Leigh Stein

If You're Seeing This, It's Meant for You

Amelia

Because I first crawled inside the internet when my parents were getting divorced, I still associated chatting online with splitting my outer self from my inner one, like peeling the rind from the fruit. It was the secret social life I carried on while everyone else was sleep ing. ing. Chatting wasn't like texting, which was efficient yet Superficial. Chatting was long and sinuous, a labyrinth.

On Instagram, I scrolled through the catalog of all the women I had ever known. The younger onesmy former interns, the assistant producers, the social media managers still posted lifestyle content: monochromatic outfits and beverages, female friendships, tablescapes, engagement rings, little treats. They documented the lives they led when they weren't on the clock by imitating the most popular influencers who made a living selling them the lifestyle they were all unconsciously copying. Now that I had more experience on the platform, I could see how homogenous it all looked. How staged for the camera. We thought we were making choices based on our desires, preferences, and values, but really the platforms were driving our behaviors by rewarding us with likes for delivering content that performed.

Maybe it was true what the adults said that the platform wasn't the real world. But it was real enough. You could leave this world for that one without dying. The old people who were so mad that we were spending all our time on the platform weren't giving us a better alternative. Who would choose the real world with all its suffering and humiliations— over a platform that excluded everyone who believed you were wasting your life? This was my life. Everyone on the platform had already bought into the platform. We were in on the joke. The joke was on them. 

If You're Seeing This, It's Meant for You quotes

Join the club