This has happened to everyone, you post something and you do not get a lot of likes or favorites within an hour. You panic and start wondering whether you should delete it or not. Then you wonder oh God what if people saw the post and saw I deleted it because I did not get a lot of likes. You break out in a cold sweat wondering what you did to deserve this.

For us millennials, making a social media account is a pivotal moment in our life. It is the first step into the brave new world of funny vines and edgy memes. We see this whole new plane of existence and establish a place in this dimension. Some may try to become a soft grunge teen holding onto the sanctity of teen angst, a free spirit who goes on adventures with their trusty emu and hikes mountains and kayaks rivers, or a person who goes to concerts every other weekend to show that “music saved my life.” No matter who you are, the way you present yourself in social media is how you hope others will perceive you. It is less of an outlet for you to express yourself, but becomes more of a factory for you to be processed and packaged into this person that you want to be.

I do not state this like I achieved some higher level of self-awareness of my social media presence. I post pictures that I hope will get a lot of likes and that people will think of me in a certain way. I am a part of this machine that fabricates things that may not be wholly true about who I am. This delves into the meat of social media, how many likes one person gets or how many followers they have. Why do we care so much about how many likes we get? People even go as far to “buy” their followers to like their pictures, or download an app that allows people to gain more “ghost” followers. It becomes more of a competition, to see who gets the most likes, views, or retweets.

In addition, social media for people to become more self-conscious about themselves. “Why does my selfie get less likes than her?” or “Why do I have less followers than him?” These questions run through our head and eventually leads us to the depressing conclusion that we are not popular, beautiful, or exciting enough. The opposite is true as well, if we see someone who does not have as many likes or followers we immediately have preconceptions about that individual. It is just a vicious cycle of judging and being judged. Now this is not true for all people, some people enjoy just sharing their life with their friends regardless of how many likes they get. That was what social media was supposed to be about, just sharing your experiences, not inflating your ego.