Social Media: Interactions, Consumption And Production

Without a doubt, nearly everyone uses social media. About 60% of the planet is on it. The evolution of technology and the invention of the internet made the globalisation of social networks possible.

Social media is a double-edged sword through the help of human nature and tech. The algorithms and coders can be scapegoated for the negative impacts but acknowledge the flaws of the human psyche before drawing conclusions.

I am acutely aware of how I and others use social media. This will be a detailed look into its aspects of it.

Interacting With Others

Having social interactions in person is far more complex than texting and commenting. Communication between two humans has a myriad of factors that determine its outcome. Being raised by our parents, we copy the skill of human interaction by replicating it in our own experience. Some have 'social anxiety' because they do not have enough reference experience to conduct socialising. Jordan B Peterson argues that the true purpose of the education system is to teach children how to interact with others correctly. So when they leave, they are not socially outcasted for their inability to hold a normal conversation and be socially acceptable.

An observation I and others have made is each cohort of grade 7s is becoming worse and worse. We've concluded this is due to the introduction of phones at such a young age in primary school. I, and many others, had only received my first phone years after the start of high school. Having phones given to children sooner than later conditions them in two ways: shorter attention spans and stunts socialisation.

Could this explain why they are random and a nuisance when talking with them?
Their inability to stay present in a conversation without the need to check their phones or jump from topic to topic repulses us? Can you blame them? We do not hold children accountable because they have no self-awareness or deep moral comprehension of their actions. For some reason, we like to do what is easy and familiar. If they grew up with texting and social media: they likely do not have the maturity to have meaningful social interaction.

Why is it a problem if the future's moving away from in-person interactions? You do not want your children to be socially outcasted for their insufficient social skills. Two people of differing ideas can socialise harmoniously by knowing how to interact with one another. But, with a socially incompetent person, people they interact with will attempt to move away from them as they genuinely don't enjoy interacting with them. It either feels too forced, awkward, inauthentic, or boring.
Another aspect of being socially competent is appearance. Some aspect of social media is very much about showing and sharing your image. Competence comes from excelling at being aware of others and your own perception of yourself. We want to interact with people who can take care of themselves. Dressing nicely, taking care of your looks, and body language all show you are aware of how people perceive you and how you present yourself in the best light. This is not a bad character trait to have. It means you care about the other person and are not selfish. Again, you can lean too far about caring about how people see you. Operate under others' perception of you, and you start living in their reality rather than your own. Perhaps this aspect is what social media amplifies.

Validation is what drives social media. It was a sound survival strategy to be liked by every member of the tribe; the tribe now happens to be the rest of the world. Validation is a metric if something is socially acceptable. With the slow collapse of Western society's norms and expectations, degeneracy is slowly becoming 'socially acceptable'. This plays into the idea of mob mentality. When it starts to become dangerous is when you value your self-worth on the validation of others. You surrender your control; not a great move. You become a people pleaser. We don't like them because they have an ulterior motive. The disharmony of actions and words does not align, and we stay wary of them.

A piece of advice when interacting with people is to care less about yourself and more about the other person. Everything is about you when you're on social media. How many likes, comments, and followers do you get. Then, what about those with a sizable following having likes and comments the average user dreams about? You get to see more of them than you did going about your everyday life. How often would you see a beautiful Instagram model walk down the street? Our feeds are full of them!

Then we start comparing ourselves to them. Perhaps not on a conscious level, but on a subconscious level where we assign our position in the social dominance hierarchy. Animals at the top of these social structures are more confident in their posture and actions. Majority of the resources funnel towards them due to the high demand for maintaining their position. What social media has done is globalised the dominance hierarchy. Before, we may have only compared and assigned ourselves within a small tribe or town. Now, you have the rest of the world to compete with. And, with some theories about the brain developing to process the complex nature of social interactions, you are feeding your brain a conveyer belt of stimuli to compare yourself to.

Most of these stimuli lead to the question: is it fake if you only show the highlights of your life? Everyone does not need to see or know every aspect of their life. We understand everyday life can be somewhat mundane and boring. Yet, we see people travelling the world, luxury cars,  partying and comparing that lifestyle to our own. The trap is believing people's highlights are the usual and comparing the highlights to your own everyday life: the grass is always greener. A feedback loop of comparison sends you into an unconscious spiral of negativity due to jealousy. They have something I don't. You either keep scrolling away or do something about it.

Consuming

Partly, why it's easier to consume than produce is people's inability to provide value. In saying that, with our beauty culture, a person's attractiveness is a value that can be put on the marketplace; it's a mixture of factors: genetics, health and lifestyle, makeup, lighting, physique, and photoshop.

What about the value that requires work? Being interesting demands work. Being able to articulate ideas into existence requires thinking and practice. The way to become interesting is you do intriguing things. People who are passionate about a topic or show clear interest and dedication to a hobby then have something to talk about. Being well-read affords you the luxury of knowledge and multiple perspectives to become interesting.

You sleep; watch Netflix; go to work; eat junk food; drink alcohol; scroll on social media. You are just like everyone else. You provide no value, so you are forced to take it.

Do you see why consuming is so much easier?

Producing

If you want to produce more, a word of advice, as Gary V would say:

"Document, don't create."

Documenting alleviates the pressure of creating something original or creative. Think of an animal documentary. On the most basic level, there are videographers capturing videos of animals doing random stuff. The value comes from documenting the animals as their unscripted selves to the camera. People appreciate other people being authentic and unapologetic about themselves. It creates respect, as it takes a lot of vulnerability to unapologetically present yourself to the world. (That isn't to say it shouldn't be your best version.) Vulnerability is the aspect that you are comfortable with who you are showing it to others.

Content creation is about connecting to the audience with some message you have. Any message people can relate to. Your likability to an audience is in relation to how relatable and genuine you are. Later down the track, when you have a massive following, to be strongly liked, you must be strongly disliked. Some will not empathise or relate to your story or journey. They have lived a life that does not allow them to be interested in yours. At the end of the day, you want an audience who are your fans and not just your viewers.

The position you can put yourself in for your audience is: you are one step ahead of them. That alleviates the pressure you have to be an all-knowing expert to your audience. You could be documenting your experience in a particular skill as others watch and take their pick of lessons you have learnt. The value you provide is helping others who are steps behind from where you are in your journey. It alleviates the burden of being the giver of advice.

Use The Tool Correctly

Consume or produce; those are your two options. Choosing one over the other will propel you to success. The vast majority choose consuming content than creating their own. Sure, they might post a picture here or there, but the ratio of created content to consumed content is 1:500.

You will receive more value from providing it than consuming it.

Sharpen your social skills; do not let social media bastardise it.