Social Media And How It Affects Our Everyday Life

When we think about Social Media, we automatically think the funny memes, posting selfies on Instagram, letting everybody know how were feeling on Facebook, or those Twitter thread rants about our overbearing Professors that give us so much work. But, that’s not exactly what Social Media is all about. Social Media is something that revolves around our everyday lives that enables us human beings to create and share content with other human beings as well as meet some interesting people along the way. Now, here’s something to think about, does the content you post/create showcase the person you really are or the person you want others to think you are? This is something to think about because every day we post things that we think goes along with this persona we have on social media that we want people to see, but why don’t we post content that shows who we really are instead of creating this different role to play? When thinking about this in a more technical way, this is something called the “Self”, the “Me”, and the “I” which is a theory developed by George Herbert Mead that explains a lot of why we have such difficulty being our real, true self and how not only social media plays a big role in shaping who we are, but other people’s opinions and attitudes toward us make a big impact as well. When we talk about the “Self”, Mead believes that it is an entity that helps individuals grow and develop to be socially, productive citizens. This is what helps us to be the normal, social people we strive to be, and it is developed through social activities and social relationships, but we cannot pursue this without social interaction. Also, as our selves develop more and more, we begin to be able to examine our own thoughts and behaviors as if we were examining other’s actions and to reach this, we must have the ability to unconsciously put ourselves in other people’s shoes and view our own actions from that standpoint which could be a person in particular or a whole community. Now, when talking about the “Me” on the other hand, it is pretty much this picture perfect life and “cool” character we portray on Social Media that is influenced by the viewers of our content who are basically asking for more and more because the content we give is now what they are accustomed to seeing and they believe we are this person were not which helps us reach the goal of achieving more likes and comments. Besides that, this is the part of the “Self” that is concerned with how others will view it. We’re not exactly being our true self that we feel isn’t accepted or we’re seen as “different” because we’re not like everybody else that’s why we portray our lives of being “cool” and “hip” on social media where we feel more accepted than in real life. This is where the “I” comes into play. The “I” is the person behind the phone which is us, the real you who we don’t show to anyone. Mead explains the “I” is part of the “Self” that is spontaneous, impulsive, and creative which is all your possible cool characteristics that are un-socialized or as said before, not shown to the world. In connection with the “Me” and the “I”, the concept of “looking glass self” shows that we, as socialized products of society, are always thinking of how others think about us and are willing to do anything to change ourselves to fit in with societal standards. This has a lot do with people who are living their life as a lie just to fit in or to gain followers, likes, comments. In connection with this concept, the blog post posted on Mcsweeneys.com “My life might look great on Instagram, but deep down I’m actually a Ciranolid Isotope” by Simone Taylor is a perfect example of how we try to fit into the societal standards by posting fake content that does not relate to our actual feelings or our own life, but is the opposite of it. After questioning the person in particular for not leaving love on her content, she comes to admit that in reality, her life is not all that great but that she is actually a Ciranolid Isotope. She goes on to speak about a few of her posts and how they all have no meaning behind it and are not as lovely as they seem to be. She then admits that, “every one is a charade for your benefit. A total, bald-faced lie.” Taylor was posting these fake pictures to show viewers that she is supposedly living her best life and is carefree, but that the connections with the people in these photos were false and had no true meaning behind them and it was all just to gain hearts that she wanted that would fulfill the role she was playing on Social Media. Taylor wanted to fit in with society by portraying how much she loved life and that everything is perfect, but behind the phone screen, she is miserable and is living in the shadows of others. To tie everything all together, Social Media plays a crucial role in society that basically determines if you fit in or not and that is why people come up with these different identities because they are not accepted for their true self. They want to fit in and be accepted with this fake persona, but after a while, it will start to merge with their true selves and it will be hard to distinguish what is real or fake. In the end, it is only up to us decide if we will live our life through reality or live it falsely over a screen.

My Blog

So I'm Cody and I honestly have avoided social media all my life. I don;t have a phone and only recently created my twitter and other various platforms for the class so I'll be learning how to use them more as I go through this course. It's very strange to people to hear I don't use a cell phone or social media in a day and age where it is almost required by our society to have use both. I honestly feel like it's a waste of time but we'll see how my opinion develops over the course of this semester.

