I think that I’ve grown to hate the word social media. It’s a term that, in this generation, is completely overrated and overused. It’s a craze that has generationally swept the nation. Your ten-year-old sister is sending Snapchats with the puppy filter; your grandpa Ed is commenting on Facebook IN ALL CAPS; and your thirty-five year old, stay-at-home Aunt Kate is peddling her pyramid scheme business on her Instagram story and trying to become a “lifestyle blogger.” And as much as I hate to admit it, Social Media saturates almost every minute of our daily lives, especially females ages 18+. According to a recent study done by The Nielson Company, this demographic spends over six hours per week (six hours and thirty-three minutes, to be exact) on social media, which is almost two hours more per week than males. That means that each day, us women are spending just under an hour every single day staring at our screens — over editing pictures, crafting perfect captions, and scrolling through our feeds to see what we’re up against.
It’s awful to say it that way, but I truly feel like that is what Social Media has become. Rather than a platform to share what’s really going on in our lives, these sites have become breeding grounds for “perfection.” Seldom do you see cellulite, sweatpants or God forbid, pimples. Instead it’s sorority poses in our best outfits, glowing skin and our $5 coffee sitting on a rustic wooden table with the blur of a farmhouse sign hanging in the background. The sad thing is, those are just the amateurs. As I’m scrolling through Instagram, I see women with perfectly sculpted bodies, sitting on Mediterranean beaches and drinking mimosas; and actual lifestyle bloggers with studio offices whose gold and marble accessories look untouched; and #MamaBears that post pictures of their kids who look like they just stepped out of Urban Outfitters. Trust me, I’m no social media saint. My feed is cluttered with hipster backdrops and filtered *cringe* selfies. Don’t even get me started on the countless hours I’ve wasted taking pictures to get one that looks “Instagram worthy.” As I sit here, I realize it’s a mindset, and a culture, and a plague. We’ve thrown self-love and vulnerability out the window and replaced them with aesthetic. And honestly, it’s pathetic.
But why? What drives us, young, talented, creative and beautiful women — all unique in our own way — to conform to these constructed guidelines of social media? The gaze. Many are familiar with the male gaze, coined by feminist Laura Mulvey, which pronounces that women are always viewed and assigned value subjectively through a male lens. I would argue that the male gaze is most certainly, but only partially to blame. Instead, I would propose that social media has taken Mulvey’s theory a step further and expanded it not only to men, but to women as well — and on an indefinite scale for both. Once pictures are posted on social media, they can remain there virtually forever and our followers can view them at any time, for however long they like. In turn, these photos, and avoidably the women or scenes in these photos are subjected to an eternal gaze. We post as a means to seek approval from men regarding our attractiveness or level of competency, but now we also, seek validation from other women who appear to be equally as, or — in our minds — more beautiful, put-together, successful, etc. We want to look a certain way, act a certain way and portray a certain persona, which may very well be a part of who we are, but more than likely, represents a whopping 1% of our actual lives.
As Maria X. Liu writes in her Huffington Post article, “Social media makes this a time when the visual begins to take prominence over the real. Instead of experiencing our lives from our own vantage points, we now see the world from how others will view and respond to our vantage points” (2015). As a society who is both aware of the scrutiny we will get from our followers, but also conveniently in charge of creating our own media presence, we end up producing these fabricated realities and claiming them as truth — all to gratify the societal gaze and what it deems pleasurable, attractive and beautiful. The problem is, we as women can’t do anything to change this if we keep falling prey to the entrapment of comparison and societal standards, posting only our best photos and documenting only the most exciting parts of our lives. For if we do, we will surely lose the entirety of who we are and what it truly means to be a woman. But even then our job is not complete. We must stop gazing, too. We must stop glorifying and idolizing other women who fuel the fire — who reduce themselves to objects for visual pleasure. As Liu states, “We have to think about what these people are perpetuating and what it signifies when we approve of them” (2015).
So, wear the dress. Keep the contour. Post pictures of your beautiful, matching family. Document your travels. Show us your food. But do it for you. Do it because you want to keep these photos for yourself and have to look back on for the rest of your life — because you want to share them with the world, despite what they may think and how many ‘likes’ you may get. Don’t spend so much time editing and cropping and retaking and searching for the perfect backdrop that you lose the beauty of the moment. There is power in stretch marks and messy kitchens and runny nosed babies, smudged eyeliner and wrinkled blouses. All of these things tell a story — a real, true and beautiful story about life and the unfiltered reality that happens in front of the lens.
