The Deceit — Self-Presentation

“Screens, like screen memories, are avoidant; they turn away from the painful.” (Renner, 2021)

Social Media has the tendency to mainly portray the positive moments of one’s life, their achievements, their triumphs. Most individuals do not think to place their painful moments onto social media.

This same concept proves that social media is mainly a presentation of our best lives, of the experiences that should be celebrated. That, in turn, is why social media generally lacks honesty, it lacks sincerity, and it has the capability to create unnecessary standards and expectations from life. It has the capability to make one compare their self and their lives with others because of the content that they see on social media.

This goes the same for influencers, who rarely ever show the truth and the actuality behind their lives, but rather present a highly idealised image of everything. For example, the way that influencers present the image that they eat out every single day at all of these restaurants with mountains of cheesy and fatty food, but the actual reality behind that is of simply going there to take photos of the food and post on instagram as if they are eating it. This further confirms the avoidant element behind social media, as first mentioned in the beginning of this blog post.

The painful is avoided, and instead perfection is often presented. Why do humans crave perfection? We are all well aware that perfection is never attainable, and it is not even viewed in a universal way. I’m quite sure that every single individual has their own idea of what is considered to be perfect. Social media is interfering with that, it is pushing an ideal of beauty and perfection, and causing immense stress and pressure especially on members of younger generations.

It is causing self presentation to intensify. Self-presentation, “refers to how people attempt to present themselves to control or shape how others (called the audience) view them. It involves expressing oneself and behaving in ways that create a desired impression. Self-presentation is part of a broader set of behaviours called impression management.” (“SAGE Reference — Encyclopedia of Social Psychology”, 2021) In this case, the audience is our social media following, and we often tend to present our ideal self rather than our true self.

Impression management, “is a conscious or subconscious process in which people attempt to influence the perceptions of other people about a person, object or event by regulating and controlling information in social interaction.” (“Impression management — Wikipedia”, 2021) This concept can be commonly found in higher levels of society where a certain reputation has to be kept up, whether it is for a company, a political party or a celebrity.

Social media is allowing a greater level of control over our social image. But unfortunately this has its own consequences, and it is possible that “striving to impress others through social networks can lead to an increased concern with others’ perceptions and possibly an increased value placed on validation from others.” (French, 2021)

Going back to the quote at the beginning of this blog post, “a screen memory is a distorted memory, generally of a visual rather than verbal nature, deriving from childhood. The term was coined by Sigmund Freud, and the concept was the subject of his 1899 paper ‘Screen Memories’.” There is a certain level of denial when it comes to screen memories, almost as if our own memories are trying to change the narrative.

“The construction of the screen memory turns on the balance between memory and denial. The blocking of an unpleasant event, thought or perception is facilitated if some harmless, but associated object can be substituted for the unpleasantness itself. The ego searches for memories that can serve as “screens” for the unpleasantness behind, which is thereby removed from consciousness.” (“Screen memory — Wikipedia”, 2021)

Most painful or difficult memories are in fact not even captured by a photo or video, and only exist in our memory, or essentially what is left of it.

Renner, N. (2021). How Social Media Shapes Our Identity. Retrieved 5 June 2021, from https://www.newyorker.com/books/under-review/how-social-media-shapes-our-identity

SAGE Reference — Encyclopedia of Social Psychology. (2021). Retrieved 5 June 2021, from https://sk.sagepub.com/reference/socialpsychology/n494.xml#:~:text=Self%2Dpresentation%20refers%20to%20how,of%20behaviors%20called%20impression%20management.

Screen memory — Wikipedia. (2021). Retrieved 5 June 2021, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screen_memory#:~:text=A%20screen%20memory%20is%20a,1899%20paper%20%22Screen%20Memories%22.

Impression management — Wikipedia. (2021). Retrieved 5 June 2021, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impression_management