Is social media making us more vain? That is the question..
If you break the words apart, social media is a means by which we can get more social. And that’s what social media was intended for – to make socializing with others easier and faster. But has it done only that?
As times goes on, I’ve noticed another side to social media, especially on Instagram with the craze for likes and followers. Although social media works great for networking, and as a communication tool, it also seems to have unleashed a vain side in most of us.
Now the questions are – Is this healthy? Is this something we should be concerned about? Is it even true that social media makes us vain?
Here are some of my thoughts:
Social media encourages us to share our personal lives.
Starting from the design of each social media platform, the developers made it extremely easy for every user to share their lives in little or great detail.
You can write long status posts (except for twitter which allows only 140 characters) recounting your day and sharing your feelings. And most times it’s centered around you. Because sharing what’s happening around you so easy, you find yourself reporting every incident of your life as soon as it happens.
Each post you create is focused on your life. Very few people post content about others without mentioning how it affects you or what role you play.
You are in almost every picture you take and its first stop is always social media
Only a few people take pictures without posting on social media these days. Except the photo is not a good one. The automatic response to every picture we take on our phone is – will this picture look good on social media? I wonder how many likes this photo would get? I am not sure about you, but I know I think about these 99.9% of the time when I take a new photo.
Videos are also not left out of this equation.
Social media can provide the avenue for celebrity status
There is the craze for increasing the number of followers on social media. A good number of social media users create content and take photos and videos that will attract the interest of their followers and possibly attract more followers. So social media can provide an avenue for celebrity status.
Verdict?
In most aspects, social media is definitely encouraging us to be vain. Psychologists who have studied social media users’ behaviours and responses to social media were also of the same opinion. But is this social media vanity that bad? I don’t think so. I think a little bit of vanity is good as long as it does not take over your life.
Social media, whether it encourages vanity or not, has helped give us – bloggers, a voice and a platform to showcase our talent. And what if it makes us a little vain. This vanity is good as long as it doesn’t swallow you up.
What do you think? Has social media made you more vain? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.
Thanks for stopping by.
