Friday, January 22, 2016

Thoughts on Ch. 9 from Alone Together

The section "The Avatar of Me" from Ch. 9 in Alone Together reminded me of what I said in class the other day about people being overly obsessed with their image. To be clear, I don't think it's wrong or shallow for anyone to think about their image and be mindful of the image they create of themselves on social media. What I think is strange and a little problematic is how obsessed the people in our generation can become with their image, and I truly think it can lead to these people becoming quite narcissistic. For example, I know many people (and they are people I know well) who become so obsessed with their online image that it consumes their personalities. They become hyper-aware of what their followers and friends think of them, and become more worried over how attractive their followers think they are than how they act in everyday life.

To reiterate, I do not think being mindful of the image you create for yourself or even the act of carefully creating your image on social media itself is the problem; I think it's the obsession that different individuals develop over their Instagram/ Twitter profiles that is problematic. When people become so concerned over how cool their lives seem through Instagram or how funny they are on Twitter, I think they become way too focused on themselves, and they lose sight of what's important in their everyday lives.

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