I fuckin love this. I am working on publishing this research in the academic literature and would love to include your words (obviously with no name or anything). Some other bodybuilders suggested building an awareness of how untrue social media images are but as my psychologist colleague said, this is unlikely to make any difference. Just scrapping social media all together is a much better alternative IMHO. But, in this day and age a lot of people would consider it impossible to do this because they would see themselves as severely disadvantaged by not having a social media presence
Yeah, everybody who knows anything knows that it's all a bunch of fake bullshit. Every photo is planned, down to the pose, the lighting, the minor (or major) edits they make in photoshop (or have someone else edit for them!), the clothes they wear. Hell, often times body builders will do a quick pump workout before taking photos so lets say they are posting a chest pic, you better bet they are gonna go pump up their chest quick before the photo.
Awareness of something being fake means nothing. Because our primal mind will still see it and compare ourselves--even if only subconsciously.
Thankfully, both my girlfriend and I have no social media other than facebook accounts we never check and I have a linkedin I never check. Some people think it's weird, but I don't give a shit what they think.
The problem I see is that, as you alluded to, so many people RELY on social media to maintain their career choice. They
need to engage (and regularly) in order to grow their follower base, or even just not be forgotten by their current followers.
For people who choose to engage with social media (or, as I mentioned, are forced due because of their job, which is adds a whole different facet to this issue that I won't get into), carefully curating who THEY follow is critical. I know that at least in facebook if you're friends with someone you can opt to not see their updates on their timeline. Idk if that is possible with instagram or twitter or whatever as I don't have those things at all (and am MUCH happier for it!), but that is something people should look into. Follow them so you can maintain the connection online, but don't see their posts. Maybe set a reminder once per month to navigate to a few specific people's pages and comment on one of their posts or something if that's what it takes, idk. Only follow people who
actually connect with and engage with.
This is all easier said then done. There is also a whole addiction aspect (and it is
very strong!) to social media too that I was a part of for several years. Post a picture, how many likes did it get? Why did this one get less likes than the other one? Was it the time of day? Was it the tags I used? It is such a shitty mental place to be in and causes so much stress.
Y'all know me, I could write way more, but I must be done for the day. I look forward to seeing others responses to my thoughts here. And regardless of my pontifications,
@MairUnderwood(Researcher), wonderful job on your article! I love the work you do and you are also looking fabulous! I look forward to seeing more of your work and appreciate you sharing it on our platform here
I strongly encourage everyone to watch "The Social Dilemma". Some of the dramatization is a little cheesy. But honestly it is an incredibly well done documentary. It goes into all of this in great detail, how the companies make their apps as addictive as possible. The guy that made it used to work at Google as like a technology ethicist or something, and left because of the unethical practices Google was engaging in to get users hooked on their platform (re: addicted). Very, very good. A must see for literally everybody in this era, from children to old people.