Is social media destroying people’s confidence?
Social media influences society in various ways from how people behave to how people believe they should look.
People have all kinds of applications on their cell phones from Facebook to Instagram to Snapchat. These social media platforms can have incredible influence on the way people view themselves and others.
But why do people care so much about how they look and how others look on social media? Why do the number of “likes” and “followers” become an obsession?
Social media platforms such as Instagram have developed different lives for people. They might be one way online and completely different in reality. But some people do not think about the fact that famous people on Instagram are just normal human beings.
Essena O’Neill understands the power social media can have on people. She decided to reveal the truth behind her popular Instagram photos to let people know that obsessing over how many likes they get on a picture is not healthy.
O’Neill essentially said that her pictures were all staged, photoshopped, that she’s not rich and that she’s presenting a false image.
O’Neill and other famous Instagram users such as Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid are actually getting paid thousands of dollars for their Instagram photos. Social media has become these women’s lives because it is now part of their career.
Yet so many people obsess over being “famous on social media” and try to look and live like the people they admire online.
George Gerbner’s cultivation theory suggests that people who watch television will have an influenced perception of reality based on what they have been exposed to.
If television is replaced with social media, this theory can be supported because people who see beautiful, sexy and rich people on social media also want to portray the same lifestyle on their own social media accounts.
This theory is also supported because social media is not necessarily a fun, uplifting place to be on all the time. Sometimes the comments people post on other people’s pages are some of the harshest remarks they have ever been told. What is interesting about this is that it usually happens to people who are famous on social media, so the jealousy the viewers have is extremely apparent.
The Instagram accounts with thousands of followers and the most appealing pictures draw people in. This creates envy and jealousy among the viewers of these accounts.
This leads to the unhealthy obsession of social media.
People can develop social anxiety and general unhappiness with their own lives from looking at people who are famous on social media. Not only can the viewers become extremely insecure about themselves, but also the social media famous people can too.
This occurs because the popular social media accounts might feel pressured to portray a particular lifestyle in order to make themselves feel confident and admirable.
The influence social media has on society can be extremely powerful in many positive ways. But this is not one of them.
It is heartbreaking to see what people go through to just gain some confidence, and it is sickening to read the hateful comments on people’s posts.
My concern is, are things going to get better on social media? Or will people continue to obsess over how to portray themselves just to get more likes?
