Social Media & the role it plays in Self Identity:

Social media can play an important role in self-identity as it enables primarily teenagers to interact and explore with new and rather exotic ideas at first which allow them to alter and express their true selves especially at times when they may begin to go through changes which they have no control off. However, the consequences of this means they will come across toxic areas of social media that glorify body image and the idea of 'perfect bodies' despite coming from social media influencers who photoshop their bodies to gain more likes and followers. As well as this, there are toxic, unstable people on social media who may take their insecurities out on those who confidentially express themselves online to feel satisfaction that they aren't the only ones going through struggles. This is harmful for teenagers as they don't know how to balance these immediate emotions and will begin to feel targeted and find the sudden urge to change their looks, clothing style and personality such as who they hang out with and the music they listen to, just to be like these 'prefect' influencers who just like their audience, have the same insecurities by changing their self-identity on social media. As a result, this may cause their self-esteem to deteriorate and may lead to further insecurities such as social anxiety which themselves may also lead to the likes of eating disorders, depression and worst of all, suicide. I think that over time there should be laws which take place that should make it illegal to fake their self-identity on social media as it is promoting unrealistic and unhealthy body standards that their audience don't realise the unforeseen dangers of.