What’s More Important; Reputation or Truth?

This stems from my last post. Usually my pet peeve posts are supposed to be a bit of a laugh, but last week’s marinated and gave me more material. This whole social media thing is starting to get to me. We’ve all read it before, about how ‘fake’ people are and how they don’t portray their ‘real’ lives through social media, but I might have a slightly different, less aggressive angle.

                So yes, I do have social media accounts. I use them to share what I think are interesting videos or articles, post pictures about what is going on in my life, get my blog out there, tweet funny-ish things that I think about or that happen to me. Now that sounds like a lot, but All of that might take up 30 minutes and that will be one week of usage for me. The problem is the long stretches people log in for, at inopportune moments, not only for them, but for who they are around. And why do they have such a compulsion?

                The importance of self-marketing through social media is quite frankly, a fallacy. This belief that we need people to think we are living this grand lifestyle is erroneous. The countless check-ins, the constant updates, the picture perfect materialism, the elitist eating habits. Why? For followers and likes? Is that how you measure your self-worth?

                The title of this post is What’s More Important; Reputation or Truth? How do you define your self-worth? Self-worth has nothing to do with the perception of others. It has everything to do with how you view yourself and what you are content with being. So what is more important? Reputation? How others view your life from the outside, judging only by what’s on the surface. Or truth? Who you really are, what you really do, how you reason, how you feel. Sadly, as I sit back and observe, I see reputation and truth blurring. People aren’t even aware that what they post isn’t even for them, it’s for whoever sees, to judge, to accept, to condemn. Do YOU, don’t do THEM.

                What’s More Important; Reputation or Truth?

Pet Peeve #37 – Cell Phone Etiquette

What is the etiquette with mobile phones these days? Is there any? Or is it just “do whatever you want whenever you want wherever you want”?

                I don’t understand why you would invite me anywhere; for a drink, coffee, meal, Netflix and chill, or a walk, just to be on your phone for the majority of this rendezvous. I remember when Nokia was monopolizing the cell phone industry, it was a fun and exciting time for everyone involved, but people knew it was just plain rude to answer the phone at the table. No one would dare play Snake over a coffee. But now the game has changed. We can do everything on our phones, from social media to transferring funds. The freedom to be able to do almost anything on our phones has confused us all, especially my generation. Now that it is so easy to access everything no matter where we are, we do, though it is not a necessity. Facebook borders on what should be one of the most unimportant things in anyone’s life. But so many people have this compulsion to check it constantly, almost as if to say to whoever they are with, “My online social network is more important than my real life social network, i.e. you.”

                People my age and up were probably the last to make it through high school before phones got too smart for our own good. We used to talk to each other at lunch without taking a picture of it, and make friends with people we had actually met, and make phone calls outside of social settings. Now people will, without hesitation, in company, make and take phone calls (quick or long), send and receive multiple texts (talking more to the people they are texting than to you), read articles, watch videos, check social media, read and write emails, shop online, check sport scores, you name it. I could stay at home by myself and have a better experience over coffee.