Social media and why we're all full of shit

Social Media and Why We're All Full of Shit

Figure 1. American Vandal season 2 villain Grayson Wentz

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 “You’re all full of shit” Grayson Wentz (18) declared in an eerie self-taped recording in his dimly lit bedroom. He is, an expelled student of St.Bernedine Catholic High school, aired out his frustrations of a generation that he perceives are socially inept. A generation that prides itself on illusions and fakery, a generation blinded by the game of social media. His generation. However, these videos are prior to him seeking and exacting his vengeance on multiple classmates and members of staff at his high school. Wentz is a product of toxic techno-cultures that exist primarily on reddit and 4chan, these communities languish in environments with minimal to no accountability as well as places that can afford them anonymity. (Massanari, 2015) This troubled teen knew how to inflict damage in a digitized and interconnected cyberworld, his methods includinged cyberbullying, identity theft, catfishing, blackmailing and finally revenge porn.

Grayson is a villain but like many great villains in cinema, he is believable and his initial grudge against his 'brainwashed' classmates makes sense. He is frustrated by the  doctrines that his classmates follow, these doctrines dictate that  likes and views equate popularity and popularity in turn equates a higher social standing. He despises their eagerness to become slaves to this 'popularity principle'. (van Dijck, 2013) He operates through Instagram in particular, and wants to expose them for who they really are; class mates that are 'full of shit'. When glancing at the shocking acts that Grayson Wentz orchestrated, it seems vital to ponder why we, as consumers of social media feel urged to live almost second lives online, and what the consequences are.

This paper seeks to explore Instagram culture and how it shapes young minds. The inspiration for this paper comes from the second season of the Emmy nominated mockumentary American Vandal. This mockumentary has been touted as the first TV show to fully understand how young people use social media (Vice, 2019)

How Did We Get Here?

It is important to paint the full image as to how we got here. A little history lesson is key to explaining the phenomenon we nowadays know as social media.

During the inception of the worldwide web in 1991, the internet began setting trends and reshaping our culture and how we interact with one other. At this point the internet would be a place of one-way communication, meaning blogs or news sources communicated to users by simply uploading their data with no visitor generated content in response, such as comments.

As necessity would have it, platforms emerged to facilitate the needs of users. T''his new era of visitor generated content was coined 'Web 2.0', it gave way for the social media platforms we know today to take ground. Social media allowed for users to communicate back to the platform while allowing communication between other users, in what is known as two-way communication. (van Dijck, 2013)

With social media platforms like Facebook taking root, the methods in which people socialized online, shifted from the instant messaging software like MSN to browser-based communication through Facebook Messenger. Entire internet subcultures took root on sites like reddit and 4chan. The youth began to express themselves with new mediums such as memes, vines and wacky YouTube videos. In essence, Facebook and its kind became mediators, helping us shape the performance of social acts rather than only facilitating them. (van Dijck, 2013)

Dduring its prime-time Facebook, like many others, made connectivity quantifiable. You could see how connected someone was with their number of friends, or followers. This introduced the popularity principle, where your numbers define your sociability and status. (van Dijck, 2013)

Facebook came out as the dominant platform in the 2000s, as it cannibalized other similiar competitors, like Bebo, Hi5, and Myspace. A new member entered the fray, one with a different model than Facebook. Something innovative and unique, Instagram.

Dawn of Instagram

Instagram launched in October 2010, andthe app was simply for users to upload photos and videos. It had the added functionality of adding hashtags, applying filters to pictures, and liking posts. It's charm is in the posts. It gives off a vibe of always being on the go and inviting friends and strangers to see a snippet of ones everyday life. It’s such a unique idea that Facebook purchases itfor 1 billion just two years later. (Marwick, 2015)

Instagram gives its users the feeling that they are on a first name basis with celebrities. It allows for famous people to provide snapshots of their lives and a sense of easy access to their fans. In a parasocial relationship, fans respond to media figures as if they were personal acquaintances. (Giles, 2002)

Instagram propelled and still propels the popularity principle, to the point where followers can be bought online (Baggs, 2019).One can argue that the monetization of the principle leads to this outcome. However this comes as no surprise as with many other monetized social media platforms this a prevelent trend. (Masek-Kelly, 2019)

The worrying issue however, isn’t so much of Instagram’s monetization of popularity or buying follower bots. It’s to do with how we use it, why we use it, and how it (as a mediator) shapes us in the offline world.