Social Media and The Self: Do They Really Mead to be Separate? (by Montrell Wiley)

When we look at each other's social media accounts, what is usually the first thing that you think of? That's dependent on whose account it is and their relationship toward you of course, since Linda was a hag towards you and everything she posts is offensive in your eyes. What about famous people? It seems like their life is always glamorous and happy. They post their fancy cars and big houses but you never see them post the paperwork and insurance agreements and contracts etc. needed to acquire all of those things. Not only that, most celebrities would never post anything about their personal life because once it's out in the public, their image will be affected whether it's positively or negatively. This applies to everyone who uses social media, although maybe not as drastic seeing as we don't all have a million followers. So what do we do to avoid this possible embarrassment? Or should we allow ourselves to be vulnerable and reveal our true selves online? We will get to that later, but for now let's look at George Herbert Mead's theories that we can easily apply to this situation.

Mead, a social philosopher, studied the connection between the self, mind, and society. An important take away from his theories is understanding the Generalized Other. Mead believes that the attitude of the entire community is the Generalized Other, and it can control most of what we believe ourselves to be. We never know what is socially acceptable until someone tells us what is. Take for example the experiment of "Five Monkeys and a Ladder" where each following monkey only did what their community of monkeys did without even knowing the reason. Our actions and personalities sometimes don't feel like our own and are just reflexes to peer pressure and society's rules, and we lose our true selves (if it's even possible to have one) because of this.


So since all of our actions are influenced by the Generalized Other, that means that every post we post online isn't actually for ourselves and that it is only there to follow what everyone else does or wants to see. This can be true in most cases, but there are times where we can manage to truly open up our struggles, triumphs, or fears to people online despite the controversy. Take Scott Simon, a Weekend Edition Saturday talk-show host, for an example. Scott has more than 1.2 million Twitter followers, so the influence of his Generalized Other will greatly affect his actions online. However, it did not stop him from posting his most sensitive moment in his life: the final days he spent with his dying mother. With only a month left before her 85th birthday, Patricia Lyons Simon Newman died after being brought in for an emergency operation. Scott documented his experience and shared it to the public of over a million people. He exposed his emotions, grief, and unique experience that no one would ever want to go through, let alone share, to so many people. Not only that, he also exposed his mother to the outside world as well. So was Scott in the wrong? Did he post his own mother's death just for the "clout"? Or was it all genuine and a step toward resisting the urge to hide our humanity? Scott was quoted as saying "I don't think it's any less sacred because it was shared with a lot of people and it must be said, you know, there was a lot of stuff that I didn't share. There was a lot of stuff that I will tell only my wife and maybe someday my children. I certainly had a sense of proportion and delicacy. I don't think my mother knew much about Twitter or social media platforms but I would read her an occasional message from someone in Australia, someone in Great Britain or Singapore and she was very touched. ...I didn't tweet anything and wouldn't have that I didn't think she would be totally comfortable with." (NPR Staff, Scott Simon On Sharing His Mother's Final Moments On Twitter)


Well, there is no sure way of knowing all of his intentions of his posts, but by using Mead's theory on the Generalized Other we can get an idea. His community of followers ate up his posts (in a good way) and proved themselves as loyal Twitter followers. They supported his posts and empathized with Scott, which I imagine made him feel less alone in his situation. I think that whether or not he posted his experience for attention, followers, or to have himself heard is beside the overall result of him fusing his social media presence with his true feelings.

This idea of merging personal hardship and social media isn't new. #HalfTheStory is a non-profit social media research project that gives people a chance to voice their stories of their struggles with depression. It aims to "highlight our most human attributes on social media to reignite human connection in the digital space" (halfthestoryproject.com) by giving people a platform that welcomes genuine and heartfelt conversation. It truly proves to us that we should reevaluate how we use social media and tells us that we can display our true selves online without hiding behind rainbows and butterflies all of the time.

Trisha Paytas, Tana Monageau and Mead. ("Fakeness" on Social Media).

Social media influencers have become a new brand of celebrity.

While many argue that these people “are famous for doing nothing”

and are “talentless” they are wrong.

These people have talent: manipulating social media in their favor,

regardless if they are beloved or somebody people love to hate.

One thing people love about social media celebrities is the degree

of intimacy that they receive. Viewers get a slice of their lives,

as it is seemingly all out on display.

They also can interact with them through sending fan mail,

tweeting at them, joining their patreon, etc.

While big A-listers are typically more reserved and private,

social media celebrities can actually benefit from having

a unrefined, messy, “relatable” life out to the public.

According to Humphreys, social media can be

interpreted as a diary. She states that “...the diary is an account of how

one has spent his or her day”, and with the rise of vlogging,

quite literally following someone around throughout their day,

there is not much difference between a physical journal and

a YouTube video, despite the much different platforms.

