Essena O’Neil’s recent actions of confessing to her social media followers in which she testifies the inauthenticity of her social media posts, and discourse of how she is perceived by her followers. O’Neil’s efforts aim at exposing the truth behind her posts, and the unsatisfying, depressing truths in the life she was really living. O’Neil’s initiative is supportive of Jose Van Dijck’s theory of the “neoliberal economic principles”. Analyzing contemporary social media platforms and the ways these networks are used to exercise social status, and power, O'Neil exemplifies all the control and politics that leads to the pressures that motivated the Instagram star to post such appealing pictures. Van Dijck wrote, "connectivity derives from a continuous pressure- both from peers and from technologies - to expand through the competition and gain power through strategic alliances"(21, Van Dijck). O'Neil is 18 years young, and as we know teenagers can be the most influenced and at risk to the power structures that guide social media. When individuals are easily influenced, they're perceptions of themselves and others and deviate quickly. Some of O'Neil's followers may look at her and admire her appearance, her persona, how happy she appears to be beginning to doubt themselves. Social media carries a power where we look through a manipulated lens of others life, and only what they wish to show basing our judgements off of this. O'Neil exemplifies the neoliberal economic principles through her profit of Instagram, and how she could make money based on what she posted because of her large fan base. In the photo above O'neil contests to the reality that she was paid to post this, and urges followers to "realise you only see what they want." Reminding her followers that there was no purpose in this photo, this photo brings no value to her life. Really has you thinking critically about what we post, and do we really like it? Or is it socially anticipated/expected to be perceived a certain way?
I really enjoyed your statement of how social media carries a power where we look through a manipulated lens of others lives, as I think this is such an accurate depiction of social media "celebrities" in addition to what Essena is trying to expose. Teenagers can absolutely be easily influenced to try to fit into a certain trend or ideal of who they are supposed to be or how they are supposed to act; and apparently Essena fell victim to the over obsession of self-image.
ReplyDeleteGood post, I liked your rhetorical questions at the end but I would like to take a shot at expanding on them.
ReplyDeleteTo be honest I think the majority of social media users do like what they post because it will get some type of attention. It is no longer about what we like but what our peers WILL like. It is all about popularity with these apps.
I agree that O'Neill is a perfect example as she is a part of the generation that has become accustomed to the social requirements of being a teenager on social media.
Lastly I do agree that there are instances where people do post what THEY like themselves but most people do take into consideration what would be anticipated or perceived as "cool" or "attractive" to the people on social media.
I believe that O'Neill's primary message was for people to stray away from social media and not to obsess over others lives- to live your own.