I'm sure by now everyone has watched or heard about the hype of Essena announcing that she is quitting social media!
I just finished watching her video and I wanted to share with you my opinions on the matter. I know my response will get lost in the list of posts that are related to the topic but when I have a belief and an opinion, I voice it especially when I feel so strongly about it.
First off, I have to agree with everything she mentioned. I believe that social media is taking over our lives, there's no denying it. I'll admit straight up, raise my hand up high, I'm wrapped up in the social media/online world.
My accounts are always the first thing I check when I wake up in the morning and the very last thing I check before I go to sleep. I've done it before, when my phone died I felt so lost, I felt out of the loop. I jokingly said that one time it happened "Oh no, now we have to talk to each other". I'm not in denial about social media... I just checked my Instagram account just now... we are so wrapped up in the online world that if we aren't connected we won't know anything about what is happening in the world or even in our friends lives. Are you denying that your wrapped up? Are you just avoiding the truth? No matter how many excuses we make about social media, its the damn truth. You can argue, you can make a huge debate about it but you know its right.
Yes, social media is benefiting our lives by making everything easier to buy online, to shoot a quick email knowing that the recipient will receive it in just a matter of seconds. I'm not saying that social media is bad per say, but the way we take advantage of it is. I'm expressing all the thoughts that are running through my head right now not to start a debate but its a realisation that I've been avoiding. It seems like such a huge effort to go outdoors and meet people face to face. Working as a waitress, I see a number of different customers and I get so sad that a couple who are out to enjoy a meal together, enjoy their company are sitting there with their eyes on their phone checking through Facebook or whatever seems to be more important than the other person. I could honestly go on a rampage right now about how social media is affecting our relationships with friends or partners.
We are so wrapped up exposing and advertising ourselves online to portray a lifestyle that we want everyone to assume we have. By exposing this, we are trying to push the reality out, to avoid the very problems that we may be facing. You see popular accounts with images sharing the highlights of their life, and we sit here feeling sorry for ourselves wishing that we had all that. Not everything that is shown online is the truth. Why would we share horrible moments of our lives, no one wants to see that. I've done it before, posting a sad moment that I may be going through hoping for validation of support, for others to care. We try to find a void to hide the truth.
Why do couples feel the need to share everything online? Is it to make the fair few people who are single to feel sorry for ourselves? To make us jealous? Or is it really hiding the truth behind what is really happening? We all want to be accepted one or the other and it feels like the only way to achieve that is by the number of followers or likes we get online versus real life.