Trisha Paytas,a well known YouTuber, has been active

on the site for over 10 years. Her life essentially is social media;

as she gets paid through YouTube and Patreon

and doesn’t appear to have a career outside of that.

She gained a lot of her original popularity through her “Stripper Diaries”

series, where she read out of her journals from when she was a stripper.

She shared intimate parts of her life, such as how she got into stripping.

For many this would be an overwhelming amount to share on the internet,

especially considering our culture of slut shaming, but, she continues

to share her life, however good or bad it may be.

One of her most popular videos, with over 8 million views is called “we broke up because

I’m too fat”. In it she’s crying on the floor of her living room (which is actually a deviation

from the kitchen floor she is usually crying on), explaining her side of her and fellow

YouTuber Jason Nash’s breakup.

Completely contrasting from another popular YouTube couple, Liza Koshy and David Dobrik,

who had a relatively wholesome split, Trisha and Jason had one of the nastiest public

breakups in YouTube history.

 (Feel free to compare the above videos to one another).

They both wracked up views, though, so viewers don’t seem to

particularly care how people are breaking up, they only care that it’s being shared.

According to an article on The Verge, "breakups are their own genre of video on YouTube",

which rings somewhat true. But why is that? Why do people like peering into the lives of

complete strangers?

In the article Socialized Self: George Herbert Mead's Self, Mind and Society it’s stated that

“Mead saw that society was a very crucial component of the mind. He believed that

individuals carry society around with them in their minds, and this regulates how they behave.

The regulation, or habits and common responses of society, are learned through education.”

So in that case, if it is learned and conditioned that we are supposed to be private about our

relationships, especially the “bad” (breakups are not necessarily always bad) parts,

watching people deviate and publish their entire breakups, can be particularly fascinating and

enticing.

  

Another issue many have with social media is the concept of photo shopping.

Tana Monegau, YouTuber, has been called out (and self admitted to Face Tuning her pictures),

for this. While it is harmful to create unrealistic expectations of women's bodies, we could

argue that particularity flattering outfits and shape wear that dramatically change the body

can hold a similar amount of "fakeness" as FaceTune.

Is FaceTuning away a pimple "okay", such as putting on concealer would be?

Or is there a "line" that is crossed-- where things become "too" fake?

Tana and Trisha are both women who have no shortage of scandals, but also no shortage of

views.

There are compilation videos of Trisha caught lying, videos of her being nasty to others,

and even YouTube psychologists analyzing her relationship with her boyfriend (the one

I mentioned earlier. Hint: It’s still bad).

   

Tana had a convention where the security guards were fighting little girls, and people

were fainting from the sun. It’s almost hard to look away from such a train wreck.

Regardless of the intent of the people watching their videos, they're still making them,

and people are still watching. This is likely happening because their lives are seemingly messier,

and therefore way more interesting, than the average person. But, we also don’t really know

the average person as well as we think we do.

Scott Simon tweeting out his mother's final days is just as heart wrenching as it would be for him

to tell you in person, however I assure you there are people who would say he’s somehow “used”

her death to gain “something” (what, exactly?) Is grieving something that should be done alone?

How is it wrong to share your grief?

Because social media is relatively new, so people are still learning the “etiquette” of social media;

what’s “real” or “fake” and what should be considered for the public, or private.

But, this misunderstanding that we somehow “know” people, that we know what’s “fake”, can

still be done in person. No one can read your mind, and no one can tell

how you feel inside just because they’ve seen you in real life.

How many people do you know that are LGBTQ+? You’ll probably say the ones that are out,

but how are you supposed to know who’s queer

if they’re closeted? How many times have you heard the same story of the boy who was

always smiling and joking, then killed himself? Or the girl who was “naturally” thin who was

found out to have anorexia?

People are faking everything, all the time. It is learned, whether in real life or on social media,

to try to present the best version of yourself. But what if there are multiple versions of you?

Then what?

Mead suggests that we see ourselves not purely as an individual, but as a reflection of

compiled traits others have given to us. If that’s true, it explains why some people are so

quick to call social media fake. If in person, we are offered one set of traits (ex: happy,

outgoing), but on social media we’re given “new” traits (ex: depressed, anxious),

it can create discomfort.

People who are uncomfortable with being labeled opposing traits

will likely reject or disregard social media as fake to minimize dissonance,

instead of accepting that they are a complex, multidimensional individual.

