I think most people use other people as a kind of mirror, to try to see who they are and how they fit. (Autists may do it less than others, or even none at all.)
If everybody thinks well of me, then I should probably think well of myself. If everyone thinks badly of me, then I'm probably not worth very much. So goes the logic.
So social media is tearing up peoples' self image, not just because of put-downs and deliberate trolling, but mostly because everyone is putting forward the best version of themself that they can, and we compare that, not to the version of ourselves that we put forward, but to the reality of ourselves, and we lose in comparison.
And that's the problem with self-worth-by-comparison. There's always someone against whom you lose, in some aspects. Richest man in the world? Yeah, but that other guy has a bigger yacht, and we use yachts as measuring sticks.
That's true of all of life, but social media amplifies it. We can see more people faster to compare ourselves to, and they can present a fake image more convincingly.
And marketers play on this status anxiety. Just look at pretty much any car ad. The best way to innoculate yourself against this (to an extent anyway) is to learn a bit about marketing and do some marketing. Once you have seen how the sausage is made, it has less power.
I think social media broke my partner’s self-worth. I’m not on social media beyond HN and found no way to communicate with someone so engaged in remote relationships.
If everybody thinks well of me, then I should probably think well of myself. If everyone thinks badly of me, then I'm probably not worth very much. So goes the logic.
So social media is tearing up peoples' self image, not just because of put-downs and deliberate trolling, but mostly because everyone is putting forward the best version of themself that they can, and we compare that, not to the version of ourselves that we put forward, but to the reality of ourselves, and we lose in comparison.
And that's the problem with self-worth-by-comparison. There's always someone against whom you lose, in some aspects. Richest man in the world? Yeah, but that other guy has a bigger yacht, and we use yachts as measuring sticks.
That's true of all of life, but social media amplifies it. We can see more people faster to compare ourselves to, and they can present a fake image more convincingly.