Essena Quits Social Media

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Essena O'Neil shocked her followers when she decided to quit social media. She's made a living for some odd years off of Instagram, blogging, Tumblr, and Youtube videos. She says she became to what others thought of her and valued her self worth in the number of likes she got online. I've mildly followed Essena on Youtube for a little bit in the summer. I remember finding myself insanely jealous of her life. She's beautiful, has a great body, is a model, she was able to quit university just to focus on her social media job, she was living what I,and many others thought was the dream life. I remember scoffing at videos she'd post where she said she needed to get her body in better shape. She already had a flat stomach that I would have killed to have. She'd say she feel alone,and I'd think nobody that stunning could ever actually feel alone. When I found out she quit social media I rolled my eyes thinking it was just a publicity stunt, or a way to make her seem more 'edgy' or something like that. I made myself read the article and my hatred for her that was really only derived from pure jealousy seemed to dissipate.She said she quit social media so people wouldn't compare their selves to her,   so she wouldn't be living in a constant 'does everyone like me' state, and she put captions on her instagram photos describing how fake and staged they were. The unattainable image this girl painted for herself seemed to wash away. You always see models in magazines or on TV and think how great and beautiful they are. Perfect hair, perfect skin, flat stomach, nice legs, and you just get defeated because 'I'll never look like that', but the girls don't even look like that. Professional hair and makeup can do a lot. Not eating before a photo shoot will make any stomach look flat. She really did show from her actions that what you see online isn't always true, it all depends on how the person makes them self look.

Catfish Reflection

In regards to my argument paper about why people catfish,it is slowly but surely coming along. I found a pretty reputable source giving reasons why catfishing occurs, and another describing the definition, usage, and origin of the term catfish. These will be great sources for my paper seeing as they are content rich. I still need to do some more research but I like taking things one article at a time.

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I plan to begin 'drafting' or making an outline of what should go in my paper later on today. It's kind of hard to do this paper, because it's breaking the traditional mold of 'write about one side, write about the other side, pick your opinion' paper that's been drilled into my brain since probably elementary school. With my argument, it's describing that it's a complex and complicated reason why people chose to cover their identity online. None of my other school teachers would have ever gone for that approach. I think it's going to be difficult to write this paper, but a good experience to learn as in real life, everything doesn't always fit into the cookie cutter mold that we've been taught. I just have to think it through, find the sources, and believe in myself!