Social Media and Self-Esteem

Before I begin, I want to thank my new followers: Healthy Body Support, Freshstart PCOS and beauty135598637. Erwin for their comment on ‘fat’ and Journey Through The Storm and Cristian Mihai for liking my first post. Lets keep ’em coming!

So, as you can tell by the title, today’s topic is comparison, social media, self-esteem, cropping and selfies. Self-esteem has been around as long as humans. But for those of you who are in their mid-thirties and over, a ‘selfie’ was a yearbook picture, taken with a Polaroid or regular camera. Comparison came from magazines and newspapers. To those of you in the 40+ age range; as teens, how many of you looked at the cover of Vogue, Cosmopolitan or some other fashion mag and seen the ‘perfect’ features of Cindy Crawford, Christy Brinkley, Tyra Banks or Madonna? You may not have cared. You may have cared a LOT. It may have made you so depressed you grabbed something unhealthy to eat, or you were so empowered that you decided to join a gym. There is no right or wrong answer. Your response was often based on self-esteem and comparison. If you felt bad about yourself, you did one of two things; became more depressed or took advantage of the situation and made yourself better. Even if you felt like you were on cloud nine, you may have felt a sting of inadequacy. ‘They look perfect. Why don’t I?’ Simple. They Aren’t perfect. It’s cropping and airbrushing. How many of you have seen a picture of a model or celebrity in airbrushed vs normal? Victoria’s Secret model Miranda Kerr is a good example. In unfiltered pics, she has a freckle or mole on her stomach close to her bellybutton. In photo shoots, it’s gone. I don’t ever remember seeing a face-up of Cindy Crawford and her mole being brushed out. She spoke to NPR about it and said it made her self-conscious. But Vogue didn’t airbrush it out. Needless to say, you can always tell airbrushed from untouched when moles, freckles and other ‘unsightly’ marks are there.

With the advent of social media and our access to the same types of airbrushing and other filters; self-esteem is dropping, depression is rising and young women are getting plastic surgery to match their selfies. I wish this was a joke. The desire to be ‘perfect’ has hit new lows and has no signs of stopping. So, lets begin with social media.

Unless you’ve been under a rock since the early 2000’s, social media is EVERYWHERE. Whether or not you decide to partake is your choice, but I’m betting you all have at LEAST a Facebook account.

social mediaEven though everyone has at least HEARD of social media and maybe have an account or two, I’m gonna run down the list(note that most of them are online with apps, aside from Snapchat):

Facebook- Founded in 2004. An online and app platform designed to allow users to post pictures, video and status updates to followers. Anyone can join and anyone can follow, as long as the recipient has an account and you’re accepted into their group.


Tumblr-Founded in 2007. Users can share photos and hashtags.


Pinterest- Founded in 2009. Users can create multiple boards, pin pictures to said boards and follow others with similar interests.


Twitter- Founded in 2006. Users can share photos, updates and video with followers. The updates are called ‘tweets.’


LinkedIn-Founded in 2002. Company and employee-relations. Users can search ideal jobs with specific interests, connect with people in or related to those positions and post photos of their craft.


Instagram- Founded in 2010. It’s pretty much like Facebook, only more photo and video-oriented.


YouTube-Founded in 2005. More or less ‘personalized TV.’ Users can create their own channels for their own creations and follow others.


Snapchat- Founded 2011. This one’s a little more tricky. It’s via phone and you can add people only if they have it and accept you. Videos and chats last about five seconds.


What does all this have to do with self-esteem? Remember the magazines? Well, it’s diverged into mobile media. Now that we have the same filters(for the most part)as the pros do, we are able to erase, enhance, crop and filter the hell out of anything we deem ‘unsightly’. Which, I’m sorry to say, is a lot. I do not use filters when I take photos. Mainly because I rarely take ‘selfies'(I absolutely LOATHE that word. It insinuates narcissism.) If you ever hear a robotic voice on YouTube say ‘selfie’ it sounds like ‘self-ize. Pretty hilarious. Some people are born naturally attractive, while others aren’t. But you also have to remember that ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’. When it comes down to it, beauty is relevant. It has no meaning except to the person who perceives. Much like time. It was invented, yet the inventors are a slave to it. Beauty is a perceived idea, yet the creators are slave to it. Take Marilyn Monroe. She was hot stuff back in the day. She wore a size 12. She was not stick-thin. She’s a classic movie star whose life was cut short.

