The first thing most of us do right after waking up in the morning is to check our phone. Even if you don’t spend much time on it in that moment, you reach for it instinctively. We’re all aware of the dangers and the harm too much screen time can cause us, how social media can affect our mental health and self esteem, and everything else everyone warns the world about. Obviously, this doesn’t apply to everyone, there are people who don’t live glued to their screens and are actually able to use it moderately, just the healthy amount. Most of the time, I try to be one of those people, but it’s not too long until I find myself scrolling through TikTok hours on end again.
The digital world has become part of our everyday lives in many ways, and I’m not going to be talking about all of the dangers of it. I just want to share some observations regarding specific things on social media that affect our self esteem and the way we present ourselves.
Types of “Pretty”…?
On a Sunday morning where I’ve woken up around noon, I reach for my phone and start scrolling while still in bed. The first thing I see when I open TikTok are different types of “pretty” one can be. They’ve created these categories sorting people into “boy pretty” and “girl pretty”, which is quite confusing, but understood as being found attractive from the perspective of the male gaze/female gaze. I just roll my eyes, finding it stupid and not giving it importance. Although when I look at the comments section, I see tons of young girls complaining about not being “boy pretty” and wishing they had a smaller nose, bigger lips, bigger eyes, or whatever it is about themselves that they’re insecure about. It’s sad to see, but it’s become so normalized to compare yourself to others on social media that nobody really bats an eye anymore. I keep scrolling, and this time come across someone talking about having “bad facial harmony”. What does that even mean…I keep scrolling, and see countless different posts and comments of countless people creating new insecurities for themselves, when people in the real world would have no idea what they were talking about if they had said these things out loud. I’ve seen many nonexistent terms people have come up with such as “Stubby Legs” “Cortisol Face” “Pointy Elbows” and so much more…All of it created to feed new insecurities to people as if the already existing unrealistic beauty standards weren’t damaging enough.
When you know these terms mean absolutely nothing and know your worth, you don’t let these stupid things get to you. However, the targeted audience for this type of content is not you. Young girls all over the world watch these types of videos every single day, look at themselves in the mirror and hate what they see. They’re still in a stage where they’re growing up and they try so hard to make themselves look a certain way, while missing out on the real things they’re supposed to be experiencing in the real world. They don’t know the influencers they watch every day use filters and edit their faces and bodies to appear slimmer, they don’t know these different terms and “aesthetics” people use on social media are nonexistent in real life and nobody really cares. They don’t know because the world keeps telling them otherwise.
After having seen these type of posts first thing after I’ve woken up, even if I don’t think about it actively, it’s somewhere there in the back of my mind, taking up space for absolutely no reason. Doesn’t matter what type of content it is that you scroll through, social media shouldn’t be the first thing we engage with, as it has a much stronger effect on setting our mindsets for the day than we think it does.
The Loss of Authenticity
Another thing social media imposes on people that I come across often are trends. It’s not a bad thing to follow trends, but lately I’ve come to see that some people cannot live without them. They don’t have their own opinions on fashion, they don’t know what they personally like or don’t like, they just go along with what everyone else is doing and wearing. I’ve seen a couple of posts where people were asking “So, what shoes are we wearing this autumn? Are “__” still in or out? What bags are we using for university?”
Just wear what you like. Do what you want, what you are comfortable in. It shouldn’t be so hard, should it? When I get off my phone and look around the real world, I find it beautiful to see different people with different styles, each of them presenting their own authentic style and who they are. The digital world offers people a great space to share ideas and inspire each other, regarding anything. But we shouldn’t let it take our own authenticity, our own tastes, our own likes and dislikes away from us. You should be able to add your own unique touch to what you wear, what you do, what you post, but that’s become a rare thing to see in this digital age where people are just copying what everyone else does on social media. Trends will always come and go, it’s impossible to keep up with all of them. Every day there’s a different trend. Every day, there’s something different you to have to do, a different way to have to “be” to fit these nonexistent standards, these constantly changing trends. Isn’t that just exhausting?
Great post. It’s very introspective and something I think all of us can relate to to some degree. I think we need to do better in educating kids on the differences between the real world and the digital one, and the effect overconsumption of social media can have on us even if we are aware of the damage it can do to our self esteem.