Vanity Slave – The Selfie generation

Slavery is dated way back in the sixteenth century when none of us (the current generation) had seen light of day in this beautiful life that we lead. Over the years we have seen tremendous changes in social realm with factors such as technology advancement playing the major role in the way views are expressed. We have become the selfie generation, a fascinating new survey of slavery and the effects have taken root in various aspects of lives from the young and the old; millennials have not been left out in this sensation.

The modern era effect of the “cool kids” has rubbed off not only to the older generation but also on business enterprises which seek to remain relevant and appeal the younger market trends. I mean who would ever have thought that one would make millions from selling “selfie-sticks”….It is evident that the immediate predecessor generations are set to become digital natives, a generation for which social media, mobile technology and internet are not close to anything that they’ll have to adopt to.

I think there has to be a balance, the obsession with how you look, doing anything and everything to look “good” as well as getting things by any means just to satisfy the number of “likes” and approval in the social aspects of our lives is not what we should live for. Self-esteem and worth have been crushed on social media, where one thinks less of themselves in regard to the number of approval given by actual strangers! The bitter sweet truth is however that no one can make you feel inferior or unworthy without your consent. The intention of having a global village was to aid communication however we have started to compare our lives to others on various social media platforms, therefore become vanity slaves, I scroll on my timeline and come across to Pinterest quotes like   “May your life someday be as awesome as you pretend it is on Facebook” This is a form of slavery that makes us to present a false image of how “awesome” our lives are.

It is however human instinct to judge our progress or success we have achieved in life. When no one sees it, we try to match up and boast through various “posts” to measure it against others. We forget that technologies will always change and mediate our behavior, we have lost the psychological principles of life through factors that are best played using digital devices.  We have thousands of friends on social media but very few in real lives. We spend hours looking down at the smart phones and missing out on the moments that this life has to offer.

We cannot auto correct this digital insanity, but it would be nice if we had a balance from becoming vanity slaves. 

*Takes selfie while sipping evening coffee*