Social Networking YOUR IDENTITY CRISIS
Are we really a society that is so fixated on youth and the body perfect, that we have to lie to the outside world about what we truly look like in order to fit it?There is a growing phenomena occurring on myspace and facebook, to name but a few which has me laughing on the one hand but deep down Im quite sad that so many people seem to think that age and looks have a big part to play in just fitting in to this online space. I suppose the people that have a public identity crisis feel secure in the knowledge that the chances of ever meeting even a fraction of the people that these people network with, are so remote. So why do they do it?“I am so popular” The media has defined that age and beauty will make you popular, you will be successful, society will readily accept you. Faces of “hot” young things, male and female stare out of the glossy’s and dictate perfection, the flawless skin, definitions of “good looking” the perfect body shape. Advertisements every where telling society that if you don’t look a certain way or your over thirty, forget it, your shit and worthless.
The irony is that at least 85% of the globe (if not more) don’t fit the media stereotype.
Its one thing having the media push this kind of misleading image of how people should look, so how pathetic is it that this has now filtered down into the online space of simple social networking. Again the media hype says that social networking has a cut off age limit of 25, that web 2.0 (bollocks) is only for the young and was invented quite recently. Can I point out that social networking has been around since the days of CompuServe and possibly (most likely) even before that. Its an outright lie that social networking is a new concept and I for one will not be conned by it or mislead or be influenced to the point where by I have to upload an picture of myself at the age of twenty-something or in some cases worse.
For those who think you have to change from reality to fantasy, stop and think about this.
There are some people who actually like you as you are now, we like you just for being you (is that not a line from Bridget Jones? sos I digress). Be confident and self assured in your self, don’t buy into all this media hype because…
a) If you do bump into some one that you have been networking with, they will get a bit of a shock
b) If you are lying about how you look and your age then what else are you lying about?
c) Displays all your insecurities to the people who thought they knew you.Message lets keep it real;0)
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Comments
U read my mind… doing an article on how much information can be seen in your profile if you dont hit that little button.
This article was very very topical and a discussed at the summit :0)
These social networking sites seem to lend them selves to a whole lot of fantasy, I find it quite sad really as did so many others at the summit.
thanks…for this, its not just facebook.com, myspace and bebo… I guess facebook is very topical at the moment, looks set to out run myspace.
Js 
When I first saw your post title, I thought it was going to be on the growing concern of Identity theft and the use of Social Networking sites by people who use them to glean information about their subjects. May be you could post about that next time