The Dark Depths of the Internet *TRIGGER WARNING
*TRIGGER WARNING - this post talks about depression and eating disorders as portrayed by social media.
You know when something pretty significant happens in your life but for some reason your mind represses it and you completely forget until one day something triggers that old thought randomly and you're reminded of this one event or time? I've only had this experience a few times before, but the other day, it happened again. This time, a segment of my past was uncovered from the dark depths of my mind, but I was surprised that I pushed this period of my life out of my heads for so many years because it has nothing to do with a traumatic experience like we often see in the psychological realm with repression.
When I was 14 years old and the popular social media app, Instagram, was just rising to fame, I was all over it. I posted every single second of my life on social media because I truly thought that people cared (news flash: no one did). I don't regret any of this because I have a lot of memories to look back on. I'm often asked why I keep all 1,544 posts up on my Instagram, because it is more of a "norm" to only have a smaller number, like 200-300 posts. I don't really have an answer besides I don't care to go back and remove pictures because that would be like removing a portion of my life that really meant a lot to me and shaped me as a person. I don't care if people click on my page and see this astonishing number, automatically judging me. This number doesn't define who I am...but anyways. Let's not get lost in a "social media doesn't define me" rant.
The main point is -- I loved Instagram. It was new, it was cool, it was trendy. This app happened to become popular at the exact time that I had moved to Vermont and was in a very lonely state of mind, so I would spend hours couped up in my room scrolling endlessly. This is also when I started to discover my passion for fitness, as I joined my local gym and began my new journey a happier, healthier life since in reality, what else did I have to do besides go to school (where I had no friends because I was the "new girl" and was too shy to talk to people) and sit in my room?
Through hashtags like #fitspo (fitness inspiration) and #healthylife, I discovered an entire online community of people who all had the same goals in the fitness realm. I was so motivated to go out and try all these new exercises I was seeing in videos and pictures of these super fit and toned girls who I aspired to be.
But then, one day I saw a comment on a "foodie" instagram page of a vlogger whom I had followed for years. The comment said something along the lines of "go starve yourself and then maybe you'll be skinny." I distinctly remember seeing this and wondering how someone could be so mean, so I clicked on the user's page. What I saw were images that will be forever engrained in my mind.
Pictures of girls wearing little to nothing, their bones and ribs clearly visible. Pictures of slit wrists. Pictures of girls chained to walls, clearly deprived of food and nutrition. In horror and shock, I didn't want to see anymore, but I just needed to see a caption to try to wrap my mind around this concept.
"This is what you could look like if you'd stop being a fat a** wh*** and shoving food down your throat."
"Fat pigs don't deserve food. Tie 'em up."
"You should be anorexic. It's the only way you'll ever be pretty."
Each photo would have tagged accounts of girls, especially young teenagers, since the person who ran this account clearly wanted to target this age group. There would be the same hashtags of #fitspo and #healthylife so that they would come up on the hashtag pages with the rest of the fitness community.
I was appalled, disturbed, and deeply saddened to see this. I discovered that this terrifying page was only one of thousands out there that promoted eating disorders as a way of becoming this "ideal look" of skinny" as the users would spread hate comments all over fitness gurus' pages as well as just pages of average girls, like myself.
That is when I decided that I wanted to be part of the group fighting against these social media bullies (to use a nicer term...), so I decided to create my blog, "Happy Healthy Holistic") to combat this and stand up for these girls who were being targeted. Although I was only 14/15, I knew that if I could inspire just one girl, that my time was worth it.
I still do not understand why I repressed this memory in the back of my mind, because like I said, I was not a direct victim of these internet trolls; I was just a witness. When reading a chapter from Martha Nussbaum about objectification and internet misogyny for my class, it all came back to me. I was reminded of what I had seen plastered across Instagram pages and the hateful, shaming comments that tore girls down for absolutely no reason.
It's not that I ever necessarily "stopped" combatting this online targeting and exploitation, but I think I tried to step away from this fitness realm when I realized how much it brought me down to see the comments. Although these comments weren't on my own account, I still felt like I could relate to these online victims. I still continued on with my blog, but as I became more busy with life in general, I started to stray.
Just because I stopped looking at these comments doesn't mean they don't exist anymore. Internet objectification and misogyny still floods many platforms, especially social media (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc). How do we fight this?
