Sonya Bateson: Social media - we can’t live with it; we can’t live without it

One little photo, a short clip, a few words – none of those can possibly show the full extent of someone’s life, writes Sonya Bateson. Photo / Getty Images

OPINION:

I hate social media.

Once upon a time in the not-too-distant past, it was a realm occupied solely by phone-obsessed Millennials like myself. But now social media has permeated every part of society, wriggling its thin, insidious little tendrils into our homes and lives.

Those tendrils now have a firm grip on all walks of society. The very same people who used to sneer at me and my friends (is that phone attached to your hand? Ha ha ha) are now uploading blurry photos of their grandchildren to Facebook and punctuating their comments with emojis, exclamation marks and oddly-placed capital letters.

Most of us Millennials are now well into our 30s and still staring down at our phones, while the next generation in their teens and 20s have never lived in a world without the internet.

The young folk have turned their noses up at the likes of Facebook, as the once-cool digital hangout spot of the 2000s and 2010s morphs into the online equivalent of Friday night at the Razza.

And yet the network still permeates so much of our lives.

I deleted the Facebook app from my phone when my now-toddler was a newborn, right in the midst of the first Covid lockdowns. I found myself in a state of near-constant anger at the utter stupidity being perpetuated online, and feeling literal despair at being able to see, in real-time, people falling into a rabbit hole of conspiracy theories and other nonsense.

The second I tapped the ‘remove’ symbol on my little screen, a weight was lifted from my shoulders. I genuinely felt lighter. No more clenching feeling in my gut whenever I heard the notification sound going off. No more filling my time with mindless scrolling. No more barrage of “Maggie posted a new item for sale in Buy Sell Swap”.

It was… peaceful. I hadn’t realised until that moment just how much those online communities had negatively impacted my moods and mental health.

But, despite getting rid of the app, I couldn’t delete my actual Facebook account. Too much of the modern world is conducted through it.

The teachers who ran my parents’ group used a private Facebook group to communicate with us. Birthdays were all co-ordinated via Facebook event invitations. Family members would send me links of items for sale on Marketplace. Messenger was, and still is, my primary mode of digital communication.

It has become so woven into the fabric of our daily lives that trying to untangle myself completely was just too difficult.

So, I just avoid it wherever I can – and my mental health is all the better for it.

We all know that social media is fake. But I think many of us fail to grasp what that actually means.

Almost everything we see on social media has an agenda behind it. Nothing nefarious, or at least, not usually. I mean, most of us probably don’t put much thought into the cutesy quote we shared or the funny meme we tagged our friend in.

But every time we post something, anything, it is for others to see. It is curated. It is a snapshot. It is, to an extent, fake. One little photo, a short clip, a few words – none of those can possibly show the full extent of someone’s life.

And so, the things we share are the parts of our lives that we want others to see, the parts we’re willing to make public. That’s our agenda.

Most of us do this casually and unthinkingly, but others have made a whole job out of it. A job that can be very well paid indeed.

Instagram, for example, is full of people who get paid to post.

The worst ones, in my opinion, are the self-described “parenting experts”, with their perfectly-curated photos and punchy one-liners that give a sanitised impression of what parenthood is truly like.

They’ve got something to sell. And they do it by carefully staging seemingly candid photographs of themselves snuggling their babies in matching designer clothing upon the backdrop of a beautifully manicured home.

They sell the message that you, too, can be as perfect as me if you wear these brands/follow my exercise routine/subscribe to my YouTube channel/don’t eat anything that casts a shadow. All you need to do is think positive thoughts and smile more (and buy my $300 a month supplements!) and you, too, can have perfectly behaved little ones in matching beige linen.

When you’ve been up since 2am and still can’t figure out why your baby is crying, or when your toddler has suddenly decided that he can’t eat anything red, these picture-perfect social media posts feel like a judgement.

Social media. We can’t live with it; we can’t live without it.

But don’t worry, I know exactly what you need to make you feel better. Just subscribe to my mailing list for the small cost of $4.99 a week and you, too, can learn the secrets to a happy life.

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Sonya Bateson is a writer, reader, and crafter raising her family in Tauranga. She is a Millennial who enjoys eating avocado on toast, drinking lattes and defying stereotypes. As a sceptic, she reserves the right to change her mind when presented with new evidence.