Now, older generations see her as a classic beauty while modern society sees her as ‘not perfect’ because she wasn’t stick-thin. Somewhere between the 30s to 2018, something changed. I think it had something to do with the change in cinema. Does Valentino ring a bell? Apparently his voice was so bad that he was out of work once ‘talkies’ came around. I think it was Joan Crawford who said she’d never make movies again once colorized film came around. I guess she didn’t look too good in color. A LOT of movie moguls lost their appeal once media upgraded. Now that TV is becoming high-definition and Blu-Ray has all but replaced DVDs, the once ‘perfect’ faces are showing signs of ‘imperfection’. I remember seeing Smallville on high-def for the first time and wondered why everyone was sweating. It was just the reflection of the lights. Then I watch stuff from pre-high def and see it’s kind if hazy, like cheesecloth. Things you don’t see at the time, but see upon comparison. Does anyone remember the TIME magazine cover with Tina Fey? I think it was TIME. She has a visible scar on her cheek that TIME airbrushed. She wasn’t too happy about that. Scars are not flaws. To me, they’re a sign you’ve lived your life. Even being in a crash is living your life. Living it isn’t always pretty. And not even the elite are immune.

So with the cropping, airbrushing and the like, what you get is a perfect sense of fake. For example. You see a picture of a fancy meal with silver, wineglasses and a lacy table cloth. Your automatic assumption is a hoity-toity restaurant. What you DON’T see? The dirty surroundings. What you DON’T see is what the brain assumes. You ASSUME it’s a fancy restaurant. You ASSUME there’s a waiter holding a bucket of chilled wine. But in reality, most likely it’s your average joe trying to look cool. Filters to capture EVERYTHING at it’s absolute BEST. And there’s nothing wrong with trying to look better or cooler. Until it begins an obsession or depression. Which is what is beginning to happen. And what’s being done to stop it? More filters.

So what’s the best way to combat? Limiting time is a start. If you want to join the game, ALWAYS be aware that IN YOUR MIND, SOMEONE will be BETTER. Nobody is telling you this, except for your own brain. The photo isn’t telling you this. Neither is the poster. As stated before, it’s ALL assumption. Just remember that there are magazines out there DEDICATED to showing the population how BAD celebrities look without makeup. They don’t look bad. They look HUMAN. With some of them, plastic surgery and too much sun has DEFINATELY taken its toll. But when you’re used to seeing beautiful people constantly dressed to the nines due to paparazzi stalking them, you’re GOING to think they look strange when, in fact, they look NORMAL. Selena Gomez was recently hounded for her weight and her scar. It was a kidney transplant scar. It’s almost as if the magazines are trying to show us that celebrities look like us without their makeup, and at the same time belittling for every little flaw.

My response is this: take a long look at your behavior when you look at this stuff. Do you feel sad? Angry? Depressed? Again, there’s no right or wrong answer. Nobody can tell you how you should feel when you look at something. If you answered ‘yes’ to any of these, ask yourself ‘why?’ Take a look at the picture. If it’s an athlete, model, celebrity, ask yourself why you’re looking at it. Are you jealous? A little envy can be a good thing  because it often makes us motivated to fix the issue. But when envy becomes destructive and affects your behavior, then it’s time to close the app. Are you jealous because you think they look better than you? Do you ever think WHY they look that way? It’s their career. They’re sponsored. They put in HOURS of hard work and dedication. However, NOBODY is telling you that YOU cannot follow that lifestyle. All you have to do is make time for it. Remember though, that no matter how hard you work, you’ll never really attain THAT specific body because your genes are different. If you ever look at fitness, NPC and IFBB models; the only thing they have in common are muscle and toned physiques. Some have bigger butts. Some have larger breasts. So don’t let social media bring you down, as it can always bring you up, no matter WHAT the content.

So here we come to a close. I hope you all enjoyed the content and I’m getting better at not jumping around and going in a flow. But that’s just how my brain works. You can follow me on any social media and I hope to see you next weekend!

-Love, Ellie