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EDIT SHARE WITHOUT A CARE
From
‘state of mind’ to ‘status of relationship’, everything is worth a post on
social media platforms. But are we all equipped to deal with being judged,
as much as we smile at the ‘likes’
What’s on your mind?” As Facebook started asking
this question a while ago, timelines flooded with updates from users. From
amusing ones (That hot dude from last night’s party) to mildly-annoyed
voices (Why does FB want to know what’s on my mind?) to infuriating ones
(I’m incensed, happy now?), the social media platform was flooded with
remarks displaying the varying moods of its users. What possibly escaped
our attention is that with its cleverly-put question, this online sharing
network managed to get the exact answers it was looking for. Whether angry,
irritated or happy, most of us did share what was on our minds. That’s the
canny power of social media. It isn’t easy to escape, whatever our feelings
are about it.
Actress and author Suchitra Krishnamoorthi, who’s
quite active on social networking sites, says why she loves sharing, “Our
lives are so busy, we hardly meet people we can have a heart-to-heart with
on a daily basis. I think all of us have thoughts that are sometimes about
to detonate in our minds. And it feels good to share them. You feel
lighter.”
Conventional wisdom too tells us that sharing only
unburdens us and lessens our pain. However 21st century virtual space
‘sharing’ has a whole new meaning. From what we had for breakfast, to who
we’ve just broken up with, to the colour of our lingerie, everything is
worth a ‘share’. Music director Gaurav Dagaonkar says, “Making
relationships public is fine but there has to be a limit. I have come
across many intimate pictures of friends online, in the bedroom or pictures
of their honeymoon. It’s like allowing someone to enter your bedroom.”
Amplified emotions
Why is distinguishing what’s private and what’s public becoming so
difficult for us? Social commentator and adman Santosh Desai says, “What we
earlier used to mutter to ourselves, is what we put out in the online space
for everyone to see these days. Our thoughts are getting cramped in 140
characters (like on Twitter) yet our emotions are amplified,
over-calculated and stored forever.”
It’s like this... what you thought at one point of
time, possibly when you weren’t being yourself, is being stored forever.
The person reading that post even
a year later, judges you on the basis of that comment. You can push a
thought out of your mind, but nothing is deleted from the virtual space
forever. Are we all equipped to deal with being judged or made fun of on an
open platform, just as much as we like to be appreciated? Says behavioural
expert, Pria Warrick, “No. In fact, senselessly uploading every emotion
that goes through your mind (I’m sad, I’m excited or I had a break-up),
will make you feel worse. It’s like talking to everyone apart from the one
person you need to talk to. If you’ve fought with your boyfriend, why
should Twitter need to know? The people you are reaching out to will start
making stories in their head about you, and the person you are trying to
make feel bad, won’t actually feel bad. It will make matters worse.”
Relationship expert Dr Nisha Khanna says, “Most relationship updates on
social media show individuals are unable to control their feelings. They
are looking for an outlet to vent. But the social media is not the place to
do it. It won’t make you feel good. Sometimes, it’s also a cry for help or
support; at others, it’s pure vitriol out of feelings like anger, betrayal,
pain. That’s mainly done to show the partner and make him or her feel
guilty so that he repents. What people don’t understand is that in that
process, they are making themselves very vulnerable.”
Look-at-me syndrome
Model and actor Flora Saini tells us what she would share on a social
networking platform and what she wouldn’t. “Engagements and weddings can be
public because you would want to announce them to the world. Also, a lot of
people can be a part of your happiness. I think PDA is fine too but when
relationships hit a rough spot, the real trouble begins. Break-ups should
be handled with more care and respect for the special moments you once
shared.”
We are an attentionseeking species. Our
achievements and happiness would mean very little unless we’ve seen them
reflected in other people’s eyes. Hence the culture of sharing has grown
from strength to strength.
Internet activist Eli Pariser believes that people
are losing their real selves to the internet profiles they have created.
“The internet allows us to create a persona of ourselves in which we can
interact with one another without actually having to interact.” So we are
free to interact, yet abuse, which you probably won’t do in real life, at
least on a daily basis. We’re also being able to edit and retouch ourselves
to appear just right, rather than who we really are.” However, as much as
we can control our profile, we cannot dictate or edit what others say or
feel about us, our posts or comments. You may block strangers, but what
happens when s o m e o n e within your friend circle posts a caustic
remark? Says actor Arif Zakaria about the culture of indiscriminate
over-sharing, “As we now live in an age of utmost transparency and probity,
social media platforms have become the new gods of worship and are our
conscience. If you live by it, you will die by it. Personally, I derive
sadistic pleasure when people reveal everything on social media.”
Time for inbuilt censors?
We all do it, don’t we? Didn’t we crack jokes, tweet, retweet amusing
comments the day the Sunanda Pushkar-Shashi Tharoor-Mehr Tarar scandal
broke? Till we are the ones dealing with the nastiness, the seamless flow
of entertainment through other’s lives, seems like the perfect panacea for
boredom and monotony. The schadenfreude derived out of the lives of others
is just too hard to pass.
Says Zakaria, “There is no limit to selfexpression
these days. Hence our censors too need to be inbuilt.”
Easily said. Can be easily done too. Question is,
do we want to?
A FEW CELEBS WHO QUIT DUE TO NEGATIVITY Superstar Shah Rukh Khan
quit Twitter last January after a controversy broke over an article written
by him in a prominent magazine about ‘Being a Khan’, though he has rejoined
the micro-blogging site; director Anurag Kashyap quit the platform after
drawing heavy criticism over his wholehearted support for The Lunchbox, as
a better Oscar contender than the Gujarati film The Good Road; actress
Megan Fox left the micro-blogging site just a week after joining, when she
became the victim of an online death hoax; even the most Twitter-savvy of
all, Ashton Kutcher (with a whopping 8 million-plus followers!) decided to
wash his hands off personal tweets and left his account to be managed by
his PR firm, after a controversial tweet of him, defending an ousted
college football coach, drew negative comments.
WHAT SHOULDN’T BE SHARED ONLINE
Future plans. If they don’t work out to be exactly as you wished, it
leads to stress.
Nothing related to personal and private moments – especially sad ones –
like a break-up. Such issues are best shared with people who are close to
you, people who meet face-to-face.
No private or intimate pictures. There are all kinds of people out there.
Online accounts can be hacked into. By sharing something personal with too
many people, you are making your private life open to be interpreted by
others.
No emotional content after a fight or argument with your partner. What
comes to your mind in a fit of anger may not be the thought that stays with
you tomorrow. Also, washing your dirty linen in public adds entertainment
to others’ lives and makes you feel more miserable, because you can’t take
back those words.
No comments about how your partner is in bed. People won’t laugh at your
partner. They will laugh at your utter lack of respect for privacy.
— Dr Kamal Khurana, relationship expert
COOL FB STATS
Five new profiles are created every second
• There are 83 million fake profiles
• Photo uploads total 300 million per day
• Every 60 seconds, 510 comments are posted, 293,000 statuses updated,
136,000 photos uploaded
ALL ABOUT LOVE
LOVE is the most-used word in a Twitter bio, followed by LIFE, MUSIC, LIKE
and YOU. Family is the most-discussed topic by women; men discuss
technology the most
Haimanti Mukherjee Inputs by Nona Walia, Purvaja Sawant & Shikha Shah
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