“The City That Never Sleeps,” was a song lyric I never quite understood until I experienced nightfall in New York City. The sky darkens from purple to black, but the bustling city stayed lit and crowded. I realized that regardless of the time, there were going to be people out and about, keeping the pulse of the city alive. To me this was amazing.
Just like New York City, the Internet is always alive. It was not, however, always this way. When the Internet first came out it was a place to escape. Now it is a place to remain connected. People speak about Facebook as a second world. If you do not exist on Facebook, you cease to exist.
A Facebook identity becomes the identity that it always on. Your Facebook self is more reliable and accessible than the real you. It does not function within the parameters of real time. If someone wants to find you, they can have the Facebook You at their fingertips. Sometimes people will use Facebook for more reliable interaction. People will mingle with someone one-to-one, then look them up later to get a better sense of who they are. In that situation identity in a virtual world become more real.
People transport their identities to an online world. As that world flourished it defines who they are in real life. This pattern has become a recurring theme. Identity is felt in multiple ways and accordingly people only feel “whole” through a combination of online and offline activities. We feel ourselves when we can move along different aspect of our persona. The integration of online identities have not only a big part of our lives, they have become a critical part.
Facebook is a Public Hang Out
Through stages of adolescence, teenagers determine how they want their identities to be portrayed in public. With the advent of the Internet, social media sites have become part of that external identity formation. Just like a park or a mall, social media sites have become a new public meeting place.
Adults of a different generation will reminisce about how they had much more physical freedom than kids today. They would play in the street and wandered around their neighborhoods, just as long as they were back for dinner. Youth’s freedom has changed. No longer is it socially acceptable for kids to wander unsupervised or be left alone for large amounts of time.
We are in an era of paranoid parents and a hyper vigilant media, which gladly blow up stories about the danger of sexual predators, the unstable nature of children and people who are out to harm children and adolescents. Physical social spaces are on the decline. Parents fear letting their kids leaves the house because they are fearful for their children’s safety.
Kids have less public spaces for “hanging out.” While parents argue that school and after-school activities are a place for kids to socialize, kids are always drawn to the places free from the earshot and judgment of adults. As “free” unsupervised spaces have dwindled, online spaces blossomed. They present themselves as spaces that mimic the freedom of an unsupervised terrain.
As a public space, social media can act as a safe haven. Some teenagers find the support online they cannot find locally. A gay teen living in a conservative area might struggle with his or her identity. Social media is a way of expressing specialness in a more genuine way. In these instances, Facebook is a supportive place. People experiencing oppression can find communities that can give support.
Identity Play
Teenagers use Facebook as a tool for identity play. By using Facebook as an experimentation zone they can try on a variety of styles and cultures. They get feedback about what others think about these changes. Like most experimentation sites, There are pro’s and con’s to this online setting.
When you create an account on Facebook, they ask you questions. What is your name? What bands do you like? Who are your friends? They provide a template for this composition. The process of clicking through these categories brings up the bigger question. Who are you on Facebook?
In the name of authenticity, are you “the real you” online? The answer in most cases is no. As we are reborn thought a new medium, we fixate on perfection. Through Facebook, we shave off the crude parts of ourselves like stubble. No one needs to know about an obsession with gossip or incessant sweating problem. You are only whatyou post on Facebook. The real you falls into the shadows of your Facebook you.
The Facebook you is your “Internet twin”. This relationship is reciprocal. You work on your Facebook self and in return your Facebook self works for you. Back home I remember girls trying to look their best for a party because right after the event they would go home and upload the photos to Facebook. These photos were meant to show everyone that they were fun and popular. These events fed an online life.
While Facebook is supposed to reflect reality, people do not post pictures of themselves on just any day. They take pictures of themselves on their best day. Facebook shows the best part of you. It gives people the chance to receive positive feedback for their lives and appearances. This can boost self-confidence, but not always in a constructive way. Loving the “perfect you” on Facebook is very different than loving the “real you.”
Fitting a Mold
The questions Facebook asks you are of a simplified nature. When Facebook asks questions in a simplified format, we are encouraged to become more simplistic in order to suit the composition. This simplified way of representation is easy to process where as people are not. Given the choices it better to be become bullet points and not to exist at all.
