine relations with people are built off of late nights that don’t have to be shared with everyone, complex conversation, actually catching up with people face-to-face over dinner. Friendships should not be generalized to how many times they show up in the photos you post. Friends are the people you can call and talk to for a good hour about nothing and everything. And frankly, social media doesn’t provide any of that. To me, social media is directed to one main idea: The Self. Your looks, opinion, friends, everything gets put out there for other people to see-- because you want them to see.
I can’t say I’m anti-social media, but rather simply that it doesn’t define me. My occasional Insta post is from a great memory I want to share, not because I need likes, people to see my outfit, etc. Snapchat is used to keep in contact with my friends I haven’t seen in awhile, joking back and forth. But to other people, you see how much this defines who they are. The worst thing is, it’s the majority of this generation. It’s not the occasional person here and there couldn’t survive without their phone for 24 hours; It’s most people. So, you tell me, do those 100+ Insta likes, Facebook photos, or the 50 retweets really show me who you are as a person? Because if so, it seems as if we live in a community has become nothing but shallow and self- obsessed.