The British Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH) and the Young Health Movement (YHM) published a report, "Instagram ranked worst for young people’s mental health" (2019), examining the positive and negative effects of social media on young people’s health. Instagram came out on the bottom, being the most detrimental to the mental health of teenagers and young adults.

The findings of the report, make it clear that there is a distinctive increase in mental health issues in the age group that consumes social media the most; the 16-25 age group. The paper reported a 70% increase in anxiety over the past 25 years. It is one of the three prevailing negative side effects social media has on teenagers, two other major issues are cyberbullying and FoMO or Fear of Missing Out.

The American Vandal and Teen Instagram Use

Figure 2. @theturdburglar's Instagram account Netflix

The  is about two journalists, investigating a villain that has been terrorizing the St Bernadine Catholic High school for weeks. Through 8 episodes of extensive investigating, a student named Grayson Wentz is revealed to be the primary culprit.

Grayson was expelled for using school computers to insult fellow students online, doing so with their own accounts if they had failed to log off.   He sees the expulsion as unfair and creates the online persona ‘the Turdburglar on Instagram. The crimes he is accused of are the following;

The first incident occurs in the school cafeteria where students that have drank the lemonade begin to uncontrollably defecate. It is revealed that someone put a laxative called maltitol into the lemonade container. The container is left with a @theturdburlgar business card. The culprit wants to be noticed. This incident is named ‘The Brownout’

WARNING: THE IMAGES IN THIS VIDEO MAY BE DISTRESSING TO SOME

,A piñata is struck by a student during a school event, at the second strike the piñata erupts into a torrent of feces. That day a picture of the piñata is uploaded to the Turdburglar Instagram account, once again with his business card.

Also,t a pep rally a t-shirt cannon is used, andas they are fired so does a cloud of dried feces in a powdered form. Once again a picture is posted online of the cannon and the calling card of the turd burglar.

The high school janitor (‘Hot Janitor’) alerts the investigators of a fourth fecal crime involving chocolate covered cat feces in an advent calendar, an advent calendar that was present on the Turdburglar's Instagram account.

The final crime was less of a fecal crime but more a data dump, likening to that of the fappening. A link containing a vast amount of sensitive data is made available to all students and faculty on the Turdburglar’s Instagram bio. This compromising data includes leaked nudes of students, and a member of the staff, as well as a student performing a sex act. Students view this sensitive data without much regard for the ethical aspects, similar to how Massanari (2015) describes the images in the fappening and how they were disseminated by reddit users with glee. It is revealed Grayson catfished classmates to reveal sensitive data on them. The data is used to blackmail students to commit his fecal crimes. 

Figure 3. Blackmail victims and their crimes Netflix

Social Media's Negative Factors In Relation to the students

7 in 10 young people (ages 16-25) have experienced cyberbullying in the UK, recent statistics show that that young people are more likely to be bullied on Facebook than on any other form of social media. This statistic comes to life in American Vandal especially with the student who sees himself as a social pariah, Kevin McClain. (RSPH, 2017) The three main detrimental factors that affect teens on social media are anxiety, cyberbullying and FoMO. So do these negative trends playout in St Bernadine as well? This following section analyzes students Kevin McClain and Jenna Hawthorn.

Kevin McClain

Netflix

Kevin McClain is the initial suspect for the ‘brownout’. This stems from his history of being on the recieving end of cyberbullying from a young age. In the sixth grade he once had a bathroom accident during gym class which sadly earned him the title of ‘shit stain McClain’. A picture emerged of this accident and was posted on facebook. It was shared amongst classmates to Kevin's displeasure. Upon being approached by a suspiciously friendly girl on Instagram (Grayson catfishing him) Kevin is convinced to carry out the ‘brownout’ crime so he can watch his classmates go through the same shame he suffered.

Figure 5. The 'Shit Stain McClain' post used to cyberbully Kevin

Jenna Hawthorne

Figure 6. Jenna Hawthorne's image pinned as a suspect's Netflix

Jenna Hawthorne is the perfect example of the tactics that young people undertake to appear more ‘polished’ on social media. Jenna’s Instagram page is highly pruned and staged. With each post aiming to make viewers envious of her lifestyle. This is done to sell the idea to her peers that she is living a fun, lavish and spontaneous life.

