Over social media en eenzaamheid

Gelukkig zijn is meer dan de afwezigheid van ongeluk. Daar herin­ner ik mezelf regel­matig aan. Social media kun­nen mensen dichter bij elka­ar bren­gen. Maar maakt dat opper­vlakkige con­tact wel echt gelukkig? Enkele jaren gele­den maak­te de VRT nog een reportage over a‑social media. Onder­staande afbeeld­ing sluit daar bij aan.

Van­daag lees ik een artikel van Arthur C. Brooks over Love Peo­ple, Not Plea­sure. Daarin omschri­jft Brooks ditzelfde prob­leem.

Today, each of us can build a per­son­al lit­tle fan base, thanks to Face­book, YouTube, Twit­ter and the like. We can broad­cast the details of our lives to friends and strangers in an aston­ish­ing­ly effi­cient way. That’s good for stay­ing in touch with friends, but it also puts a minor form of fame-seek­ing with­in each person’s reach. And sev­er­al stud­ies show that it can make us unhap­py.

It makes sense. What do you post to Face­book? Pic­tures of your­self yelling at your kids, or hav­ing a hard time at work? No, you post smil­ing pho­tos of a hik­ing trip with friends. You build a fake life — or at least an incom­plete one — and share it. Fur­ther­more, you con­sume almost exclu­sive­ly the fake lives of your social media “friends.” Unless you are extra­or­di­nar­i­ly self-aware, how could it not make you feel worse to spend part of your time pre­tend­ing to be hap­pi­er than you are, and the oth­er part of your time see­ing how much hap­pi­er oth­ers seem to be than you?