I plan to explore this more going forward as I begin my #PressforProgress project for class. Stay tuned.
You know when something pretty significant happens in your life but for some reason your mind represses it and you completely forget until one day something triggers that old thought randomly and you're reminded of this one event or time? I've only had this experience a few times before, but the other day, it happened again. This time, a segment of my past was uncovered from the dark depths of my mind, but I was surprised that I pushed this period of my life out of my heads for so many years because it has nothing to do with a traumatic experience like we often see in the psychological realm with repression.
When I was 14 years old and the popular social media app, Instagram, was just rising to fame, I was all over it. I posted every single second of my life on social media because I truly thought that people cared (news flash: no one did). I don't regret any of this because I have a lot of memories to look back on. I'm often asked why I keep all 1,544 posts up on my Instagram, because it is more of a "norm" to only have a smaller number, like 200-300 posts. I don't really have an answer besides I don't care to go back and remove pictures because that would be like removing a portion of my life that really meant a lot to me and shaped me as a person. I don't care if people click on my page and see this astonishing number, automatically judging me. This number doesn't define who I am...but anyways. Let's not get lost in a "social media doesn't define me" rant.
The main point is -- I loved Instagram. It was new, it was cool, it was trendy. This app happened to become popular at the exact time that I had moved to Vermont and was in a very lonely state of mind, so I would spend hours couped up in my room scrolling endlessly. This is also when I started to discover my passion for fitness, as I joined my local gym and began my new journey a happier, healthier life since in reality, what else did I have to do besides go to school (where I had no friends because I was the "new girl" and was too shy to talk to people) and sit in my room?
Through hashtags like #fitspo (fitness inspiration) and #healthylife, I discovered an entire online community of people who all had the same goals in the fitness realm. I was so motivated to go out and try all these new exercises I was seeing in videos and pictures of these super fit and toned girls who I aspired to be.
But then, one day I saw a comment on a "foodie" instagram page of a vlogger whom I had followed for years. The comment said something along the lines of "go starve yourself and then maybe you'll be skinny." I distinctly remember seeing this and wondering how someone could be so mean, so I clicked on the user's page. What I saw were images that will be forever engrained in my mind.
Pictures of girls wearing little to nothing, their bones and ribs clearly visible. Pictures of slit wrists. Pictures of girls chained to walls, clearly deprived of food and nutrition. In horror and shock, I didn't want to see anymore, but I just needed to see a caption to try to wrap my mind around this concept.
"This is what you could look like if you'd stop being a fat a** wh*** and shoving food down your throat."
"Fat pigs don't deserve food. Tie 'em up."
"You should be anorexic. It's the only way you'll ever be pretty."
Each photo would have tagged accounts of girls, especially young teenagers, since the person who ran this account clearly wanted to target this age group. There would be the same hashtags of #fitspo and #healthylife so that they would come up on the hashtag pages with the rest of the fitness community.
I was appalled, disturbed, and deeply saddened to see this. I discovered that this terrifying page was only one of thousands out there that promoted eating disorders as a way of becoming this "ideal look" of skinny" as the users would spread hate comments all over fitness gurus' pages as well as just pages of average girls, like myself.
That is when I decided that I wanted to be part of the group fighting against these social media bullies (to use a nicer term...), so I decided to create my blog, "Happy Healthy Holistic") to combat this and stand up for these girls who were being targeted. Although I was only 14/15, I knew that if I could inspire just one girl, that my time was worth it.
I still do not understand why I repressed this memory in the back of my mind, because like I said, I was not a direct victim of these internet trolls; I was just a witness. When reading a chapter from Martha Nussbaum about objectification and internet misogyny for my class, it all came back to me. I was reminded of what I had seen plastered across Instagram pages and the hateful, shaming comments that tore girls down for absolutely no reason.
It's not that I ever necessarily "stopped" combatting this online targeting and exploitation, but I think I tried to step away from this fitness realm when I realized how much it brought me down to see the comments. Although these comments weren't on my own account, I still felt like I could relate to these online victims. I still continued on with my blog, but as I became more busy with life in general, I started to stray.
Just because I stopped looking at these comments doesn't mean they don't exist anymore. Internet objectification and misogyny still floods many platforms, especially social media (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc). How do we fight this?
I plan to explore this more going forward as I begin my #PressforProgress project for class. Stay tuned.
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