I know it
has been a while since my last post… I apologize for that. However, as
compensation, this blog post will be something that most of you can relate to.
This
week in class we looked at the virtual world. We discussed Jean Baudrillard
famous work of Simulacra
and Simulations. Baudrillard claims that we live in a simulation, making us
question what is “real”. Today, our virtual world is blurring the line between
what is “real” and what is “virtual”. People are living lives in the “virtual”
world and are essentially giving it power to determine what is “real”.
This
automatically made me think of Facebook. These days Facebook has so much power
that it is sometimes ridiculous how much we rely on it for “information”—I say
that in quotations marks because not everything on Facebook is trustworthy. We
post so much of ourselves on Facebook, socially important information that is,
that it almost seems like a “real” representation. However, we must keep in
mind that this is just a simulation of ourselves and is not as “real” as we
like to believe it is. Today, we say things like “Its not official, until its
Facebook official”. WHEN DID FACEBOOK GAIN THIS POWER TO DETERMINE WHAT IS REAL
AND WHAT IS NOT!? What better example to use then ones relationship status on
Facebook. Some people actually believe that if a relationship is “real” it will
say so on Facebook. Here we see that people are defining themselves through
their second life- in this case Facebook.
Why
do we feel so compelled to share our personal lives on Facebook (FB)? Why do we
want people ONLINE to know who we are dating, where we went on vacation and so
on. The content on FB is being seen as the “real” you more than the actual “real”
you.
Facebook
is an online world - a second life rather. It does not and cannot encompass who
we are truly, because we SELECTIVELY share information about ourselves, and
represent only what we WANT to be shown. That being said, there is serious blur
between our real lives and our FB lives. FB is being held accountable as an
accurate representation of who you are- scary I know. So when there is an
inconsistency between who you are in “real” life and in FB life, people
question you.
When did the
Internet gain all this power to tell us who we are and who we aren’t?
I
would love to hear your feedback on this subject matter.
I think this is a great post and you bring up some interesting questions about how we live our lives today so much through our virtual selves. Since we choose what we put on Facebook and other social media it really gives a distorted view as to our "real" persona and gives off only what we view as the best representation of ourselves. The idea that a relationship isn't official until it's on Facebook is really sad but shows just how invested we've become in our virtual selves. Or maybe our virtual lives are a fantasy that we want to be reality?
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