By Maire Rowland
One night in a bar in Blloku I watched as a group of well-dressed twenty-somethings gathered together at a reserved table to celebrate a birthday. Their table was garnished with a collection of elaborate and inviting cocktails, strings of helium-filled balloons were floating above their heads. At a glance, this get-together seemed fun, a perfectly nice way to celebrate another year in the world, but as I continued to observe I began to notice that this was far from festive. For at least fifteen minutes there was no human-to-human interaction between the group. Every single “partier” was scrolling through their smartphone.
Then the cake came and all of sudden their behaviour changed dramatically. For the duration of “Happy Birthday” while the birthday girl blew out her candles there were hugs, smiles, cheers, and kisses all meticulously documented by flashing cameras and numerous selfies. Then, once the lighting and angles were deemed satisfactory and the snapping stopped, this cheerful group of young people went back to their smartphones. I assume, to pick, edit and filter the photographs that would best portray how much fun they were having to their virtual “friends” . The birthday girl included. It seemed like the purpose of the party was fulfilled, time to get back to not talking.
Observing this social interaction (or anti-social interaction) did not make me feel happy or envious in any way. In fact, it made me feel embarrassed and uncomfortable. I started to wonder if I had ever acted like that when attending a friend’s party, had I been so absorbed in my virtual life that I had neglected talking and interacting with my friends in real life? Has our obsession with taking selfies and documenting every single moment with a picture resulted in us missing out on important real life moments?
Some argue that the ability to create and share our own image to the world has made us more empowered. We have the possibility to construct and control our own identities; our image is portrayed the way that we want it to be portrayed. Access to smartphones means that we can all be connected all of the time. Cameras on every phone mean we can snap constantly and then share, share, share. But are we really controlling our own image? Or are we just copying the ways that others present themselves, mimicking what they do online so that we are praised and feel accepted? Are we doing this to show our confidence or are we seeking validation by counting the number of likes that our shared pictures receive?
When does this empowering ability to present ourselves as we see fit become unnerving and even unhealthy? To me this happens when we begin investing more in our virtual life than our actual life. When we start to miss beauty and stop observing because we are too busy photographing or recording. When we start to ignore harsh realities by investing our time into our lives on social networks instead of facing problems. When we are spending too long thinking of witty one-liners or inspirational quote to accompany our beach selfie rather than laughing, talking and, heaven forbid, listening to those in our company.
Is the world becoming more obsessed or even delusional? When we constantly pretend we are having a great time do we actually start to have a great time? The sorry sight of the birthday party group in a bar in Blloku makes me conclude that the pretence does not become reality. Personally I’d choose a pictureless picnic with friends filled with laughter, affection and conversation over a stylish posed selfie on Facebook with fancy cocktails and a hundred “likes” any day.
