Is Social Media Turning Us All Into 2-Faced Meglomaniacs?

“You look so different on Instagram,” said someone, when they met me for the first time in person. “Uhm.. thanks?” Clearly, I was quite unsure whether that was a compliment or an insult.

And I know you feel like you have heard this one before because, in a weird way, we all have. Now, is it just the technology, camera angles, filters that make us look different, or do we deliberately put on a mask for the world on our social media profiles?

 

A Way To Feel Accepted

Many of us think twice before posting anything on social media. The constant fear of being judged lingers in our minds. You never know what will be deemed as offensive and you don’t want to go against societal norms.

The perfect captions, forced candid pics, capturing the ideal sunrise — all to get those likes or love reactions. We’re constantly refreshing our newsfeeds, just to gauge if our ‘friends’ have accepted and ‘liked’ us.

In fact, the trend currently is to not only be a completely different person online, but to be different on the various social platforms we’re on as well. Family friendly on FB and a total badass on Instagram. More the accounts, more the faces.

 

To Escape Reality

Though social media has slowly become a warped version of our reality, more often than not, we try to escape who we are and be a different person — maybe just because we want to. The rush to be whoever we want to in the same life, without really doing much, is too high, so much so that when it crosses the line, it may be too late.

In your daily life, you may not feel loved or you may not get the attention you are craving for, so you reach out to the virtual world for help…and it responds. No one understands that this is all short-lived.

You and I try to live 2 lives simultaneously, and get so engrossed in that misleading virtual life that when the 2 characters meet, it may spell disaster.

As Shakespeare said, “The world’s a stage and we each have a part”. The only glitch is that we don’t have ‘a part’, we have many, and credit for that goes to our dear social media.

 

But Really, There Is No Escape

We have come too far now, to stop using social media, and with each passing day, the addiction is only growing. Even if we train ourselves and try to go on a detox, you know it won’t work.

We make these profiles to connect with strangers, to meet new people, and to get social, but aren’t we basically just interacting with the same people we already know? Any new person is labelled a ‘creep’ as soon as he/she sends so much as a hello.

Today, Facebook showed me that I have around 900 friends on my friends’ list, which I should celebrate it — and all I wanted to do was smack myself. Out of that 900, I must have interacted with just a handful; the other are just…there. So isn’t it all just a show?

And yet, I go ahead and write ‘Wanderlust’ on my profile, without even having left the city of Mumbai, just so that people think I travel a lot and I’m cool. And I don’t like that girl’s new hairdo but I say, “Gurlll… Hair goals, bae!” on her picture.

All of us do it — some of us a little more than others, but clearly, there’s no end.