The internet is bizarre.
Yesterday, in particular, was more bizarre than most because I noticed that much of my feed was filled with lies. And no, I’m not talking about fake news.
What I am seeing more of in 2020 is people lying to themselves about who they are comfortable being to others. Those that see the lie then think that if that person can be comfortable with their reality, so too, can they.
The problem lies with the fact that the original poster of the comfort content isn’t actually comfortable at all.
The 3 most prevalent examples I have of such behaviour are:
- Body Image
- Relationships
- Causes
Body Image
There are a few truths in life that are undeniable. One of those truths is the less fat you have on your body, the healthier you are overall. In recent years though, those who carry more weight have taken to the internet to show off their bodies proudly, saying that a person should not be ashamed of being bigger.
The problem with that is it flies in the face of biology and it creates a dangerous idea that being overweight is okay. Meanwhile, most people who are putting out these images are not actually okay with their bodies and are simply using social posts to give them a momentary reprieve from thinking about how they can re-shape their life and live longer.
Let me give you an example backed up by some first-hand research.
I’ve known this one woman on my feed for just under ten years. We dated a few times and ultimately settled on “being friends”. Essentially, it just means that when we see each other, we’re cordial.
When we met she was quite fit and slim; she took a lot of pride in her appearance. In fact, she was the type of woman who would spend 15-minutes getting ready for a trip to 7–11. Her mom stamped an Eastern European ideology on her from a young age; you do not go out in public without looking your best.
Since we stopped dating I’ve seen this friend a handful of times. I saw her at the gym, yoga, jogging at a park, and at a local ice cream shop. Each time I saw her doing something physical we would stop for a few moments to talk about our lives.
During those conversations, she would always state that she just got back on the exercising bandwagon—eight years, five occasions of seeing each other, all five times she was starting to exercise again. To be clear, she has gotten considerably bigger since we dated.
When I saw her at the ice cream shop we talked about our weight. At that point, I had a major injury and I lost a ton of weight. She joked that she should go injure herself too as it seemed like a great diet. We laughed and went about our lives.
Now, I don’t pay much attention to my Facebook feed anymore because there’s so much shit on it. But yesterday, I was looking for something in particular and started scrolling. That’s when I came upon this post from her:
I decided to scroll through her profile and discovered that aside from the occasional news post, her entire feed over the years is largely posts about being comfortable with your body image. She pushes out the message that there is nothing wrong with carrying an excessive amount of body weight and that women should be as proud as she is to show off their curves.
During our last conversation at yoga she had stated, “I want to get back to the girl I was when I met you.” I told her she was beautiful—because she still is—but if she wants to get healthier, great!
I believe that being slim is a health choice, and should have nothing to do with vanity (even though our world is largely built on a vanity rewards system).
For me personally, I’m probably healthier now that I’ve ever been and I feel so much better! For some, eating whatever they want and being bigger makes them feel so much better. If you can find true happiness that way, rock on wit’ your bad self, but I find that most aren’t … and this woman definitely isn’t.
She’s in an internal struggle with her weight that (based on her profile and our conversations) leads to widely disconnected moods and depression.
Quite often, she’ll post pictures of other bigger woman pushing a message of positive body image but never her own. When she does post pictures of herself, the angles are always flattering, she uses FaceTune and you’ll always find her in black on a dark background. These are all indicators of low self-esteem based on the academic articles I’ve read and rational conclusions.
So, she pushes out these messages about being proud while being bigger but she’s not at all proud. She’s masking her struggle and over the years I’ve seen more of it exponentially.
As a cycle, she’s sharing other body positive messages and people are sharing her posts, and what we get left with are a lot of posts by people that aren’t able to find the motivation to get healthier. Worse yet, because of these posts they’re not going to find the required motivation and they will use the cycle to justify getting bigger, which will lead to complications later on in life.
Now, you might be thinking that this is simply anecdotal and so did.
With that in mind, I had 15 uncomfortable conversations with men and women in my life who are overweight. 11 of these people post positive body image messages constantly and 4 don’t. All 15 said in the end that they’re not happy, they hate not being able to do things that others can do like play a full game of soccer, and that they really WISH they could change.
All 15 also said that they see positive body image messages and that helps them get through it because they know others are proud of their body despite being unhealthy.
In the end, we’re left with a lot of people lying to themselves and their friends, with those lies creating a dangerous pattern of complacency to a lack of responsible health—both mental and physical.
Relationships
I am not trying to come off as above it all with this article. When it comes to faking it on the internet, I’ve been guilty once or twice.
