I’ve touched upon this topic very lightly in the past. There seems to be an obsession, especially with Generation Z (or younger) to be the most popular, most liked. The stereotype has existed for a long time, stretching into times when history wasn’t even recorded. Only now, through the spotlight of social media outlets like Instagram, Snapchat, and even Facebook, is popularity tracked by follower count and likes. So why do humans care about attention so much?
I’m pretty sure almost ninety percent of children with social media have experienced this feeling of wanting followers. You need to have more followers, or more likes, or more comments on posts. Any engagement will put you ahead of everyone else. I surely fell into this trap. When I was young, it was always about having more followers than following, or how many views you got on your Snapchat story.
I’m not a historian, or social behaviorist, or any related professional on the subject. I’m sure there are thousands of academic articles you can find on this topic. This is purely my rambling and thought process behind the subject. Although we didn’t have the luxury of social media to see trends in the past, there was a feeling of superiority in the popular. No matter how far back you travel in time, there was always those who were popular in grade school. That idea of popularity quickly descends into nothingness once you reach the university or professional scope. Popularity no longer becomes the most sought after choice.
There are technically career paths for those who seek attention. Athletes, celebrities, actors and actresses all benefit from the attention from fans and paparazzi. From a figure I found online, from The Atlantic, 0.0086 percent of humans are “famous” (what “famous” stands for in this case, I’m not sure). However, in another survey, polls state that 30% of surveyed desire fame. So what’s the obsession with being famous, under the spotlight, getting all of the attention?
Why do we care?
I can’t state this enough: this is purely opinion. I think it comes from the deep down urge to impress others. Social media, especially on Instagram, shows the best of what we are to others. Instagram doesn’t see how we look when we wake up in the morning, or when we’re drunk out of our minds, passed out in a bush. The people on Instagram might see how we look in full makeup, or us at a sports game, or when we traveled across the world. It doesn’t see us at the worst.
This isn’t to say I haven’t gone down this wormhole of trying to impress. Take one quick look at my profile on Instagram, what do you see. The first five posts, I could give less of a care about because I wasn’t in that mindset of needing to impress people on what I was doing. There’s a picture of my cat and dog cuddling, me holding a jack o’lantern, and some palm trees. The next six posts include: my trip to Ireland, a trip to Toronto, another trip to Ireland, and group photos with friends. One more thing to note: I only posted once a year for maximum engagement, because I saw the more you post the less likes you gain.
I’ve even seen how few likes affects me. I once hit 263 likes on a post in 2022. My most recent post attracted 111 likes, which is down over 150 likes from two years ago. Sometimes I look at my follower count too. One minute I’m at 700, the next I’m at 650, then 600, and now I’m nearing 550. For other social medias, like Snapchat, I’ve deleted the app permanently off my phone because of how I’m perceived.
Why should we stop caring?
Popularity is just that, it’s an imaginary contest on how many people you can please at once. To think of it, it’s impossible to please everybody, so why should we try to please a great number of people. It starts with not jumping behind curtains on random topics that are black or white. I won’t specifically state what things come to mind, but nothing is black and white. There’s always an infinite shades of gray in between those two lines.
I haven’t existed in a realm without social media. Ever since I was born, the internet was already created, iPhones were established a couple of years after, and social media followed. I’m only two years older than Facebook. I’m one year older than MySpace. Just from examining photos and videos without phones in the picture, people seemed happier. That isn’t pure coincidence.
Social media has created a competition of sorts within people my age. This competition never existed before 2000. The rapid development of technology and how we communicate with other individuals is never before seen in any level of evolution. To combat this, I deleted one of the most toxic social media outlets I ever downloaded, Snapchat. I’ve limited my presence on other social medias as well, although I use them more than I’d like to admit.
The goal is to find more inner peace with how you’re perceived online and in person. I still generally care about how I look and how others see me, but not to the point I’m actively trying to please. If I say something not agreed on by the general public, I won’t blink an eye. It’s no longer about caring about attention. Be one with yourself and delete social media, or even see how life still goes on without a cell phone. All of this is to say popularity and attention shouldn’t be as important as it is. Be at peace with yourself.
Go outside and enjoy the nice weather, take a hike, or if you live in the city, walk around the block. Interact with the people around you in reality, not over the phone. Make a friend. Smile. You’re alive, in person, now.
Today’s cover image is a throwback from 2017 atop Mount Sunapee, NH.
I LOVE the perspective of this. I think there has always been at least in my life a sense that I need to impress or be up to code with others. The feeing of being less than or not good enough is something I feel everyone feels at some point. The part that really is telling about yourself is how you deal with the realization that popularity doesn’t really matter and we need to live life to the fullest ever day :).