I don’t really know why I started writing this post. It was either my disgust with the juvenile behavior of supposed adults; or it could have been the pent-up nausea caused by excessive regurgitation of the same content everywhere. Either ways, a saturation point had been reached. What tipped the scale was perhaps the discovery of being stalked by my (alleged) friends. I find it awkward that they are silent in posting own content or commenting on mine but will dutifully remember that beer or coffee photo I posted six months ago!
To that end, this post serves a dual purpose. It is intended as a tribute to my social media stalkers (yes, I am aware who you are, and I acknowledge your efforts in keeping a tab on me) and as a venting board for the proliferation of online stupidity. For reader’s ease, I have tried categorizing the SM population by behavioral themes that are most common across popular platforms. This list is dynamic and by no means can ever be exhaustive. Just like smokers, social media addicts are a floating population of headless chickens. A little slice of them falls off from the top of the curve and is quickly replaced by a bigger chunk of dolts at the bottom. Unfortunately, the IQ of the ones on the way out almost always gets matched by the incoming lot – despite the age difference.
The most prominent universal theme I have observed is loneliness. I’ve tried – and may I add, in vain – but haven’t been able to figure out if social media addiction kills solitude or feeds off it. I have personal experiences of both kinds so I’m a bit biased. But from an external viewpoint, I have seen people who are trying to cure depression by browsing social media websites endlessly and those that are getting chronic insomnia by the very same scrolling. The jury is still out to decide what is the cause and who is the effect. To me it sounds like the textbook example of a vicious cycle. My grammar Nazi friends prefer to cite this as an example of a feedback loop. Quiz them further and even they are flummoxed if this is a negative or a positive one!
On Facebook, the most prominent theme is dedicated to a special category of individuals: the habitual check-inners. The trend started with a bang when people tried showing off their presence at a new club/bar/cinema and they quickly realized that tagging a friend will double their coolness quotient. These people were clearly unaware of the stupidity of their naivety.
In the next phase, some high-headed ones tried to distinguish themselves by regularly doing it at airports. The creative ones furthered the trend by checking-in at a business class lounge that they were able to access for free thanks to a credit card (or maybe they were just hanging outside for the tagging?). This breed of people used to be a rage till a decade ago but have lost their sheen since free cards became commonplace. Thankfully, this species has gone into hibernation since the last five years. I believe that’s because they have officially entered mid-life crisis and gotten busy with raising mini dolts like themselves.
Twitter is the online equivalent of corner cafes where intellectuals used to gather in olden days and argue endlessly on existential matters. Only that in today’s times the intellectuals have been replaced by armchair activists who feel it’s their birth right to have an opinion on everything under the sun. Oh, and also, most of the matters they discuss are hardly relevant to their existence. For the lesser inclined, Twitter is a platform for consumer complaints and brand bashing. It does have a feel good “please notice me” factor when used that way.
On Instagram, my biggest pain point is with people who blindly emulate ‘trends’ (I prefer to call them fads) without understanding them or if these even suit them. These are the unsung heroes who make the annual lists every December for trends that will be forgotten as soon as the hangover of January 1st wears off. Some noticeable fads in recent history were the Ice Bucket Challenge, the Kiki Challenge and the Dalgona Coffee. In all cases, the fad is initiated as a sponsored post by a celebrity, followed by several wannabe starlets and then the influencers pick up the pace. Before you know it, it’s all over the place.
Unfortunately, there are some longer lasting mega-trends that will take time to wean off. Examples includes body positivity (which is in reality a politically correct term for obesity) and gender positivity a.k.a the alphabet soup called LGBTQAPCNB+. I don’t know what this means, and why they are not mutually exclusive. I stopped keeping track of letters after T. But if you are inclined, CNN has a quick read here. Body positivity gives a chance to women of all shapes and sizes to post obnoxious photos of themselves which shouldn’t have been clicked in the first place.
Instagram is also the place where you find the largest online collection of self-professed travel bloggers and fashionistas. Most of them are living off credit cards or freebies thrown by brands in return for cheap publicity (aka semi-naked photos). 99% of the (heavily photoshopped and filtered) pictures they post feature them (in awkward poses, may I add) rather than the country they visited. The ‘beauty bloggers’ on the other hand divide their 24-hours equally into putting on make-up, clicking selfies, posting and heavily hash-tagging the editing photo, and then removing the ghastly face paint. It’s the best example of ‘rinse and repeat’ lifestyle.
If you notice closely there is one unique pattern that emerges across the years, platforms and themes. Psychologists call this the herd mentality. Elite white-collar workers refer to it as rat race. The laymen, for want of a better word, just call them millennials. Wikipedia might classify them as Generation Y, but the real parameter is their mental age. Irrespective of the birth year, their online activity makes me wonder if their brains have ever grown beyond pre-adolescence age!