Gen Z’s Digital Diary
Image Courtesy: Pinterest
Social media has an artificial reputation. It’s an outlet where people share highly edited versions of their lives, filtering out the messy moments they experience every day. The pressure for everyone to showcase a perfect, polished version of themselves online prevents people from showing their genuine personality. But fortunately, our generation is beginning to change this.
As Gen Z, we are known to post more casually, with “photo dumps” of all the pictures we took throughout the month or “day-in-the-life” videos where we share our morning routine with others. We often post spontaneously, broadcasting photos that do not necessarily match our feeds. Our generation tries not to curate a fake version of ourselves to display to the world. The reason why is simple.
Gen Z is not trying to look perfect. We have grown up with social media, making it evident that overly edited pictures are unnatural and artificial. Instead of trying to fine-tune the imperfections out of our lives, we choose to embrace them. These imperfections are natural, and sharing them helps portray a more authentic version of ourselves. Our Instagram accounts contain collections of seemingly unaesthetic photos: a simple breakfast we made, times when we thought the sky looked pretty, or trinkets we have around our room. Our feeds may seem a bit scattered to others, but to us, they are special. They remind us about the little moments that we often forget. When we look back at pictures of us enjoying a hot cup of tea or cuddling on the couch with our cat, we remember how special these small memories are. It helps us feel grateful for all moments in our lives, not just the ones that are “picture-perfect.”
Image Courtesy: Lithium Magazine
We are beginning to acknowledge the harm of posting only valuing eye-catching images and harnessing the idea that all of our memories have value. We are not trying to impress our followers or brag about something cool we have done. In fact, we aren’t really posting for our followers at all anymore. Gen Z uses social media as more of a scrapbook, assembling little memories into one cohesive place. When we look back on our collection of photos, we aren’t looking at how high quality our picture is but trying to relive how we felt the moment when we took that photo.
Image Courtesy: Pinterest
By using our feeds as more of a diary, we create a new narrative: social media does not have to be used to impress others — it can be for ourselves, too. Sharing odd photos we take throughout the day helps reframe the purpose of social media as a tool for preserving our memories. We want to cherish all moments of our lives and embrace the imperfect moments that make us human. Our generation is slowly dismantling the superficial aspect of social media and focusing on using our platforms to showcase the natural, unfiltered parts of life.
Strike Out,
Writer: Zara Khan
Editor: Grace Groover
Tallahassee