I was once in this amazing relationship … if you judged it based on our social posts. The rest of it was a total nightmare.
We were putting out an image to the world that wasn’t real. I’m not even sure why we did it. I guess we were so unhappy at times that we wanted the world to see the good side and perhaps we could trick ourselves into being happy? That’s the best answer I’ve got for you. In reality, I don’t think I really know why we did it and I suspect that most people don’t.
The weird thing is that I don’t really care what people think the rest of the time and I have no interest in trying to make people feel jealous or envious. It was a strange thing for me to do.
The only time I have ever posted anything else from other relationships is when I’m genuinely proud of them, us, or when it’s just the greatest day and I’m riding such a high that I feel compelled to share what’s going on.
I find that my life is on a yo-yo. Some days it’s all good, and others, it’s a complete cluster-fuck. I lack middle ground, which I’m working on. But, through it all I’ve never gotten depressed. I know others that follow my journey who are, and perhaps if they see such happiness in my life they might be encouraged to get out and find some of their own.
I’m not a saint though, by any stretch of the imagination. I do this subconsciously and then go back and realize, “Wow, I’m that guy that posts quotes … weird.” Granted, they are my own personal quotes but still, it’s not a conscious decision.
There are a lot of couples that post nothing but the greatest hits, and then others look at that fairytale and want exactly what they see. Some people still have delusions that there are relationships out in the world that are easy. That’s as dangerous a message as it’s okay to be unhealthy.
Everyone is looking for love, even when they say they aren’t, and we need to be more cognizant of the fact that love is never easy or perfect. To make 2 lives fit together, there will always be a struggle like doing a puzzle. The hope is that through struggle you find someone that you can share your life with.
These posts portraying perfection are not healthy because it’s, once again, a lie told for likes and aww’s that will come back to bite them.
I see comments when people break up all the time, “You guys looked so perfect together.”
Well yeah, it’s all an image and we need to recognize that.
The lie is dangerous as it creates false expectations, kinda like a kid watching porn his whole life and expecting sex to be just like that.
I have a friend who posts how much he loves his wife at least once a week. However, behind the scenes, they’re a mess. Young, impressionable minds might not realize there is a more real side and expect what social media shows them.
And why do we do this? For the likes? No, I believe it is to make ourselves feel better about our situations. I don’t really believe that it works though. Some of the saddest people I know look happy on Instagram.
Causes
The current trendy cause is Black Lives Matter and it is not immune to internet lies. I don’t mean any disrespect by calling BLM, trendy. But that’s what it is.
People everywhere are clamouring to turn their profile pic black and take pictures at rallies with black people they barely know. I haven’t done any of that, but my friends know I do not support racism and have, many times in the past, stood against it.
In fact, I have supported the equality movement my whole life. But, there are those who show up to protests and rallies just so they can hit the Gram and show how woke they are. But just like all social media fakery that leads to unhappiness and discourse, so too does being a fair-weather supporter.
This came a head for me during a BLM protest in my city. The organizers didn’t want white people to post because they didn’t want fake supporters doing it for the likes. On the surface—depending on who you are—this seems like a perfectly reasonable request but it has caused ripple effects.
While they will temper some fake woke individuals from using the cause to get more popularity, they also exclude people like me who legitimately have supported equality for many years.
In this case, being fake causes a loud public reaction, which causes anger amongst allies, which is amplified but peers of the organizers; adopting the policy in their every day lives.
Supporting a cause because it’s the cool thing to do doesn’t help anyone except you! And that’s the crux of this article.
Looking Forward
What you’re left with is the liars of social media causing a reaction to how they act that in turn causes a wider divide. I’m hoping that perhaps one person might read it, see themselves as the problem and fix their ideology.
By trying to gas yourself up and show off, you’re causing a dominos effect. Whether it be a cause, a relationship or body image, faking your way through it isn’t going to help you or anyone else.
I believe this is going to be one of our biggest challenges going forward with social media. Using social to externally put out messages we don’t necessarily believe in that influence others who are in the same boat, who will then use your example to try and build on their happiness can cause real mental trauma.
Why can’t I have what she has?
Why does he have such a great life while I have nothing?
How do they deserve all of that?
The whole cycle of people are then faking it and become exceedingly unhappy.
How is this not something we talk about more? Oh right, we’re too busy talking about shit that doesn’t matter, politicians that don’t even care about us, and world issues that people pretend to care about.
We just need to stop putting on an act, but no social network is designed that way. Billion dollar idea?
