This blog post was requested by my sister, who noticed that I’m… fairly active on multiple social media platforms and asked what I use each one for and, to use her phrase, how I “cultivate a different persona” on each platform. So I thought I’d explain how I use each social media platform and what I see as the purpose of each, which informs the “persona” I present on each one. First I want to say that we all know that social media is just a slice of our lives, not the whole picture, and that it can be specifically cultivated to leave things in or out. Now I don’t lie on my social media, but I’m also not sharing every single one of my days–partially because I’m just not that much of a sharer and partially because my life is just not that interesting, I’m job hunting most of the time. Without further ado, the different platforms I use regularly and a little bit about them.
Starting with Facebook because I think it’s has the simplest explanation for me. I use Facebook to share major life updates and some political things (mostly reminders to register to vote and to vote) with my extended family and larger network of friends. I don’t regularly post on Facebook because I don’t find it to be an interesting or friendly platform and I think it does a terrible job at monitoring and regulating the spread of disinformation. Basically, if I want every single person in my extended network to know something, this is where it’ll be posted, which is why I save the posts for larger updates.
Instagram is obviously a photo-sharing platform so it’s easiest to fake a picture perfect life here. Obviously, I share photos that I like on my Instagram but the feature that I use the most is Instagram Stories. I use Stories to share the things that sparked me to start this blog–what I’m reading, cooking, my skin care routine, and little things during the day that make me smile or that I want to share. Because I use Instagram more on a day-to-day basis, it’s a larger window into my life. If I had the organization and commitment, my page would be color themed like @Akilahh‘s, but (lucky for all of you who follow me) I am not that committed so y’all get a more realistic view into my life. My page is pictures that I like and make me smile (and, yes, that I think other people will like to see), which means that I don’t usually post pictures about work to keep things separated.
My favorite part of this platform is that it feels easier to cultivate who you follow because there’s slightly less pressure to follow someone on Instagram than there is to friend someone on Facebook (or, more accurately, it’s less taboo to unfollow someone on Instagram than it is to unfriend them). In addition to following my friends (and their pets, definitely their pets), I follow a few bloggers, some wedding brands and accounts (I’ll unfollow these after I eventually plan my wedding), and cooking accounts. I’ve tried to keep it so that everything that appears on my Instagram feed is something that makes me smile, because I want it to be a happy space for me and not a space that creates anxiety.
Full disclosure: this is the messy one. I very much have a love-hate relationship with this platform.
The good: I’ve met some pretty excellent people on Twitter and made friends with them. It’s an excellent place to get breaking news and to learn from experts (as long as you double-check to make sure the sources and information are accurate). If you work in politics or digital it’s an excellent place to make connections and find job leads. Being on Twitter has taught me so much about basically anything I can think of. It’s also the perfect place to share random thoughts and jokes and even stupid observations–usually without (too much) judgment.
The bad: Harassment. A lot of it. Trolls. Also there’s the whole Russia-Donald Trump-Twitter situation. Twitter has a lot of the same issues with spreading disinformation as Facebook does, but I find it’s easier for me to avoid on Twitter since I can control (to an extent) what I see on my Twitter feed.
I use Twitter to share my random thoughts, to engage in political conversations, to make connections and friends, to get news, and to keep myself accountable with my workouts. I’m pretty honest and open on my Twitter, probably because I’ve cultivated a type of community among the people who I follow and who follow me back that feels safe, even with all of the potential for harassment on the platform. I’d say I share more of my political beliefs on Twitter as well as personal updates and thoughts, so maybe it’s the most complete picture of me on any social media platform, but it doesn’t feel that way due to the way Twitter is structured because you can’t look at every tweet I’ve posted at once. Twitter can be a bit stressful on big news days (which seem to happen more and more often lately) but I’m trying to be better at walking away during things like that.
That’s a quick rundown on how I’ve been using these different platforms. Let me know if there’s anything else you’d like to know in the comments!
Leave a Reply