I am not a particularly social person. I have people I enjoy spending time with, interacting with. I like being a participant in their lives and giving them a place in mine. Sometimes the contribution of energy to my general existence is what I need to give me a healthy perspective on life. And while laughing alone is fine, there is nothing quite a shared laugh that feeds itself.

That’s what social media tries to be. But the truth of social media is that it knows it can’t duplicate real life so it offers the facade of distorted connections. The truth of social media is that within its frame it is filled with false wishes and empty air. It’s a postcard sent from nowhere. The postcard of gorgeous scenery of where you wish to be only to look on the back side and see a vacant slate of plain paper.

I have been on Facebook, but not anymore. I currently have an IG page with less than 20 followers. I signed up for X when it was Twitter but never posted anything. I am on Threads which is what got me to thinking about how social media has pushed me passed myself.

Threads offers immediate and direct access to controls of the desired interactions. I don’t know if X does. I know in the days of Twitter, controlling what came across your feed was a pipe dream. Trying to sort through the muck wasn’t really worth the time it took to eliminate it. Although there is an attempt at applying safeguards, Threads is still the false front of a backlot from a movie set. A knock on a door goes unanswered because the door is not genuine.

There plenty of real and authentic people accessible in social media. Comfortable in their truth, they still can only share a slice of who they are. Try to do more and they run the risk of being seen as inauthentic because of the complexities and contradictions of the human heart and mind. What may be true and accurate one day in a certain situation may not hold true in another. And trying to explain the nuances of each situation would take more time than there is in a day.

Nothing can take the place of a good conversation. The give and take in the moment. The realness that comes out through spontaneity. Seeing the immediate positive or negative physical reaction to a statement or event. We are who we are most in the moment that something happens. People can tell a lie; they can’t act it. Built into social media is the delay that provides room for the lie, or subterfuge. If not actual disingenuousness, at least time and space to adapt a truth to the moment as opposed to the other way around.

I respond to the thoughts of others more than I create original posts. I have found that my responses are more unstudied as long as I stick to my gut response. I allow myself space to find the right wording, but it has to stay within the framework of truth. My original posts are well within those lines but are measured not in terms of authenticity, but in exposure. Do I want unknown people to know this? Is this something I feel compelled to say, or am I just screaming into the void?

It is in the limited and controlled view of social media that the real me is disguised. A view that changes with the angle of perception. An illusion. It is still me, but is it the real me if you can only see a small part? It’s like only being able to see someone’s hand. It is really their hand, but what does that tell you about the rest of them?

There is space in the world for the reach of social media, but we need to understand its limits so we can use it to its full potential. It is not safe space. We know this because we have to protect our children from the dangers inherent in it. Its advantages are obvious. The harm it does is not so evident. And screaming into the void only creates an echo chamber. And an echo chamber only throws you back at yourself, kind of defeating the greatest advantage to social media.