Teenagers become part of a presentation where the nature of the program is to endorse special interests. Whether you like online Scrabble or listen to the Grateful Dead in real life no one cares about your menial preferences, On Facebook, these preferences not only matter, they define you.
When Your Identity Becomes Part of a Competition
Showing yourself “authentically” becomes irrelevant when push comes to shove. When everyone else’s Facebook life looks better than yours, you want to maintain a similar level of Facebook status, if you are already exerting yourself to make your profile look good, however, why stop at mediocrity?
When humans are put into a competitive environment they become competitive. This is not a generalization. This is human nature. Facebook indicates success using superficial markers (“likes” and profile complements.) Life becomes making “the best profile.” People stop focusing on genuine representation and begin to focus in on cosmetic details.
We are taught to never judge a book by its cover, how are you supposed to deal with a book of faces? When we are given a space of Internet “covers” we can’t help but to judge for superficial reasons. The act of judging, however, is loaded. You cannot judge other people without using the same marker to judge yourself.
Competition requires a certain mindset. It creates a “me versus them” attitude. When this mentality arises it further invites viewers to rationalize putting people into crude categories. Skimming profiles on Facebook is an outlet to compare your life with the lives of others.
“Facebook binging” is an activity in which one spends massive amounts of time looking at profiles on Facebook. In the end, these sprees are not for fostering interconnectedness, but jealousy and vanity. I have heard statements: “I looked at his profile and was like, wow my life sucks” or “I saw her profile and she’s gotten pretty trashy.” When Facebook is a contest, the playing field becomes real lives and the sacrifice is personal identity.
The Appeal
Teenagers put information about themselves online because it results in reciprocity. Like Wikipedia, the culture surrounding Facebook is based upon a communal consensus. The vast Facebook community maintains a round-the-clock stability. Posting on Facebook is comforting. When someone puts a statement on Facebook the sheer number of people online assures that there will be some form of response.
When Furbies were still a popular toy, many young children expressed that they knew the Furbie was a robot. Regardless of this fact, children would give the same amount of love and compassion to a robot that they would to a living creature. When the children were additional asked if they thought the toy was alive many of the children answered back that the toy was “alive enough.”
The idea of “alive enough” reflects the way in which our generation looks at compassion. The community on Facebook does not care about us, but it “cares enough.” Sometimes knowing that there is a community out there that feel even the smallest amount of empathy is better than being in a situation where no one cares at all.
Losing a Reality Check: A World with no Feedback
In movies, the most common “psychotherapist segment,” is a scene in which someone is lying down on a sofa, looking up at the ceiling and spilling their guts out while a therapist takes notes. The implications of this dynamic are extremely important when understanding the reasoning behind online dialogues.
Just like the patient in the psychotherapist’s office, users’ online get no direct responses for their actions. As a consequence it is easier to say things that will receive harsh judgement. Teenagers get into the habit of composing their texts as they are thinking them. Rather than thinking first, they just express themselves. This way of acting is much easier because you cannot see anyone looking stern or disappointed at you.
Some people will express that bullying has gotten much worse with social media. This is untrue. Bullying has not gotten worse; it has merely changed its format. It is common to say things online that you would never say in person. When this form of thinking and expressing become mainstream, the blunt nature of Internet communication can turn crass.
Facebook Forever: The Archiving of People’s Lives
The mindless free form commentary manufactured by the Internet can turn toxic. Statements only meant for a split section on Facebook can be taken out of context and be misconstrued in a new situation. When kids are applying to college the context of their social lives is often times inappropriate to share in tandem with the college applications they send out. The context in which you share information with your friends is not the same way you want to be acknowledged by an institution.
Teenagers have become over reliant on Facebook. They will do things on Facebook that normally they wouldn’t do. These act of rebelliousness and drama have become a normal part of a teenager life. Unlike in reality, however, the actions you make on Facebook are archived. Conversations, posts and photos can be brought back at any time to reminisce, blackmail or humiliate people. The world on Facebook can be cut and pasted, but it can also be cut edited and disseminated.
The world on Facebook is reshaping the way we look at ourselves. People are expressing themselves on Facebook, but their interactions reflect the person they want to be rather than who they are. It is a new free space, but it is not as forgiving as we would like to think. Trading the negative part of ourselves for the “nuisance” of reality is tempting. We should remember, however, that this world comes with a cost.
Putney Mediates the Media 