I imagine, for social media stars such as Tana and Trisha,

who's generalized other is much larger than the average persons, it's easier to be "fake" and

cater to your fans, than to be "real". It's easier to photoshop and to tell exaggerated

stories about their lives; because if you don't do these things for viewers, you lose your income.

While a lot would say that social media is the cause of many problems,

I find social media itself to be neutral, it is only in how people respond that it could be

problematic. Downloading the twitter app, then doing nothing with it, does not create problems.

How can it?

An app cannot gain sentience and ruin your life. It is not social media promoting "fakeness",

but the way that it is used, and the people that are using it.

Again, people are complex, as well as hypocritical, but people are already that way.

Social media did nothing but provide a new platform.

Sources:

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/07/30/207032871/on-twitter-scott-simon-s-long-goodbye-to-his-mother

https://www.theverge.com/2018/6/6/17435218/liza-koshy-david-dobrik-youtube

http://www.everythingsociology.com/2014/03/socialization-george-herbert-meads-self.html

My Social Media Posts That Are About Social Media Posts

Social media is, in many ways, useful to many people across the world. For close to the same amount of ways it can be useful, there are hindrances to society and toxic uses of social media as well. It is probably the fastest growing technology advancement of the 21st century, so I think  it is important to learn about how it affects us all. My name is Montrell Wiley and my blog will be exploring the psychological effects as well as the social changes that social media brings to the world through pondering and research.

Understanding Mead's framework and the history of personal journal

To comprehend exactly what Mead covers within his structure constructed that gives a separation within the "I" and "Me"of an individual, one must be able to view their selves as one who is able to be distinctive from the rest that are of everyone else or at least near them in an often appearance. In class and in our general conversations from an academic standpoint, we have been capable to pull apart the system from Mead that has been seemingly embedded within us as human beings beholding this egotistic manner to hold the belief that different perspectives are existent of us in our everyday matters. We have been able to display how that structure plays out within us in our physical presences and then in our social media platforms, in order to give a concrete difference of how our social essences are of real distinctions within our day in age of social communication and content in general, that we display to our followers and to other friends/family/peers within our real life physical settings.

In order to give a connection to the general framework, for me to explain it is best to use myself in order to speak on a more concise level...

 

https://twitter.com/cee_dos/status/1033516413301022721


The "I" over the past couple of years have been attempted to be a more suitable and clear cut individual, a "blue collared young man" (the sample tweet) could be a possible phrase given in order to express the essence of what I have been attempted to construct as the ego that is driven through from the lens that I usually assume to give most of the people who know me as that image alone primarily.  Egotistic? yes it's a quality of holding the "I" value, of course limited but still relevant. This would be carried out through the accomplishments, aspirations, and family oriented factors that I constantly reiterate whether through social media or from when I speak about myself as an individual that goes through my everyday settings, this would be what Mead essentially preaches about the individual having their "I" as the overall product that is displayed for individuals in order to have an essential image for others to carry about that particular individual. The inverse of the "I" of course is the "Me", which for myself personally would be the laid back person that I know for a given fact is latched within myself. Through all the perceptions people could possibly have about yourself that is most likely constructed because of what type of content that individual displays or constantly says, the individual will always have a perception of the self that is known to be of a nature that they understand within their own inner element and can't always be expressed much more than a simple facial expression or notion, it may only be understood by other individuals who are as close to you as they could ever be possibly.


Personal journaling/postings


https://rungum.com/blogs/blog/nick-symmonds-2012-training-log-ebook-free-download

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBsAYgDxBp0

Throughout the Humphrey's material in that has been covered thus far within our class, the topic of personal journals have been shown to have cultivated throughout time and dependent on what their means or overall purpose is entailed for. As it has been thoroughly explained that journals or personal diaries had a purpose in times long ago that were detailed in much thought and emotion in order to captivate what specific situations/ideals/emotions that an individual was going through and making it aware for their loved or close ones that were away from them, time went on and essentially changed the true function for the personal texts or content in general as lifestyles were altered by reliance of different extents of communication methods. Throughout our recent boosting of social media platforms giving accessibility for individuals to post many different forms of content, personal routines, practices, and even itineraries have been yearned form individuals to display to external viewers. It is fascinating at it's most simplistic level that so many different kinds of content have been able to be at the same purpose as the initial diaries and personal journals, but now at the automatic push of buttons counter-parted with so many components being able to captivate a moment or series of moments in order to reveal a mantra.