Jenna partakes in parasocial activity as Jenna insinuates her close relationship with supermodel Kendall Jenner through an Instagram post. (Marwick, 2015) Her classmates later reveal that her picture with Kendall was from a public photo op that Jenna had waited in line for hours to attend. The crime here being that the photo she had uploaded was cropped to appear as if they maintained a personal friendship with Kendal Jenner. This sort of behavior amongst young people is driven by a fear that they are not enough and have to appear as someone bigger or better on social media. (RSPH, 2017) Jenna's posts feed into the idea that authenticity doesn't coincide with the doctrine of the popularity principle. Her post is knowingly manufactured to sell an idea of exclusivity with a superstar in exchange for an increase in possible likes and shares of her Instagram page. In essence, a post with a superstar is top dollar in the attention economy. 

Figure 7. Jenna's infamous Kendall Jenna Instagram post versus the reality Netflix

Jenna is contacted by a fake Instagram account named Brookwheeler99 who is actually Grayson Wentz catfishing her. He takes advantage of her anxiety from having to keep up hever evolving appearances on Instagram. They form a bond stemmed from Jenna's need for a confidant and share sexually charged photos with one another. Grayson takes the opportunity to use the photos as leverage and force Jenna to partake in one of his fecal crimes. On the day of The Dump her naked images are part of the files that is sent to all the entirety of the school.

Figure 8. Grayson Wentz's video manifesto posted to 4Chan Netflix

Grayson Wentz carried out these ‘poop crimes ‘to send a message. to literally expose people for the fact that they wore masks online and presented themselves not as they truly were on Instagram. He labelled them as ‘full of shit’ which in itself is an exaggeration to drive his sick crusade for vengeance. However there is truth in Grayson’s gripe with his classmates. We do present different versions of ourselves online, but are we all full of shit?

Millennials and Gen Z individuals have been the beta testers for social media, the lab rats if you will. We’re only beginning to research the long term effects of constant exposure online and the pressure of the need to displaya specific lifestyle on social media. We don’t fully know the repercussions of this lifestyle but we do know is that it puts an increasing amount of stress and pressure on young individuals to place unrealistic standards on themselves and others.

You see, what Grayson failed to notice is that the masks that we and his classmates wear, are actually a single piece of a full set of armor. The internet can be a hostile and unforgiving environment. This armor helps us build self-assurance. It allows us to explore who we really want to be and in-turn, teaches us to be comfortable with who we are. This shield is imperative, especially in a time where a constant barrage of marketing is forced on teens, scaring them to comply to a social norm or risk being labeled as a pariah or outsider. This offers young people protection, and allows them to shed it upon discovering their true selves. It is an ever increasingly daunting task in an never ending sea of constant curation from all facets of social life. As the final sequence of the show so rightly states, we’re witnessing a generation that has to live twice. So no, we're not full of shit, we're just playing the game that is social media.

References

'American Vandal' Is the Only Show That Knows How Teens Use Social Media. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qvabjb/american-vandal-is-the-only-s…

Baggs, M. (2019). Why fake followers are bad news for real fans. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-48952123

Dijck, J. (2013). The culture of connectivity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

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How Facebook Beat MySpace. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamhartung/2011/01/14/why-facebook-beat-m…

Instagram ranked worst for young people’s mental health. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.rsph.org.uk/about-us/news/instagram-ranked-worst-for-young-…

Marwick, A. (2015). Instafame: Luxury Selfies in the Attention Economy. Public Culture, 27(1 75), 137-160. doi: 10.1215/08992363-2798379

Masek-Kelly, E. (2019). 3 Ways To Monetize Social Media That Actually Work. Retrieved from https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/3-ways-to-monetize-social-media-t…

RSPH (2019). Instagram ranked worst for young people’s mental health. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.rsph.org.uk/about-us/news/instagram-ranked-worst-for-young-…

Teens, Social Media & Technology 2018. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.pewinternet.org/2018/05/31/teens-social-media-technology-20…

Massanari, A. (2017). #Gamergate and The Fappening: How Reddit’s algorithm, governance, and culture support toxic technocultures. New Media & Society, 19(3), 329–346. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444815608807