Social media has become such a large presence in our lives. In my marketing class today, we were watching a film that made the claim that in the next few years, we will be surrounded by nothing but screens; computers everywhere. Now i’ll be honest, I find myself scrolling through Twitter and Instagram way more than I should be, but that's not the point. One of the main issues that I’ve had with social media lately is the idea that everyone can truly post whatever they want. Using their 140 characters or less to spread hate, or drag someone else for something so insignificant. For a lot of millennials, your social media presence is essentially your brand.
Personal brand is becoming more and more important these days. One person may be the class clown, having very witty tweets and comical "finsta" posts. Others use their Instagram profiles as forms of self expression, whether that be through selfies or food. Others use it to bare their soul, putting their innermost feelings or mentalities to the world. I think this is a brave move—to bare all to your friends and hope for support. I have watched many mental-health and body-positive posts go wrong. The intention was set by the person who posted it, then others interpreted it differently, and it was thrown in that person’s face. I’ve seen this on Twitter, too, where people will either drag someone or call them out on something that they did. I find this so incredibly childish to resort to such a public interface to publicly humiliate someone. We get so much of our information from these platforms, whether it be news, gossip or anything relevant. We have become so reliant on it that we don’t know anything different.
I sometimes wish we could live in a world that was free of comparing how many likes you got on your Instagram compared to the similar photo your friend posted. Living in a world where your internet presence and overall aesthetic just didn’t matter. What happened to face-to-face conversations? Leaving your phone behind and being so present in every moment that you were hanging out with your friends instead of documenting every second of it on Snapchat for all your followers to see what a fun time you are having. We use our social media platforms as a way to one-up each other, as if to say, “Look, i’m having more fun than you.” Technology has it’s purpose, I’m aware. I understand what it has done in medicine and science; I just don’t know what it has done for our social lives. I think as a generation we have become so accustomed to tuning out and coming into ourselves and relying on our phones if we are bored or just don’t want to have a conversation.
Can you imagine your life without your iPhone?