Mead and Cooley: Making the Society Easier to Understand

Mead and Cooley: Making the Society Easier to Understand

During the first part of this unit I have learned a lot about Mead’s theory of mind and “the self”. Mead believes that certain people can affect how we view ourselves; people that we interact with throughout our day by day activity change who we are possibly in a good or bad way. Mead gives the example of childhood. Children tend to act and be as they please, not really caring what others think. But Mead believes that as we develop and grow older we start to care about other people's opinions and do less of what makes us unique. Mead explains that there are three MAIN stages: the preparatory stage, the play stage, and the game stage.
The first stage, the preparatory stage, is where kids tend to mimic others and that is pretty much their main source of learning. During my first semester of college I took Introduction to Psychology. Something cool I learned that Mead’s first stage made me think about was the Bobo Doll Experiment. Around the 1960s, a scientist, Albert Bandura ran a bunch experiments that had to do with learning by observing others. One of his most popular and successful experiments was called the Bobo Doll Experiment.

https://search.alexanderstreet.com/psychology/browse/experiment-material?ff%5B0%5D=experiment_discussed_facet%3ABobo%20Doll%20Experiment

They had a clown doll and would have some of the children watch a adult punch the doll (showing multiple signs of aggression towards the doll) and some of the children would be left alone with the doll (without any adults). Then they would see how the child would react when alone with the doll. Most of the children that observed a adult abusing the doll would find similar ways to “harm” the doll. The other kids that did not observe a adult hurting the doll would do no harm to the doll. Here is a cool link that goes into greater detail about observation experiments that help prove Meads first stage (the preparatory stage); https://www.simplypsychology.org/bobo-doll.html.
The second stage, the play stage, is the where kids are beginning to develop from communication with other kids and/or adults. They start using words and certain hand movements to get their “point” across to their peers. The children also start to understand that creating relationships with people  are important; certain roles are important. He discovered this by observing kids when “playing pretend”. Most kids when playing pretend tend to act as other people; especially people with big roles in their life- like parents, doctors, etc…. Which in this case is different then imitation because in this stage they are able to put themselves in someone else's shoes and answer in a different perspective. They continue to create their own scenarios and scenes.
The third stage, the game stage, kids are able to reflect on people attitudes and certain behaviors. The children start to understand that most citizens act in ways that make not only themselves happy but act how other people will accept you. Mead believes that this stage lead to the creation of the “me” and “I”. “Me” being how others see us; showing what we learn through socialization. “I” being how we think about those interactions. Here is a link to a youtube video that helps understand the “me and i” aspect; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDhe48mLFmQ.
Another topic related to self-identity that we already started to discuss in this unit is Charles Cooley’s- “Looking glass self”. Cooley tried explaining that we as people, are NOT actually being impacted by our peers or surroundings. He believes that what is actually affecting us is the opinions we create in our mind that we think other people have about me and you. In the opinion of Cooley’s theory we most likely are changing who we are based off of possibly true and possibly false assumptions. Here is a example that really helped me understand this theory that we discussed in class last week; let’s say that you wear these new pants to school. You are walking through the ASC in your new pants and this girl you spot kind of gives you a semi-mean/judgemental look. You automatically are thinking, “Why the hell did I wear these pants?! Who even wears pants anymore?!!! Pants are so dumb OMG!!!” By this one observation you received you automatically begin to make assumptions about the look. We are influenced by simple daily interactions way more than we think. This simple thing about pants could possibly lead to creating a whole different self perspective.

https://blog.bufferapp.com/6-proven-strategies-for-promoting-content-across-social-media

On the second day of class we discussed how throughout social media people are easily hyped up or put down. People are able to create someone they are not through a social media page. An example of that would be the blog story, For Immediate Release: The Birth of Samuel Allen Novak.

During this blog post, I discussed how a couple that usually has little to none media attention  were able to create a totally real account based off of a totally unreal person. I believe that that proves that when seeing someone’s social media account it is very possible that that account could be nothing like the actual account holder/user. We also discussed how Cooley believed that "the self" is simply just a product created by our social interactions with other people that involves three steps: 1) The imagination of our appearance to other people and associated feelings; 2) Imagining that others are evaluating our behavior; 3) We develop feelings and react to the imaginary evaluations of ourselves as objects. We also talked about Mead; Mead dealt with imitation. With imitation, you’re always trying to see the world from another's point of view; a self image is developed in recognizing how others are perceiving you or how others view you. As a human, people are constantly trying to put themselves in the shoes of another, thinking about how they are seeing this particular event, situation or action.