We listen to and believe almost everything we see and hear on Instagram. But, can Instagram be living a lie? The answer is, yes. Instagram is made up of the art of photo editing, cropping, and filtering. Users post pictures that others will enjoy and like, but do we tend to take it too far sometimes? We post pictures that will please others and not ourselves.
I found a video on Youtube called Are You Living an Insta Lie? Social Media Vs. Reality, by DitchtheLabel. Ditch the Label is an anti-bullying organization. They help and support anti-bullying in different ways all around the world. In this case, Ditch the Label made a video is show us that not everything we see on Instagram is real.
In the beginning of this video we see a young lady named Sophie, wake up in the morning and Instagram’s a photo. She captions it, “Gooood Morning!! #iwokeuplikethis”. Before this moment, we watch the young lady as she brushes her hair and teeth, puts on makeup, and attempts to look better than she did when she first woke up. Right off the bat we can put together that clearly, she did not just wake up like this.
Next we see a man named Chris drive to a mountain and put his biking helmet on. He gets out of the car and goes to take a photo on the mountain with his helmet to caption it, “30km bike ride done! #Fitspo #HillClimb #Cyclinglife”. We know that Chris did not go on a 30km bike ride, but do his followers?
For the next two Instagram users, we see them take photos for their page and once again lie about what they are doing just to make themselves look better online. We also are exposed to a young man named Michael who happens to try on ten different outfits and take about 30 selfies. He also goes to caption his picture with “#effortlessselfie” and #oneshotwonder”.
All of the people in this video are posting things that they know others will like. They are not enjoying life or even socializing with one another. They are simply faking photos just for the attention. Knowing this, why do we constantly get jealous of one anothers Instagram post. I am not saying everyone's posts and photos are a lie, but I'm sure a good amount of them are. So, be careful what you see because not everything is exactly what it seems.
We have seen a lot of this within the course this semester, with people lying on social media. Authenticity is something social media will always struggle with because behind closed doors you don't know what is legitimate and what is not. Do you think you are always real on Instagram, or have you lied once or twice just for the likes?
I did a paper on this last year! It was on the effects of online disinhibition on modern communication. John Suler is who described this behavior as “the online disinhibition effect”. What is meant by this is that people act out more or self disclose differently than they normally would in person. He describes this behavior as defines online disinhibition as, “lowering of psychological restraints, which often serve to regulate behaviors in the online social environment”. Basically my paper said yes it is crazy that we all represent our selves differently online but its mostly showing the best versions of ourselves, boosting self confidence and isnt always that bad.
ReplyDeleteI think that the idea that we post pictures for others and not for ourselves is so interesting! When I make my social media posts I definitely choose the photos that I like the most, but I put the more conventionally "attractive" photo first. If I want to include a funny or goofy picture that's always the last picture even if it's my personal favorite, so I'm definitely guilty of this.
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