Social networks are now a part of us. Our thumbs scroll on their own. Without our phones and our Facebook or Twitter accounts, we’d be truly lost. These profiles allow us to express ourselves to an audience that’s bigger than ever before. We can also see photos of what our friends have been up to at the weekend, and follow celebrities on Instagram. We have access to the lives of millions of people and we are supposedly more connected than ever. But with this connection comes comparison. And isolation. And the feeling of not being as “cool,” or pretty, or popular as your online friends.
This blog is looking at this idea much more closely and will be focusing on one social network in particular. On 6th October 2010, Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger launched an image-based social network, Instagram. Instasham is all about the pretend lives we live through our Instagram accounts; the different versions of ourselves displayed across our profiles.
We’ve all been there. Applying 3 different filters to a photo; editing it within an inch of its life until it looks just right. Flicking between 20 subtly different photos, trying to find the perfect one. Posting a photo of your fancy dinner. Or a “hot dogs or legs” photo showing off your latest holiday location. To some degree we all keep up this act of posting photos of our “perfect” lives.
Everyone shares their own “perfect” images, so all that we see is each other’s carefully constructed presentations of our lives. And what do we do? Compare. “Why can’t I be as naturally pretty as her?” “I wish I had a figure like hers” “Why can’t I go on holiday to Bali?”
With every scroll comes a comparison to yet another manufactured image. Sure, we know photos in magazines are photoshopped and those Victoria’s Secret models barely eat to get the bodies they have, but what about that girl you follow on Instagram? The one who posts photos from her yoga retreat in Bali, and her toned, tanned figure on the beach – surely her photos can’t be edited? Well actually, yes.
Why is this a problem?
Too readily do we accept these Instagram lives as genuine. Too often do we compare ourselves to these constructs. And now far too regularly are young people saying their low self-esteem is caused by Instagram.
Instasham is a platform where you can discuss this “contrived perfection made to get attention” that Australian teenager Essena O’Neill spoke about.
Let’s wake up and stop comparing ourselves to these false images. Let’s fight this self-esteem plague that’s taking over young people today thanks to Instagram.
Join the discussion on here and on our Facebook and Twitter page!
Leave a Reply