Pre-Class Blog 10/12

 “We might almost say that reality is jealous of fiction, that the real is jealous of the image”

This quote really stood out to me in Baudrillard’s writing because I agree with what he argues. I believe he is saying that real life is not the same as the images that try to represent it. To me, this is the exact definition of social media. Social media can often be a gross misrepresentation of people’s lives. In today’s world, it is socially encouraged to highlight or post only about the positives going on in one’s life. I can apply this social standard to myself. My life is definitely not perfect, but my social media posts only show the positive moments in my life.  My instagram represents a person I want to be, not the person I fully am. My instagram does not represent me as a person, but as an image of a life with no problems. Social Media often is not reality. It does not give the whole picture of who someone is or how an event happened. It only shows what the user wants to share, not the whole truth. This is sad because the purpose of social media is to be able to connect with other people to share experiences and ideas and while this does happen, it is less often. People are so concerned about having the perfect social media image when it is not even a true representation of themselves. They just want to feel acceptance and praise from peers. In saying all of this, I wish the standards of social media would change. I am interested in hearing about the good, the bad, the sad, the etc. about a person’s life. I do not want to see some perfect image that I know there is more too. Social Media should have the purpose of sharing the real, not the altered representations of life.